Worldschool Adventures

Everyone goes to Siem Reap to see the majestic Angkor Wat, but there is so much more to do there if you have the time.  We spent 13 days in Siem Reap and only three of those days were dedicated to the temples.

So what else is there?  Here are our top picks for Siem Reap with Kids:

The War Museum

The War Museum was actually a highlight for our family.  The actual museum part of it was just OK, although the kids really loved seeing all the war machines and guns (me, not so much).  The memorable part of The War Museum was meeting Mr. Soon, one of the free tour guides.  Mr. Soon took us through some of the exhibits while he told us his life story.  Mr. Soon was 10 years old when the Khmer Rouge took over Cambodia. His family fled in fear and were caught by the army. His father was killed. His mother and sister were taken and he never saw them again.   He was taken to an army training camp and was trained to be a soldier.  He fought for the Khmer Rouge in the Killing fields and later in the war against Vietnam.  He lost his leg when he stepped on a land mine during the war with Vietnam. His story was so incredibly sad and moving.  Visiting The War Museum gave our children a glimpse into the atrocity of war from a first hand account. When they touched the guns they understood that those guns actually killed real people. When they saw the land mines on display they understood that those are the same mines that took Mr. Soon’s leg.  This museum gave them a deeper understanding to a difficult subject.

Phare Circus

The name of circus is misleading here. Yes there are acrobatics in the performance but that is the only similarity.  Instead of a true circus I would describe it as performing arts.  The performance that we saw portrayed a powerful story about a young woman who lives through the war.  It was beautifully enacted and I admit I shed a few tears on more than one occasion.  This is definitely worth the money to see ($56US for our family of four), as the profits go to help this NGO put at risk youth through school.

The Land Mine Museum

When we visited there were no guides on duty which was a shame after our learning experience at The War Museum.  We took the self guided tour which meant walking around reading the signs on display.  There were some personal, touching stories from land mine victims and this gave us a glimpse into the lives of the many amputees that we saw in our time in Cambodia.  The money from the admission ($5 per adult) goes to help fund the dismantling of land mines in Cambodia as well as an orphanage for young land mine victims.

Walking Pub Street

Three million tourists a year come to visit Angkor Wat and at some point in their trip most of them will end up on Pub Street.  Restaurant after restaurant line the streets and alleys in the centre of Siem Reap and it is an attraction in itself.  Whether you are looking for a place to eat, a place to drink, or a place to watch all the people, this is the place to come.  It is also, by the way, the place to come if you are looking for fried tarantulas, snakes on a stick, or deep fried crickets.

Eating For A Cause

There are many NGO’s working in Cambodia helping to relieve the poverty of this country.  We saw so many beggars on the streets.  We also learned that the women we saw with young babes asking for help to buy formula were actually a part of a scam. The women have deals with the stores and would return the formula to the store and receive 50% of the money.  We all want to help when we see people in such dire circumstance but giving money to beggars only perpetuates the problem.  One of the ways we found to help was to frequent restaurants that were a part of NGO’s.  Our two favourite places were Marum and Haven.  Both of these places help at risk youth by giving them food, shelter, education, and training in the restaurant business so that they can go on to find jobs in the tourist industry.

If you find yourself in Siem Reap, give yourself time to do more than just the temples and you will be rewarded!

Angkor Wat only recently came onto our list of things we wanted to do with our children.  We needed to do a Visa run from Thailand.  Airfares were expensive to everywhere we looked at so we narrowed it down to either Laos or Cambodia as these are easily reached overland from Thailand.  We weren’t keen on Laos, not that we didn’t like it but because we have been there with the kids already.  So the decision was Cambodia.  We would bus it over from Bangkok and show the children the majestic ruins of Angkor Wat.

I am so glad we made this decision as it has become the highlight of our trip so far.  We ended up buying a three day pass to the ruins for $40 per adult (kids under 12 are free).  There was also an option to do a seven day pass but we felt like after three days (and possibly after one!) the kids would be totally templed out.

We had three full on days of exploring. Each day we spent between six and eight hours in the hot, hot, hot, sun.  We clambered through ruins, climbed their steep stairways, and explored their dark corridors.  Our kids surprised us with their sheer enthusiasm and energy.  The only complaints we got were usually a the end of the day when they were so exhausted they just wanted to get back to the hotel to cool off in the pool.

We learned so much from our time at Angkor Wat.  Much of what we learned we learned from reading our guidebook as we walked through each ruin.  We also hired a guide to take us around the main temple (the one that is actually named Angkor Wat) and learned even more of the history and stories of the Hindu legends that inspired the building of these temples.

Our children were enthralled with the stories of the Angkor God-Kings, their wars, their drive to build bigger and better temples.  They asked questions about the Hindu stories and loved to hear about Vishnu and Shiva, Naga and Garuda.  They interpreted stories from the ancient carvings that line the walls and giggled at the beautiful half naked Apsara dancers who smiled at us everywhere we looked.

We walked through corridors and wondered what it would have been like to live here in its heyday when its inhabitants were said to number one million.  We imagined what it would have looked like in all of its splendour.  We touched the stones and felt the energy of this magical place.  We marvelled at the power of mother nature in the places where she has not yet been pushed back from her slow assault on the temples.

And so my advice to you, if you are ever thinking of making the journey to Angkor Wat, is:

GO!

I thought I had the procedure for the Cambodian border crossing down pat.  I researched all the possible scams for the notorious Poipet border crossing online and researched the different options for transportation.  We decided to go with the new bus route offered by Thailand’s Transport Company Ltd which is government run (buy tickets at Bangkok’s Mo Chit Bus Terminal).  According to my research this is the only reliable bus option that takes you all the way through from Bangkok to Siem Reap thus avoiding the tuk-tuk, fake borders, and taxi scams.

Our bus left Mo Chit station at 8 am and the journey took us 8.5 hours from start to finish.  The bus was comfortable and the ride was smooth. We were given snacks on board (juice, pastry, cookie) as well as a luke warm 7-11 lunch of fried rice.  We avoided the first scam when the bus stopped before the border at a travel agency so we could “conveniently” buy our Cambodia Visas at an inflated price.  Yay us!  We are too savvy to fall for that!  Ha!

Then the bus continued on to the actual Thai-Cambodian border.  We stamped out of Thailand without a hitch.  Next came the rip off.  When I had done my research I had learned that children under 12 are not charged for their visas.  However, when it was our turn to get our Visa’s the border officials claimed that we needed to pay $30 for each of our visas including the children’s.  I argued, saying that children were free and the very stern looking border guard explained that in fact children were only free if they were traveling on their parents’ passports.  Hmm. I faltered.  The border guard stayed his ground and would not budge.  Ummm.  OK then.  I could continue arguing but from the look on the guard’s face I knew he held all the power.  I paid.

After all the kafuffle, another line up where we got stamped into the country and fingerprinted (what?), we had the chance to look at the full page visas in our passports.  Guess what it said on the kid’s visa?

Gratis.

Yup. Those border guards lined their pockets with an extra $60 US from us.

And here I thought I had all my bases covered.