Being a touristy town, the floating village on the nearby Tonle Sap lake and river system has been set up (apparently by some enterprising Koreans) as a tourist destination. The people living on a mixture of floating houses and boats are largely ethnic Vietnamese, and the area is interesting for the fact that twice a year the flow of the river changes direction, and the lake level changes dramatically, so the people tow their houses either up the river, or down onto the lake twice a year. Most of the people are fishermen, catching their livelihood on the lake. There are also a few floating shops, schools including a school of Vietnamese orphans, a church, and even a floating basketball court.
Not too sure if it was worth the US$20 each for the village tour by boat - unfortunately that money probably goes straight back to Korea and not into the village itself
Caching! 20 tourists, $20 each...
However, it is amazing to see how the village people live. Kids float by in buckets or washbasins with a paddle. Ladies pull up the the tourist boats selling cold coke and water. Fishermen fix their nets, whole families lying outside in hammocks. We didn't really know what to make of this tourist exploitation, but the villages were obviously very used to having the daily load of tourists ferried up and down outside.
Before visiting the school for Vietnamese orphans, we were "encouraged" to buy them noodles for lunch by our guide.
Someone must have bought them rice earlier
Crocodile farm - seeing this makes you not want to buy that croc leather wallet or bag
Notice the satellite dish? They ALL have satellite TV. How? They use car batteries for their electricity. And in order to charge the batteries, they hook them up to the motor of the big tourist boats which head down the lake from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh, and when the boat comes back your battery is charged.
Genius.
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