... "You want Tuk Tuk?" was asked 50,000 times?

You would go insane. The Tuk Tuk to tourist ratio in Cambodia (or Siem Reap at least) must be staggeringly off because there seems to be 10 times more rides available than there are people. Thankfully we found a wonderful kind-eyed man to take us around Angkor Wat today who was nice enough to let us finish our breakfast before he approached our table asking if we needed a ride. See "Patrick" (still not sure what his Khmer name is) below along with our friend Taylor who was able to meet up with us after teaching for a few months in Chang Mai, Thailand.

We had an awesome day seeing 6 of the 15 temples at Angkor Wat - a staggeringly impactful ruin site that dates over 1,000 years old. I was really looking forward to this and it didn't disappoint. The $20 admission and $5 Tuk Tuk ride for the day was well spent - check out some of my favorite photos below.

Sorry I had a hard time narrowing it down...

The genocide that took place in Cambodia only 30-some years ago is still very apparent and begging from those affected (missing limbs, burns, disfigured children) is extremely common and difficult to take in. I bought the book "First They Killed My Father" (which talks about the genocide from the perspective of a 5 year old girl) from a limbless man named Douk on the street who warmed my heart. It's hard to believe that 1.5 to 3 million Cambodians were killed by their own people, the Khmer Rouge, in a Natzi-like takeover. What's harder still is that I was unaware of this before I decided to come to Cambodia. Something is either off in our education or maybe just my understanding of world history. Anna and I have taken on a case to become more informed - googling just about anything we don't know enough about (which is everything). From Communism to Che Guevara to the difference between Holland and the Netherlands to the US' involvement in the Vietnam War, we're slowly working to understand certain events and embarrassed we hadn't deepened our knowledge and broadened our perspectives sooner.

Ah well. Better late than never! Boarding a 6 hour night bus to Phnom Penh soon and we plan on seeing the Killing Fields tomorrow which is one of the labor sites turned grave sites of thousands of Cambodian victims. Preparing ourselves for a darker (but necessary) day. 

... Border crossings weren't so simple?

Little did I know that getting from Bangkok to Siem Reap, Cambodia would be so challenging but doing it solo was a pretty memorable experience. After about an hour of searching near the airport I found a bus to take me to the border of Cambodia but no one could tell me what would happen once I got there. Feeling confident that I could at least get that far, I boarded a tiny mini bus with two other Thais and realized about an hour into the ride how unprepared I was. I had expected to have some Internet access at some point but since I was never able to get on, I couldn't check some pretty crucial details. I was on a four hour bus to enter a new country with absolutely no cash, no idea where Anna was staying, no knowledge of what the money in Cambodia was even called, or what the exchange rate was. I also had no clue how much the visa would cost or if I would even be able to find an ATM.

I imagined getting to the border and being unable to enter - held up by some guards who would berate me for how dumb I had been and having to convince someone to drive me to an ATM for an insane amount of money. Thankfully even that scenario didn't sound too too scary so I just took a nap and decided I'd have to take it as it came.

We arrived in the pouring rain and I spent 20 minutes in a room that looked like a garage with 7 Cambodian guys who only seemed to be interested in one question - not "do you have a visa?" Or "do you have 800,000 riel to pay us?" But.. "do you have a boyfriend?" I was then informed that having a baby with a Cambodian was great for the kid because they'd have dual citizenship. Always good to have that info I guess. I agreed to pay for a shared cab to Siem Reap from a nice Cambodian guy who proceeded to take me all around the border on the back of his motorbike with my giant backpack balanced in his lap. It was my first time on a motorbike of any sort and while I wasn't sure if that was the best option of transportation, it really was the only one I had. 

So I'm on the back of a motorbike with a Cambodian guy in the pouring rain and he's talking on his cellphone. Oddly enough as out of place as I was and how dangerous it all may have seemed, I felt very calm and aware. I hadn't seen a single tourist or non-Thai or Cambodian the entire day and I finally felt like I was truly traveling. My new Cambodian friend carted me around to a place with Internet where I got Anna's hotel information, then to a guy on the street who helped me convert my money - he was shirtless, wearing only a bath towel, sweating profusely, and standing in front of a giant glass case of money. Not you normal bank but I converted some and it all seemed to work out just fine. I made friends with the bath towel man's wife and son and we shared an orange on the street and laughed about our inability to communicate. 

An hour later I was squeezed into a tiny packed corolla on my way to Siem Reap with a family of 6, sharing the front seat with a 20 year old pregnant Cambodian girl who was only 20 years old, sold shoes for a living, and was infatuated with my skin color. After getting my arm rubbed for a few hours, I finally saw signs for Siem Reap and felt relieved but the car ride (which was full of some hilarious very broken English conversations) was cut short when they dropped me off on the side of the road (again in the rain) and told me I had to take a tuk tuk from there. After some intense haggling with a guy in the dark (he was trying to overcharge me and took me to the wrong place) I made it to the hotel and heard Anna's laughter as I walked down the path to the hotel. After 33 hours of travel I was beyond excited to see her and could already tell this trip was going to be quite different. I showered and we went into town with a crew of straggler friends Anna had picked up along the way and had a blast drinking $0.50 beers all night. Hellooo Cambodia!

A few photos...

I made it!!!

Straggler friends from Brazil, Germany, England, Israel and the US out for beers on my first night in!

Tuk Tuk ride today out of the city 

Cute kids playing in the water

My favorite kids in the world

Awesome views despite the rain... the journey begins (again)!

... Bangkok Again?

What a crazy and unexpected last few weeks its been. But guess what? I'm back in my favorite city Bangkok! Fortunately I'm not staying here too long. After 23 hours of travel I'm currently sitting in some obscure part of the airport and haven't seen a non-Thai in a few hours. It's kind of refreshing to be such a minority and oddly freeing to be on my own and somewhat (totally) clueless. 

I just wandered around the airport and talked to about 15 Thai people to try and figure out how to get myself to Cambodia and finally found a bus ticket there. By "bus ticket" I mean handwritten note and by "there" I mean the bus is actually dropping me off at the border and I have no idea how I'll get to Siem Reap to find Anna. Ah well, there's got to be someone who can help me when I'm over there. I just hope Cambodians are as friendly as Thais. 

I'm definitely coming into this round two of the trip with a much different perspective and new layer of confidence. I feel very capable and able to travel on my own but am so excited to see Anna and be with her again - hopefully that will happen soon! She's continued traveling on on her own like a total badass and I couldn't be more proud. I'm just excited to catch up and swap stories with her - I bet hers will be a bit more exciting than mine. But I feel this renewed sense of excitement and also have a better idea of what I want out of the trip - I want to meet lots of new people, hear stories about how others are living their lives and hopefully feel inspired about mine. I also want to work on learning to meditate and remind myself to have fun and enjoy every moment. Small things I guess, but sometimes even those small things are easy to forget so writing them down is a good reminder (plus you all can hold me accountable).

Oh and quick Ellis update in case you hadn't heard: He is doing well after surgery but still has a long road to go with chemo and radiation as the the tumor removed was malignant. Feel free to help support him in these next few months through this fund I set up -- 

Fingers crossed my next update will be something along the lines of "Anna and Evelyn Conquer Cambodia!" More to come...

... Reflecting didn't come easy?

It's hard to feel reflective and figure out how to draw meaning from situations when you're still in the midst of them. That being said, I feel like I'm constantly trying to see the greater picture and figure out why things are happening that are changing me and potentially the course of my life. When my dad passed away I remember a moment where I was able to step away from the deep, unfamiliar, and truly indescribable pain and realize that I could now relate to a whole different spectrum of human emotion. I felt a strange sense of comfort in knowing that that spectrum, and my level of relatedness to others had just grown. I could now understand loss on a different level and relate to an emotion that everyone has to encounter at some point in their lives.

So I've been trying to step away with what's currently going on with Ellis and see the bigger picture - what life lessons are we both learning from all this? Some may take time to reveal themselves, but I think one of the biggest I've learned is that just showing up means the world. I was talking on the phone with my friend Mel about this earlier today and we both agreed that you'll never regret making a compromise to be there for someone. And having been on the other end of the spectrum, it really does mean the world to be the receiver of that support.

The amount of love Ellis has received has been amazing and humbling - his house has been like a revolving door of friends and family driving from all over just to be there with him, even if it's for 5 minutes. Friends from childhood and college, extended family and long lost acquaintances - that's the silver lining. While this situation has been emotional and difficult, the amount of support it's provoked makes you really take a second to think about what's most important and remember to realign priorities in the future.

I'm grateful that I've been able to be here for Ellis as a currently unemployed shmuck hanging out at his house 24/7. Since the surgery, we've heard a lot of positive news from the MRI and are just waiting to received the biopsy results on Wednesday. Once we get more information I'll make a decision about my next steps. If I end up making it back on my adventure with Anna, I'm sure I'll have even more time to think or maybe (hopefully) just get lost in the experience. Because sometimes all this thinking is exhausting.

So that being said, it's time to play my mom in backgammon. All for now.

A photo of me and Ellis when I arrived at the hospital straight from the airport - so relieved