After Bayon, Baphuon, and Ta Prohm, we travel by car with a guide along a picturesque road to a canal, which will take us to the aforementioned village, where we pay $30, board a boat, and sail to Lake Tonle Sap.
Usually, everyone is taken to another place. There, people swim in polluted waters among floating structures with houses, chicken coops, piggeries, and all the necessary infrastructure. To the uninitiated tourist, all this is impressive. When he's ready, naked little children with boa constrictors around their necks swim up to him in basins and, of course, ask for money. Then they take him to shops where they sell him crocodile-based products at exorbitant prices. They also trick the tourist into giving him something like "give a handout to the poor children of Tonle Sap Lake" or buying them notebooks, which they then immediately return to the shop.
But I won't take you there. We'll sail to another place.
We boarded a boat and sailed past this structure. If I remember correctly, they were celebrating the king's coronation at the time. That's what all the fuss was about.
This is my happy foot in a sneaker and my knee in the sand. I don't know where I was crawling. It's late afternoon, the sun has softened and is no longer fierce, and my foot and I are together anticipating the sunset on the lake.
This is Zhenya, our guide. He's a famous practicing drummer, by the way.
Somewhere along the way.
It's started. The red one—I think it's the police. But the green one...
This is a secondary school. So when they tell you that children in Tonle Sap don't go to school and all that other nonsense, don't believe them.
The rainy season isn't over yet, and the lake is full of water. During the dry season, some streets become completely dry, allowing you to walk. And then you can see that the piles are sometimes up to 12 meters high.
It all looks pretty neat compared to the floating village.
Those two guys on the poster are the leaders of the opposition party, the Camodian Resque Party. I have genuine dislike for both of them. They're even worse scum than those in power. Incidentally, it's generally accepted that Tonle Sap is populated mostly by illegal Vietnamese immigrants, since you don't have to pay land taxes on the water. It's especially odd to see this sign, given that the CRP's rhetoric is blatantly anti-Vietnamese, and its supporters have repeatedly attempted to stage anti-Vietnam pogroms in Phnom Penh.
Beauty, everything is in bloom. And the pictures!
Life goes on as usual.
For those who wish, there is a guesthouse.
A villager rode home in our boat. The bag seemed to contain a radio.
Adorable little thing.
Closer to the lake there were restaurants.
In one of them we transfer to a boat like this one for 5 dollars.
Source: travel.ru