We hoped in and off we went, zipping through the traffic and after a quick stop at the bakery we were soon in the Cambodian countryside. Its just like you imagine, dry rice paddies surrounded by thick jungle with a bumpy, half dirt/half paved road cutting through. We passed by run down shack after shack, emaciated cows, fat water buffaloes and kids playing in the creeks.

We passed the time in between staring at the scenery by talking about a hobby we have in common, photography. He showed me some of his pics and they are pretty damn good.

The tour of the silk farm was pretty interesting but short. In this day in age its still hard to believe that anyone still uses wood, hand powered tools to make the silk and weave the garmets.

We woke up our tuk-tuk driver who was napping under a tree and we left the silk farm 45 minutes after we got there. We had the driver take us to the market so Philipp could upgrade his wardrobe with some T-shirts from the market. Traveling as long as he was, its makes sense to buy shirts as you go and just wear them until they are unwearable anymore. It was quite funny to see him bargain with all of the shop clerks to save a Riel here and there but he wouldn’t pay more than 5000 Riel ($1.25) for a shirt.

The key to market shopping in SEA according to Philipp is to know what you should pay. For example T-shirts b/t $1.50 and $2 are ok but the shop owners are immediately going to start with a price of $3 or more. All SEA people see us farangs (whites) as walking bank cards so just be prepared to haggle. A laugh and a ‘No’ usually gets a response of “Ok, how much you pay? For you I discount.” You tell’em what you are willing to pay, or a little less, and it will go back and fourth a few times. If no common ground is reached, just tell’em you’ll come back if you don’t find it cheaper and walk away. The walk-away tactic gets you the price you want to pay (if its reasonable) 8 times out of 10. PW was eventually able to get the shirts he wanted for $1.25 but the best I was able to do was 3 for $4.25 @ the night market.

While haggling can be a pain, you really have to have fun with it. If you smile and are generally having a good time, it will be more enjoyable for both sides. Even though it may seem silly to haggle over a quarter or 50 cents, they generally expect and welcome it, and it does become quite fun.

PW and I moved on back to his guesthouse to compare pics of the silk farm. We both had taken some good shots from what we could tell on the old dim computer screen. I eventually headed back to my place to clean up and we decided to meet for lunch later that afternoon.

A quick stroll around downtown Siem Reap landed us at a back alley place that had my fav Pineapple and pork. Yum! We sat outside and chatted about everything. We talked about the differences in our cultures which covered just about everything including girls, dating, politics, traveling but we spend the most time talking about friends and relationships. PW says he doesnt trust anyone and didnt have any friends back home b/c he can’t trust them. He told me some backstory about some girl cheating on him and some incidents with friends and girls. I guess it struck a cord with me b/c I felt similar when I was his age, 23. Maybe not to his extent. But had a bad break-up with a girl who was cheating and close myself off emotionally to everyone, especially girls. I think I wrote about it before so I won’t rehash it all but it took a harsh but true comment from one of my best friends to snap me out of it.

PW and I talked a long time about friends, trust and life philosophies and it was quite entertaining. We are on 2 opposite ends of the spectrum b/c my friends are one of the most important things in my life and I would do nearly anything for them. He and I went back and forth about this for a while and we even ended up betting $100 that in 5 years he’d think differently. I’m really looking forward to that conversation. You can’t travel as much as he does and not be open minded and welcoming to people. At one point he got up to wash his hands and asked me to watch his bag, when he came back I told him he is already changing. He’s only known me for 2 days and trusted me enough to watch his bag full of camera equipment. We both got a good laugh from that and decided to continue the convo on my guesthouse balcony.

We got some drinks and headed to my guesthouse because it had a decent view. Unfortunately others had the same idea b/c the balcony was full. We ended up crawling out of the window by my room and sat on the roof. We talked about tourism and if it was good or bad but both agreed that it has its plus sides, such as saving the fresh water dolphins and downsides the biggest being the sacrifice of culture and community for the tourism dollar. He and I both sort of saddened as we realized that in 5 years the same thatch/terracotta skyline we were watching the sunset over, probably wouldn’t be here in 5 years. More big hotels would pop up and even overtake the small yard the kids were playing in below us. Its unfortunate.

Over the horizon about 4 blocks away we saw the night market begin to light up and made our way there just to see what was there. Even though all of the markets seemed to have the same touristy stuff we went anyway and I’m glad we did.

I fined tuned my haggling skills and picked up a couple of things for my friends. PW, on an ever going quest for cheap t-shirts got in one of the funniest haggling experiences ever. This old guy was just having a ball with us and it was hilarious. Def. memorable although I’ll never be able to describe it, it just wouldn’t do it justice. I ended up stumbling across this this husband and wife selling paintings. The guy was painting and the woman who spoke decent English was selling his work. There were some beautiful paintings and it was the first time I saw some semi-original works. I ended up buying an oil painting from them. Its a yellowish sky with the silhouettes of a family of elephants walking in line. It stood out to me from the moment I saw the booth full of paintings. I would have loved to buy a larger one but I didn’t want to carry it around for 2 weeks. This one is rolled up in a bamboo tube that barely fits in my daypack anything else would have had to have been shipped back to the States.

We went back to his guesthouse to eat and he wanted to give me a gift. He dug out of his bag a t-shirt he picked up in Vietnam that has Ho chi Minh’s face on it. It surprisingly resembles PW which I found hysterical. It def. won’t fit but maybe I can frame it, it would look cool in Sasha’s room.

We ate and after PW told me his aspirations of buying an elephant in India and riding it to Austria and his bone-carving hobby (don’t forget you’re gonna send me one!) we parted ways but vowed to keep in touch. It was a good day and we are both looking forward to our conversation in 5 years.