Siem Reap, Cambodia: Today we visited a floating village near Siem Reap called Kompong Khleang. Kompong Khleang is the largest floating village on the Tonle Sap river in Cambodia, with 1,500 houses and 15,000 residents (that’s ten residents per house, on average). The Tonle Sap becomes so large during the wet season that it goes from a river to a lake, so the houses in the surrounding fishing villages are on stilts so that they are above water. We came during the dry season, so all of the houses were suspended in the air, with ladders or stairs descending to the ground; if we had come three months later, we would have been going by boat instead of by foot! We also visited an extension of the village that is further out in the river, where there is still plenty of water, and visited a floating market of people buying and selling fish and fruits and veggies on their boats.
As we wandered around the village lots of little kiddies came out to say hello - or rather to say “bye-bye,” which was the only English that any of them knew. We felt like celebrities!
We took more great pictures than Tumblr would allow, so we switched to Flickr to post this album - one of the advantages is that you can see this slide-show full screen. Once you press play on the slideshow, click the “expand” button on the bottom right! Also once you’re in full-screen, click “show info” to see the captions.
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