Raining Heads

Trusting Evil Twin Sister fully with my life, I did not even bother to check on the list she gave of sites we were going to see in Siem Reap.

So after the etherial walk into the Banteay Srei, we proceeded to our next stop, Kbal Spean.

Going on a backpacking trip, I naturally decided to bring only two pairs of shoes, my slim sole Chuck Taylor, and my even slimmer sole Fila espadrilles.  Lightweight, easy to tuck in my bag.  That day, I had Chuck on.

We entered the protected area, I still unmindful of what was in store for me.  Probably borne by the fact that I always want to be surprised.  Or probably because I was mindset that this was going to be another ancient temple.  I let ETS talk to Sam, our guide, because I could feel blood coagulating in my sinus.  I was just clicking away indiscriminately.

We started to walk into the forest.

I see more and more rocks.

We were uphill all the way.

I decided to listen into the conversation.  It was then that I realized that it was going to be 1.5-km or so climb to a water reservoir.

There were tricky parts where I almost fell to certain death.  My shoes were designed for malls, and parks, and catwalks, not for mossy, slippery rocks!  And ETS was in her hiking shoes.

"It was an awful waste of time!", I heard a skinny snooty European girl say on her way back.  Her group's horrified tour guide could not do anything but take in all the rant.  At the back of my mind, if indeed it was just a water reservoir at the end of it all, maybe she's right.

After a few more slips and lung breaks, we finally got there.

And it was not an awful waste of time!  Yes, it would have been just another quiet stream if not for the series of carvings on the sandstone formations in the river bed and banks.  These are button-like carvings called Lingas.  Lingas, if you should know, are phallic symbols of Hindu god Shiva.  Phallus means an erect p_n_s!  The river is known as "The River of a Thousand Lingas".  Talk about sausage fest! Ahahahaha!

Seriously, though, the Hindus believe that water is sanctified by the lingas over which it flows.  The same water eventually flows into the Tonlé Sap Lake after passing through the plains and the Angkor temple complex  Aside from the lingas, other sculptures of Hindu mythology can be found everwhere.


After a much needed revitalization, thanks to a Cambodian delicacy similar to our local "suman", but this one with banana stuffing and a can of Carabao energy drink, I guess their version of Red Bull,

we headed back after freshening up first in a nearby water falls... 

where we met Yvonne and Gaeai, two travelers who were leisurely basking in the cool waters of the falls.  We learned that they had been in Siem Reap since November 2010 and no plans yet to leave.

Now, that's a vacation!