When we woke up we found we were already moored at Wat Hanchey. The monastery here is at the top of the hill, and it was quite a physically demanding excursion. There was no smooth walk off the ship, at the end of the ramp we had to jump onto a steep river bank and follow a rough dirt trail upwards. The incline was steep with some homemade bamboo steps filled with sandbags to get up the steepest bits. Then it was a short ride on a bus to the bottom of the mountain. The trail up to the monastery had been a concrete path at one time, but was in poor repair. By the time I reached the top I was out of breath, but we did have superb views.
Most of the "monks" here are actually children. Believe it or not, education is optional in Cambodia. Children from poor families are often sent off to become monks for a number of years - as the monasteries are places of learning. This little boy was 13 years old and had been at the monastery for 2 years. His parents were divorced and his mother simply didn't have the resources to look after both him and his younger sister. He seemed very happy there though. The monks have only 2 meals a day - breakfast and lunch. Buddha forbade various forms of "enjoyment" but didn't mention things that hadn't been invented yet. So most of the monks enjoy playing on the computer, watching TV (nothing too "sexy" though) and riding around on motorbikes checking their mobile phones. After a tour of the monastery it was time to go down the hill again - but not the same way we came up. Instead there were 300 odd steps straight down with nowhere to stop. My thighs were burning by the time I got to the bottom.
After lunch back on the ship, the afternoon excursion was to a temple and a Buddha Garden. What's a Buddha Garden you ask? Well basically it's an ornamental garden with lots of Buddha statues in it. There are 2 types of Buddhism: Theravada, which is the main one in Cambodia; and Mahayana which is more prevalent in China. They are also known as thin Buddhism and fat Buddhism, because the Theravada Buddha statues show a thin Buddha with a meditative expression, whereas the Mahayana statues are the smiling Buddha with the big belly. When creating this Buddha garden part of the site was found to be a killing field. The main area of the killing field is cordoned off adjacent to the garden, but the bones that were exhumed from the garden site itself are housed in a stupa.
Since this was our last evening on the ship there was a 7 course gala dinner. We've made a lot of friends on this cruise and 10 of us sat together on a large table and had a grand time. Most of us are carrying on to Siem Reap tomorrow for the land portion of the tour, but some people were only doing the cruise. So we were saying goodbye to Lee and Chantelle - 2 Australian ladies who would not be going on to Siem Reap.
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