There is often a lot of waiting around on the Khmer Project and so we had a bit of a wait for breakfast and then a further wait before setting off on a cycling trip. I was interested to try rice porridge and told Sython about oats later but this was as bland as all rice dishes, nothing of note to report. Otherwise breakfast, at Mum's again, was more hot food including eggs, chicken and fish soup again (which is a local speciality). I asked what happened to leftovers and was told they either eat it cold or it went to the dog. Which did not make me feel any better about the amount of food we had to refuse. There was a lot of it!
Cycling was hot and excellent just as in Mai Chau. We stopped off on the side of a highway at a local market. The grandmother who had been in charge of the rice paddies was there so we greeted her and word started to get around as to who we were. We bought some of her waffle cake ( which was lovely). Cambodians look at you blank faced at first but if you smile they smile back beautifully and immediately, even the toughest sorts. And the kids are wonderful, all saying 'hello'! We bought some delicious peach fritters. They do banana and apple fritters here too that are fantastic but these were the best. We continued along the highway for a bit getting covered in red dust before turning right down a track/side road. Saw some beautiful homesteads, trees, buffalo etc as we went along. Pedalled into a huge pagoda ( removing hats) and ou the other side.
Eventually we arrived at Roka primary school. This school has a huge Buddha statue AND a pre-Angkorian ruined temple in the playground. So we played a bit. The children were waiting to start school ( it was only 9am) and were playing hard. We watched one game for a while which involved four or five of the boys grabbing one girl out of a group and the girl having to fight them off. It looked awful at first but the girls often triumphed and when they did there was much celebrating from her group. In the end I thought it was quite a useful sort of game!
The pre-Angkorian temple was fantastic, just sitting there in the playground in all it's ruined glory, gradually crumbling. Apparently it's been surveyed and they are pretty sure some of the stones etc have been 'recycled' in the community over thousands of years. The decoration and iconography indicates it to be just pre-angkorian, possibly 11th century. We also had a look at the Buddha who was huge and concrete and gold, flanked by two large gold horses. And weeds and a rubbish strewn crater. Most schools in Cambodia are associated with pagodas. Pagodas all have walls. They even go to the trouble of building the walls off the ground in the middle of a field if necessary. Possibly this accounts for all those wild, walled areas of nothing I had previously seen in Vietnam too, though those walls were generally less elaborate.
We also messed around in the classrooms, I got the children to all say 'susdedai' in unison. Surprisingly I was the only one who tried, I had thought Herman would have had a go but he just wandered in and out of the rooms taking pictures. The kids were very rural and very unused to photos at first, especially the younger ones. We were there for about two hours. Sython had an iced drink from a bicycle seller who I think he knew. The man produced an ice block and wooden block and scraper from the box on the back of the bike and shaved off slivers of ice for the drink, before adding some hideously coloured goo over the top, just like a slushie. Could have been in New York! But instead in the middle of really, nowhere.
We cycled home for a lie down on the table followed by lunch and further lie down (in hammock, bliss!) until the minibus arrived. This one driven by Sython's other brother, greeted with a laugh and a joke (I think about having a pee as he got out). We were given some waffle cake made by Sython's Mum to go home with, in the heat though you just don't want to eat! We also had a last minute snack of some sticky black seed that falls ripe and is eaten as is from the tree in huge pods. It wasn't bad and wasn't cinnamon is all I can say! The minibuses are like long distance taxis here and take parcels and news up and down the highways. They are always greeted by groups of young men at every stop, eager for ...something! It was a relief to have a shower on return home but it was a fantastic trip.
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