Day 111-112: Transit to Siem Reap & Silk Farm

After another long, boring, and hungry bus journey (damn these buses giving you 2 minutes every time they stop), we finally made it to Siem Reap, neighbor to Angkor Wat.

We got there quite late and decided to take it easy on our first day in Siem Reap. We figured we would just explore the town and see what it had to offer. As I perused my Lonely Planet, I found a company that supports local artisans. They give you free tours around their facility and give you a 3 hour free tour over to a Silk Farm.

Silk Farm? Nope. Never been to one of those! I always love my Mr. Roger's Neighborhood factory tours. We're totally in! It's a place called Artisans D'Angkor. Apparently during the time of Khmer Rouge, a lot of traditional arts and crafts got executed along with the people. This place is trying to bring it back. They participate in all traditional crafts and even work on bigger pieces, such as the restoration of Angkor Wat sculptures or any commissioned pieces for places such as the airport.

Anyway, so here is what we learned about silk what from the silk farm!

1. Silk worms love mulberry leaves. Apparently eating anything else gives them indigestion. 
2. They kill the silk worms for the silk! It seems so logical, but for some reason, I just figured the silk was more like Charlotte's Web, but for silk worms. Not the case. 
3. They keep 20% of the ugly silk moth's for reproduction. 
4. Silk moths cannot fly, which seems all a bit pointless if I was trying to escape a silk farm.
5. The silk actually comes from the silk worm's cocoon. 
6. Each cocoon has both raw silk and fine silk.
7. There is some difference between tie-dye color and the pattern. I do not know what. 
8. There are a lot of stages that are involved to pull the silk from the cocoon and put it on a spindle. 
9. They do not pay these women enough. Or do they? Hard to say. $5 a day. What do you think? 

It was incredibly cool and interesting. I'd put it up there with visiting a tea plantation. 

We spent the rest of the evening trying to crack a $100. Here in Cambodia, the ATMs dispense USD. They also charge a $5 fee; however, if you withdraw more than $100, you get big notes. Here, everything costs $1.00. You feel like a real deutsche if you buy something for that little and give $100 - that's if they can even break it. We went to pay a t-shirt guy and had agreed on $3.00, but when we said we only had $2.15 or a $100, he just gave it to us for $2.15. Who'd have thought that negotiation tactic would work! After a few beers (where they cracked our $100), we called it an early night! 

Time for some temples!