As mentioned in the post Things to do in Siem Reap, this trip to the floating village of Kompong Khleang was another private guided tour organised by the hotel.
We went to the floating village of Kompong Khleang, situated on the shores of Lake Tonle Sap, which is approximately an hour’s drive from Siem Reap. In Kompong Khleang, the road that led us to the boarding area for the boat ride is usually underwater during the wet season, which is at its peak in October. However, during our trip in July, the road was transformed into a marketplace where people sold various items such as toys, food, and fish caught in the lake. People were also smoking fish for personal consumption and for sale. The fish caught in the lake is also often fermented in jars, which allows them to have food all year round, even in the dry season when the lake gets considerably smaller.
Cambodia’s biggest lake, the Tonle Sap Lake, provides the primary source of income and food for the populations of the floating villages. And just like many places around the globe, the quantity of fish in the lake has declined, making life even harder for these communities.
During our boat trip, with a captain no older than 16, we passed by floating houses, fish traps, schools, and Buddhist temples. The boat is the only means of transport here, and you have to slow down every time another boat comes in the opposite direction, or you will end up getting wet.
Before the trip, I had read that there are other floating villages closer to Siem Reap where you can see some scams in which tourists are taken to buy school supplies for the children, and in reality, the items are returned to the stores because it’s all part of a scam. In Kompong Khleang, we had the opportunity to experience the authentic local life without any tourist traps. We got to know the life of the local people as it is and their everyday lifestyle, bearing in mind of course that there are some boats running tours for tourists like us, which also ends up being a source of income for the families.
Visiting a place like this can be a shocking reality check, especially when comparing it to the privileged life we have growing up in a country without war and with all the basic conditions of hygiene and safety.
It was well worth the visit, were we learned more about the history and present-day life of the Cambodian people.
For more information regarding the harrowing and tragic period in Cambodian history under the control of the Khmer Rouge regime (1975-1979), please refer to this source here. This page is from the Documentation Centre of Cambodia (DC-Cam), which is dedicated to investigating and documenting the crimes and atrocities committed during the Khmer Rouge regime.
On the way back to Siem Reap, we stopped at one of the dozens of roadside stalls selling the famous Bamboo Cake. This bamboo cake is simply a rice pudding made with sticky rice and black beans, which is then cooked inside bamboo sticks over an open fire – quite tasty!
Check out other tours to the fishing village of Kompong Khleang at Get Your Guide.
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