A Trip To Cambodia

This summer my family and I took on the adventure to go to Cambodia – A trip back to the roots of my wife (Sophal Strupler).

We spent 16 days watching, learning, traveling, enjoying this beautiful country. Here is my recap of this unforgettable trip!

The Borderline

I could not hold my tears back as I was walking just a few feet behind my wife. The short walk from the plain to the terminal in Siem Reap was legendary. It was the first time Sophal is back to Cambodia after her adoption with 6 month.

We held our kids closely and let the atmosphere take our family back in time. It seemed as if we have been here before, but only in our dreams and imaginations. Almost unreal! As we gave our papers to the customs officer, it became clear – Sophal was not easily let into the country. It took us 15 min. of questions and answers until the officer was convinced that she was adopted and has no connection to any relatives there. I felt weird and did not understand the problem this presented.

Finally, after checking with the officers supervisor we were let to the immigration counter. There I understood the magnitude; the Kingdom of Cambodia had an incredible corrupt history and it’s still present today. The immigration officer made it very clear, that I needed to give him money in order for him to let me through and give us our passports back. So I did, and entered Cambodia with feelings of excitement, frustration and tremendous gratitude.

I am glad to be here with my family. This trip will not only lead us to my wife’s origins, but unite us as a family more than ever.

Ancient Identity

Waking up to a tropical rain in a foreign culture has it’s excitement. The morning drive to the Angkor Wat with the Tuk Tuk was fun. Watching families with up to 5 members ride a single motorbike is thrill. If this would be legal in my country, I would sell our car in a heartbeat.

The Angkor Wat captured my attention in a second. The beauty, the timeless design and incredible architecture is mind-blowing. I took well over 500 photos of the thousand year old rocks that where put together to create a spectacular place of ancient worship.

It stunned me, how dedicated people can get, if led with a visionionary and a passionate leader like the “god-king” Suryavarman II to build this legendary temple.

The Angkorian period spans more than 600 years from AD 802 – 1432. This incredible period of history saw the construction of the temples of Angkor and the Khmer empire consolidate it’s position as one of the great powers of Southeast Asia.

Almost all of these glory times have passed for the Cambodian people. Still, I felt great respect and honor for the people living here today. It seems, as if everyone still has a sense of the old Kingdom inside. On every Cambodians face you can see a true and honest smile – the smile of ancient Identity and pride.

I am blessed to be here.

Family Value

Our kids filled a whole suitcase of toys to give to Cambodian kids before we left home (It was the suitcase with overweight).
Today, they could give some toys to our Tuk Tuk drivers 3 kids. He is 40 and his kids are between 3 and 8 years old.

Our Tuk Tuk driver drove us to experience the Bayon temple. I am still very impressed with the ancient temples here in Siem Reap. Standing inside the Bayon temple gave me a feeling of being watched from all sides. The beautiful stone faces are looking at every angle of this mystical place.

The feeling of belonging is essential to the Cambodian people. The family value is central to this culture. Everwhere you look, families are sitting together to eat, play and talk. At the local market, families run the business together.

Life centers around family.

It was no surprise, that our Tuk Tuk driver brought us to his extended family restaurant for lunch, after we asked him for a tip on a good and inexpensive place to eat.

Family values are life giving to the Cambodian lifestyle.

I feel it’s fueling our unity as a family by just being around these people.

Simple Life

After a little breakfast at the near by Silk Lounge we headed out with the little hooded carriage towed behind a Motorcycle — aka tuk tuk.

Today we want to see the famous floating village of Chong Kneas.

The tuk tuk ride to the boat docks took 25 minutes. There a teenage boy with his 7 year old brother took us out to see this amazing place — a town on the water. A town with shops, restaurants and schools, a complete functioning little village where people live the simple life.

It looks like a harmonic community of simplicity. No rent, no noise of trucks and trains, just little boats that pass with slow tempo. I felt as if I was entering  a timeless space, where life is simple. Providing food for the family seems to be the only task of the day. Men are fishing, women are doing the “boat” chores and playing with their small children.

I was surprised to see TV sets on most of the boats. I guess the simple life involves watching TV even on a remote place, like the middle of the lake somewhere in Cambodia.

We enjoy the simple life — even if it sometimes feels so complicated.

That evening we spent watching traditional Cambodian dancing. It was truly an amazing experience to see the traditional dance. In comparison to Latin or other dances it seems pure and shameless.

Another wonderful day in Cambodia — life is simple!

Danger!! Mines!!

Our tuk tuk driver drove us to the distant temple called Banteay Srei. An ancient Hindu temple with amazing carvings. It was so hot, that we didn’t stay very long. But long enough to shoot some spectacular photos.

On the way back we stopped at the Cambodian LANDMINE Museum. The museum showed the big mine problem Cambodia is dealing with. Everyday hundreds of mines are discovered and dismantled.

The Man that runs the museum was raised in an army camp with other children after his parents where killed by the Khmer Rouge. He received his first weapon when he was 10 years old. His story is unbelievable and gave me goosebumps despite the tropical climate.

He still dismantles mines everyday and runs an orphanage for mine victims with his uncle that used to be his enemy on the battlefield. On some days he will find and dismantle 200-300 land mines.

His dedication to clear Cambodia of land mines is impressive. We could not leave without donating money to help.
It was hard walking through this little outdoor museum trying to explain to my kids why people hide these deadly mines that could stay active for over 100 years. As we drove away, we spent a long period in silence. The brutal and evil doing of humans was overwhelming.

On the ride home we started to sing songs and wave at people standing along the road.
We desire to bring joy, love and hope to this country and it’s people that have gone through so much pain.

Road Trip

Today’s program was the 5-6 hour ride from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh.

It’s very easy to buy a ticket for a bus, mini van or privat taxi. It’s not so easy finding the best price. The bus ticket costs US$ 6-9 depending on the quality of the bus and if it has a toilette on board. A mini van is between US$ 9-12. A taxi is as expensive as you want it to be. It took me 4 ticket shops to get the price down from US$ 18 to 13.

In Cambodia nearly everything is negotiable!

The adventure starts when you get out of Siem Reap. In Cambodia all activity center around the main road from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh. Left and right are houses nearly the whole 300km.

The road is the  modern day battleground. You have to know, that there are no traffic laws enforced. The locals call it freedom, I call it anarchy!

Everyone fights for a space on the road. The majority traveling the roads are motorbikes with up to 5 people on it. Some carry 3 giant pigs or wood that spans 4 times the size of the bike. It seams like helmets are something they heard about or saw on television.
Cars, trucks, buses and mini vans fight the center of the road by honking the horn.
Bicycles ride the very edge of the road. They are very wobbly, because of the rubble and the one or two people sitting on the back or front.

Tuk Tuk’s are mainly in the city, so the are not very common in the countryside. But you’ll see two oxen pull a carriage at a very slow tempo. It’s like a roadblock!!!

That’s not challenge enough for our high speeding taxi (TOYOTA Camery). Our driver always has his eyes open for the unexpected cow or dog that could run across the road.

And then, there are the pedestrians, they travel in packs and play as they go.

Our driver used his horn more than the break traveling up to 120 km/h.

One thing is for sure: A road trip in Cambodia has it’s thrills.

Inhuman Regime

Today we took a look at one of the bloodiest places on the planet.

The Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum.

On April 17, 1975 Pol Pot turned a High School into a prison for interrogation and inhuman torture called S-21.

The imprisonment lasted 2-4 month. Political prisoners were held between 6-7 month. Everyone was killed after the confession.

The Khmer Rouge killed about 20’000 from 1975 – 1979 in the S-21.

Walking through this place of horror was too much for my wife. She had to sit down after 3/4 of the tour and cry her heart out. The possibility of her parents being tortured in this prison was to much to bear.

As I continued the rest of the way, my son was grabbing my hand harder and harder. His face showed pure shock and disgust. As we exited the place we all sat down in tears and cried.

We couldn’t understand — what makes people do evil things like that?

As we sat in tears — the thankfulness for Sophal’s adoption was overwhelming.

Life Giving

This morning we visited the “New Life Fellowship” in Phnom Penh.
A life-giving church with many social activities in Cambodia.

It’s so good to see, that there are people that bring hope, peace, love and faith to this hurting country.

Today was not only the national birthday of Switzerland, but also the birthday of my wife Sophal.

She celebrated her birthday in Cambodia for the first time after 37 years. It truly was an amazing day today being here in Cambodia.

Street Kids

We visited a local “Street Children Transformation Center”.

Or kids brought 5 plastic bags of toys to the 30 children in the center. It was an incredible experience to see the happy faces. It was like Christmas!

We played with the kids and had a lot of fun.

As we drove home our kids said how good they have it and how much they like to share what they have.

The joy of giving!!!

Watch this video

Village People

We started out with a boat 3 hours up the Tonle Sap River. As we landed on a remote riverside, village kids came running to greet us. We took all our toys and started out on bicycle going from village to village. We passed out toys, played games and talked to the people living in little wooden houses along a dirt road.

Two young men followed us around and helped us with translation.

One of the guys told me that his parents had to sell 2 Oxen in order to buy a motorbike for him. This makes it possible for him to study in Phnom Penh (2 hour ride). He rents a room in a Orphanage during the week and wants to become a tour-guide.

As we went back on board we talked about the different lifestyle. Our fast paced and online connected life is as normal to us, as the 2-3 sleeping times during the day and simple life of these village people.

After eating a big river fish we went to sleep on the open-air deck and enjoyed the not so quiet Cambodian night — somewhere along the Tonle Sap.

Social Media

Yesterday night we went out with Barbara & Koni Schwaz and a small group from World Vision to meet with street kids in 2 places.

A 10 year old boy was explaining to a group of kids basic soft skills, like using the toilette, washing hands and drinking only clean water… Another boy was tending to the wounds of street kids.

It was impressive to see how kids that used to be on the street now help others. Sophal brought baby cloths to the little onesthat where running around naked. It was a moving night in downtown Phnom Penh.

It was a great experience for our family!
Today we visited a local business that started 4 month ago called WEB ESSENTIALS. Sophal and I were invited to speak. I did a Social Media Workshop and Sophal talked out her adoption and moving life story.

We enjoyed meeting these 25 new Cambodian friends that work in this new company. I was surprised, that everyone was on facebook.

After we left, the social activity on facebook exploded and now we have 25 new facebook friend from Cambodia.

We enjoyed helping in this simple and practical way.

Kantha Bopha

Today we spent time searching for the hospital ( Kantha Bhopa ) where Sophal was dropped off as a baby. We drove to 3 places, till we found the right one.

Things have changed in 37 years!

Sophal explained to the guard at the entrance what her story was, but he did not understand any English. Finally a nurse came that spoke some English and asked us to come back on Monday.

We are looking forward to get a tour of the place Sophal was placed for 3 months. — After being placed at the hospital, she never got collected from her parents – then she was adopted by her Swiss parents.

After all this time — it’s still moving to be in the place where it all began.

Food Heaven

Today is our last day in Cambodia and I still have not written anything about food.

I would call Cambodia “Food Heaven”.

The variety of different foods, seems endless.

You can have the original Khmer cooking with meat that is freshly grilled on the table. Of course you can choose between different meats. Most common is chicken, beef, pork of frog.

Rice goes with every order! Rice goes with everything!

I think you can even order ice cream with a bowl of rice.

A Khmer snack is a fried spider, grasshoppers or bug.

The cambodian kitchen is not as hot as the Thai, yet still very similar.

If you take a ride trough Phnom Penh you can choose from Swiss, Spanish, Greek, French, Italian, Vietnamese, Thai, Chinese, Korean, Indian, American or Khmer restaurants. Almost every place is a ” food heaven”.

The price for a meal starts with US$ 1. Of corse you will find a place where you can pay 10 times as much, for the same meal. When it comes to the service, there is a lot of  room for improvement. The Khmer culture is so polite that if there is a misunderstanding you’ll always get a nice smile, but never know if they understood what you just said.

Half of the population in Phnom Penh is under 18 and because of it’s terrible history many are not well educated.

Over all — Cambodia is a country with a lot of potential. Things are looking up and the people are lovely. It’s also called the country of many smiles.

I don’t think this was the last time we were here!

Check out all the Photos in HQ on Flickr.