A+

So it was like groundhog day this morning...waking up before the crack of dawn, 500 am to be exact so we could attempt, yet again, to see the sunrise over Angkor Wat. Our tuk-tuk driver from last night, Chenda, agreed to pick us up at this ungodly hour and in fact, for $25 USD we hired him to be our personal driver today.



He picked us up on time and we climbed in the wooden and precarious attachment to his motorbike. It had comfortable seats (which was good b/c my butt is soooo sore from riding on that ancient bike yesterday!), and he even covered us up with a blanket...good thinking Chenda, it was cold!!!



We got to Angkor Wat and almost immediately were attacked by the mob of the people and most disturbingly little children...trying to sell us stuff...we watched the sun rise over Angkor Wat, a beautiful site...one that we missed yesterday b/c it was so cloudy. We had a cup of coffee and breakfast at one of the stands alongside the lotus pond.

Then we saw the rest of the temples fast-forward! They are all so amazing but we didnt' have much time to spare. We hit our favorites a second time and then had Chenda take us to his favorites...they are all just incredible. It's so cool to think that they were built so long ago...and that they're still holding up despite people climbing all over them! I'll write more detail about each one later when I get my pictures up because you really have to see them to know what I'm talking about...

On the way out of the temples, Chenda stopped by the monkeys once again :) This time Hadas tried to hand me a granola bar to feed them and they tried to attack her! She almost ran right in front of a moving tuk-tuk to get away from them! They just came out of the woodwork...in fact, once we climbed out of our tuk-tuk they climbed inside! They were on the roof, on the wheels, everywhere...the monkeys were definitely they highlight of Cambodia for me ;)

Chenda then drove us to the Cambodia Children's Hospital which is experiencing an epidemic of dengue fever. Dengue is a hemorrhagic fever transmitted by mosquitos and is similar to ebola virus although less virulent. THere is no vaccine, no cure. Basically you have to hope that your body is strong enough to fight it off and since it's a hemorrhagic fever most victimes require multiple blood transfusions. We decided to donate blood at the hospital...it was really easy. We told the guard we were interested and he walked us right into the lab. There we were greeted by 2 really sweet Cambodian nurses. They made us fill out a form, pricked our fingers with the edge of a sterile razor and checked our blood types...apparently I'm A+, I knew it ;) Then they instructed us to lie down on the cots. They inserted an enormous (but sterile) needle into my left arm and left it there for the entire blood draw!!! Very different from the states! I had to stay really still but aside from the initial prick it was no big deal. Afterwards they gave each of us a soda and a goodie bag which included a t-shirt, sticker, box of crackers and a little baggie of enough vitamins and iron to last us 7 days...all in all was a great experience and made me feel good about being able to give something back to such a poor country...

Then we went downtown, booked our flight to Bangkok...had a traditional Khymer lunch similar to curry with lots of veggies and spices for $2...then I went off on my own to explore Siem Reap while Hadas treated herself to a massage...while we were split up apparently the town experienced an all out power outage...everyone seemed to act like it was no big deal, like it happens all the time...

We met up and wandered around the night market for a 2nd time...it was really slow...not many customers once again. We then stopped by to pick up our laundry and Chenda picked us up at 6. We ran back to our hotel to check out and re-pack our bags and then Chenda took us on the backroads to get us to the airport...Cambodia is a great country...it is really poor though and its very sad to see the living conditions the people live in. I would definitely like to go back there again...but for now, moving onto Thailand!