Cruise – Day 6 – Khmer Farm and Pottery Village

Cruise – Day 6 – Cambodian Pottery Village

Well rested after our exciting first day on the Jahan, we are ready to get out and explore more of Cambodia.  Today our first excursion took us to a traditional Cambodian Temple, and village.

On the way to dropping anchor and getting on the excursion boat I decided to take some pictures of the various structures and boats along the river. Here we pass one of the Vietnamese floating river houses that line the Mekong river even on the Cambodian side.  The Vietnamese government has an agreement with the Cambodians to not evict the Vietnamese settlers.  Interesting woven grain storage in the fields.

I enjoyed watching the different types of boat traffic that ply the river.  All of the people that we passed were extremely friendly, and it was a blast photographing them

It was really amazing the cargo that could be carried on their boats as well,  Here is a family transporting their bike.

Arriving at the pottery village here is a stack of finished product.

One of the things I loved about Cambodia is that nobody seemed to have any problems with you taking their picture, here is one of the village boys by an ox cart.

Here is one of the village women working on a fresh pot.  She had just recently given birth to a baby girl, and already back at work.

This kid kept taunting his sister until she was in tears.

Here is her older and wiser brother giving her comfort.

The other product the village made as coconut sugar, here we see a villager climbing the tree to retrieve the coconut.

This woman is adding water to the coconut mash in the distilling process.  To make coconut whiskey.

“Toil Toil Boil Bubble…”

Again, there was always a villager happy to have their photo taken.

This was a purse made out of two coconut halves, and some hinges.  Surprisingly it even had a zipper.

Here is Mi Jung modeling the latest in Khmer fashion.

Further down the road we come to a pottery factory that was built by a Japanese company.  Here the clay is fashioned using foot powered lathes.

The finished clay is then glazed before being put in a kiln

On our way back to the boat, we walked through the local street market.  Which as you might image was very strange for us westerners used to convenient things like refrigeration.

Here is some freshly cut fish, being tended to by the local flies.

A woman selling meat.

This little Piggy went to market, and never came home.

Here is some western style clothing for sale, the Despicables.

We then head back to the boat for a shower, rest, and lunch before the afternoon excursion.

The afternoon excursion consists of visiting an English elementary school, sponsored by Heritage Line, the company that runs the cruise. Then we get to ride in an authentic Ox Cart to a Lotus fiend, then back to the ship for a party on shore.

We come on shore by boat to visit the school, and are seemly met by 2 children playing hookey, In reality because there is such a shortage of teachers, and too many students. The students are broken up into two groups. One group goes to class in the morning until noon, while the second group comes in the afternoon. Each for 4 hours of instruction Monday – Saturday.

Here is a picture of the class, and following western education logic you put the child with vision problems in the back.

Here is one of the young teachers, which work at the school.

The students sang the Hokey Pokey for us, and we left to ride traiditional Cambodian Ox Carts to a Lotus Flower field.

Everyone loved the traditional Ox Cart ride, and somewhere along the way I commented to Mi Jung, that I am sure her mother rode in an Ox Cart sometime during her child hood in Korea.  Here Mi Jung and are being followed by the police!  I don’t think we were speeding.

After the Ox Cart Ride, we went back to the boat, and got ready for our evening bon fire. The crew got our and played Shuttle Cock, which Mi Jung played with them, and did a pretty good job.

The game looked kind of like hacky sack, but you kick this strange dead fish looking things between the people in the group trying not to let it touch the ground.

Here Mi Jung is trying to climb a tree, which the crew assured her was safe and would not break. Of course when I tried it, the ladder promptly broke!

After the BBQ it is time to head back to the ship and get ready for tomorrows excursions.
Thanks for visiting, and please come back to continue following our South East Asian adventure.

Thanks for visiting, and come back soon to continue to follow our South East Asian adventure!