Day 2: Exploring

While waiting for the remaining groups to arrive, we had a day free just to explore. Savvy entrepreneurs in Siem Reap have come up with all kinds of ways to make a living from tourists. At the market in the morning, Laura and Carlos even paid for a fish pedicure: "Please feed our hungry fish your dead skin," the sign invited.

Laura and Carlos get a fish pedicure. (Photo by Miranda Beranek)

Next we toured a silk farm operated by Artisans Angkor. Artisans Angkor provides young people with vocational training in traditional Cambodian arts and then employs them in several workshops that produce high-quality textiles, artwork, jewelry, and ceramics.

I held a silkworm!

We witnessed all the stages of producing a hand-crafted silk scarf:

Mulberry leaves are grown on the farm to feed the silkworms (which are moth larvae). When they are twenty-five days old, the silkworms spin cocoons from a single strand of yellow silk. The cocoons are soaked in hot water and unwound by hand; strands from a number of cocoons are twisted together to form a single string. 

Photo by James Sprenger

Then the strings can be knotted, dyed, and woven into beautiful, intricate patterns. We watched workers weave thread by pushing a pedal and passing a shuttle back and forth across the silk threads. It takes sixteen hours of weaving to create a single silk scarf. That really helped put the prices in the gift shop into perspective.

Photos by James Sprenger

After lunch we visited the Angkor National Museum, where we saw many stone carvings and learned about the country's history.

Water lily courtyard at the Angkor National Museum

By the time we returned to the hotel, the Singapore group had arrived. A student from there named Henry was interested to hear what Americans thought about President Trump, and what we predicted would result from his upcoming meeting in Singapore with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Henry said that if he were at home, he might be called upon to provide security for the historic meeting. Each male citizen of Singapore is required to give two years of national service between the ages of eighteen and twenty-one and to serve as a reservist thereafter. Henry spent his two years working as a firefighter and is now eligible to be called back into service for events such as the meeting between Trump and Kim. It's fun to get to learn about the cultures of our GEN partners as well as our host country.

I was also glad to be sitting by Henry at dinner, so I could imitate his use of the silverware. Cambodians (and apparently also people in Singapore) eat from a spoon held in the right hand, pushing food onto it with a fork held in the left. There are so many little customs like this that are different when you travel across the world.

Dinner at the Memoire Siem Reap hotel

At the end of the night, the hotel bartender brought out one of his special drink concoctions, to replace a drink one of us didn't like. The new drink was made with apple juice, rum, coconut, and mint. Yep--coconut and mint. They were not flavors any of us would have thought to combine. And although it's not a flavor combination we'd like to try again, how would we know without taking a sip?