Bangkok to Angkor Wat

I got to Bangkok the 17th and stayed 2 days, but honestly I didn't do all that much. I felt like it's a great city if you like shopping, drinking or lady boys, but those aren't exactly my favorite pursuits... The highlight for me was Wat Pho. The day I went, there were hardly any visitors so I just wandered around the maze of courtyards. Eventually I got to the sanctuary with the world's biggest reclining Buddha, a giant, gold-leafed Buddha with a cheeky grin. You can pay 20 baht for a bowl of little coins, which you drop one by one into a row of about 50 pots all along the wall. Throughout the whole temple you can hear the "plink plink" sound of coins.

I got to Cambodia 3 days later and my first impression wasn't great. The border crossing town Poipet is basically a crappy version of Las Vegas, and everywhere people are trying their hardest to scam you. It was really difficult to know who to trust, but thankfully I had met two Italian guys (Marco and Paolo) on the bus over, so we stuck together and managed to get through. We couldn't get out of the 100 baht ""processing fee" though... Also the 34 C weather and 60% humidity made me want to lie down in an ice bath and die. By the time I actually got to Siem Reap (the town right by Angkor Wat), I was hot, cranky, and exhausted.

However, I ended up really enjoying the place. I met up with a flagship friend and his fiance, and we were temple trekking every day. The Angkor temples are beautiful, and even though I've gotten all the names mixed up, I have a lot of photos of intricate stone carvings, weathered stone faces, and jungle trees splitting apart entire stone foundations. Other than the incredible heat, I enjoyed every minute and even gotten used to being constantly sweaty and covered with red dust. The pace of life is very slow, and I miss the midday naps, reading during the afternoon rainstorms and 50 cent banana pancakes at night.