Revisiting Siem Reap

If you have never been to Angkor Wat you would probably underestimate how absolutely huge it is. The ancient temples sprawl out forever. Angkor Wat is about 5 km from Siem Reap, where I stayed for about a week. It seems like years ago but it was only about five months ago. So I'm sitting in this beautiful Hindu temple, kilometres from any other human soul, until I see two people approaching in the distance.

Nooo! I think. These people are going to ruin my solitude!

But then I met them, and they were these lovely Americans. We had a really interesting conversation and talked about photography and India... and Cambodia.

I recently saw some photographs that Katie Beth Gill took of Siem Reap, which despite what you might read on Wikipedia, is one of the poorest provinces in Cambodia. It was savaged by the Khmer Rouge, like the rest of the country, and survives off the thriving tourism industry that Angkor Wat provides.