Cambodia Fact File
Country name: Conventional long form: Kingdom of Cambodia. Conventional short form: Cambodia. Local short form: Kampuchea
Area: total: 181,040 sq km
Terrain: Mostly low, flat plains; mountains in southwest and north
Population: 13.5 million
Age structure: 0-14 years: 37.3%, 15-64 years: 59.7%, 65 years and over: 3.1%
Life expectancy at birth: Total population: 58.87 years male: 55.92 years female: 61.96 years
Ethnic groups: Khmer 90%, Vietnamese 5%, Chinese 1%, other 4%
Religions: Theravada Buddhism 95%, other 5%
Literacy: Definition: age 15 and over can read and write total population: 69.4% male: 80.8% female: 59.3% (2002)
Capital: Phnom Penh
Languages: Khmer (official) 95%, French, English
Government type: Stable multiparty democracy under a constitutional monarchy established in September 1993
International airports: Phnom Penh & Siem Reap
Currency : Riel (US$1 = 4000 Riel) - US$ are used for most transactions with Riel used as small change.
Climate
Cambodia has four seasons.
1. November to February, cool and dry.
2. March to May, hot and dry.
3. June to August, hot and wet.
4. September to October, cool and wet.
The hot season rarely reaches above 35C and the cool season may go as low as 20C. The monsoon rains follow a regular pattern of 1 to 3 hours of rain in the afternoon making them easy to plan around. Dry season can be dusty and in the wet season the countryside becomes spectacularly green.
Siem Reap facts
Siem Reap is the tourist capital of Cambodia due to the magnificent temples of Angkor. This means that the town has many bars, restaurants, ATMs, internet cafes and hotels catering to foreigners' needs. The major economy in Siem Reap town is tourism although Siem Reap province remains one of the poorer provinces of Cambodia. It is estimated that one third of Cambodia's population lives on less than one $US dollar per day. Siem Reap has colonial and Chinese-style architecture in the Old French Quarter and around the Old Market. In the town, there are Apsara dance performances, craft shops, silk farms, rice-paddy countryside, fishing villages and a bird sanctuary near the Tonle Sap Lake. The name Siem Reap actually means "Thais defeated" in reflexion of the many times that the Khmer people re-took the Angkor temples from the expanding Thai kingdom. The town is situated on the north east edge of the largest fresh water lake in South East Asia, Tonle Sap Lake, whose rich resources supported the construction of the temples of Angkor.
The area around the old market provides a lively night life, especially along the aptly named "pub street". Siem Reap provides for all tastes, with worldwide cuisine from Thai, Mexican, Indian, Japanese, Italian as well as menus catering to western tastes. There are quiet cafes, lively bars and nightclubs.
Bars - more than 70
Restaurants - more than 180
Plenty of markets, stores and street vendors selling souvenirs, textiles, clothes, food, appliances and just about anything you will need.
Emergency services - there are many health clinics with doctors and pharmacies around the town for minor ailments. There is one international hospital (Royal Angkor International Hospital) which provides international standard medical services, 24 hour emergency care, ambulance, translation and evacuation services.
Police - Siem Reap has a dedicated tourist police service for visiting foreigners.
Embassies - all international embassies are located in the capital Phnom Penh.
Local expenses
The official currency is the Riel although $US dollars are used in most transactions and the Riel is used as small change.
4000 Riel = $1 US dollar.
Local transport:
Bicycle = Free for Globalteer volunteers (US$2 per day for tourists).
Moto taxi = 2000 Riel for a short journey, US$10 for all day.
Tuk-tuk = US$1 for a short journey, US$13 for all day.
Taxi car = US$60 for the 5 hour journey from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh.
Bus = US$8 for the 6 hour journey from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh.
Food and drink:
Meal at local food stall = Less than US$1
Meal in restaurant = US$2 to $20
Soft drink in a restaurant = US$0.50 to US$1
Glass of draught beer = US$1
Drinking water (1.5l) = US$0.50 to US$1 (free drinking water is available at Globalteer House for refilling bottles).
Keeping in touch:
Internet cafes = less than US$1 per hour
Telephone calls = approximately 1000 to 2000 Riel per minute to Western countries. If you are spending a long time in Cambodia then many people bring their own mobile cellular phone and purchase a sim card locally for around US$5 making text messages a very affordable and versatile option for communicating.
The post office is located near the centre of town.
Money:
There are many ATM's in the town centre.
Travellers cheques are also a good option in Cambodia, commission is often as low as 1%.
Visa withdrawal can be found at a few banks.
Money transfer facilities are also available in town via Western Union.
Laundry:
Laundry services are available at Globalteer House for US$1 per kilo.
Massage:
Various types of massage techniques for US$5 to US$10 per hour, the best being "seeing hands massage" - an organisation supporting the local blind community.
Getting to Siem Reap
There is an international airport 6km to the west of town. It is often easier to fly to an major destination such as Bangkok, Singapore or Hong Kong and then take a local budget airline to Siem Reap. Overland transport is also possible from neighbouring countries.
An easy and more environmentally friendly way to reach Siem Reap is by bus from Phnom Penh or Bangkok. Getting from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap by boat is also possible.
Visas - A passport with at least 6 months validity and three blank pages is required. A 30 day tourist visa is available on arrival at the international airports and at border crossings with Thailand and Vietnam, a passport photograph is required. The tourist visa can be extended for only a further 30 days in Siem Reap town allowing a 2 month stay in Cambodia. For longer visits a business visa is required, 30 days on arrival but can be extended indefinitely in Siem Reap town.
Clean water
Water Filters - In Cambodia, 1 in 7 children die before the age of five from preventable diseases such as typhoid, malnutrition, malaria, dengue. The common denominator in many of these is waterborne illness. To address this issue we work with an organisation that is constructing and providing bio-sand water filters. They are a low cost way to provide potable water to impoverished areas from any water source (ie: pump wells, pit wells, rivers, ponds). Bio-sand water filters are a new technology to Cambodia. They are made of gravel, sand and cement at a cost of US$45 per filter. The filters are easy to construct with locally available materials, install and maintain. The filtration media consists of a layer of gravel, a layer of course sand, and a layer of fine sand. The biolayer holds the key bacteria essential to removing 98% of biological pathogens and 100% parasites. Water poured through the filter processes at a rate of one litre per minute. Each filter can optimally filter 50 to 80 litres of water per day.
The Temples of Angkor
The millennium old temple ruins of the Angkorian Khmer Empire are designated a world heritage site by UNESCO. There are dozens of major temples, the most famous being Angkor Wat whose artistic and archaeological significance and impact put it in class with the Pyramids, Machu Pichu and the Taj Mahal. At its height, the Khmer empires capital was home to over one million people, holding sway over modern Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam and Laos. The Temples were built between the 8th and 13th centuries and are spread out some 40 miles around the village of Siem Reap. Some temples have been restored, some cleared of vegetation whilst others remain shrouded in jungle giving a unique and memorable vision of huge trees growing through ancient ruins.
Buddhism
The predominant religion in Cambodia is Buddhism. Buddhism is a rather flexible religion which teaches that nothing is eternal and everything in the world is subject to change, only aging, sickness and death are certain and unavoidable. Buddhism has no unique creed, no single authority, no single sacred book. It focuses on the potential of the individual to obtain enlightenment or "nirvana".
Buddhism was founded from the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama, born in 566BC on the Indian - Nepalese border. He was from a privileged and wealthy family but became disillusioned with his life and left home to embark upon a life of wandering on a spiritual quest. As he sat meditating under a tree he had a profound experience called Bodhi or "awakening". He had a deep understanding of the nature of suffering, its cause and a way of stopping it. The Lord Buddha then devoted his life to teaching the way to cease suffering. By his death at the age of 80 he had a considerable following and a well organised community.
The eightfold path teaches the moral principles that all Buddhist should practice. Following this path helps a person realize that greed and selfishness cause all earthly suffering, with this understanding one's own suffering may end. Buddhism is a very peaceful religion that teaches morality, meditation and wisdom.
A brief history of Cambodia
For 600 years powerful Khmer kings dominate much of present-day Southeast Asia, from the borders of Myanmar east to the South China Sea and north to Laos. It was during this period that Khmer kings built the most extensive concentration of religious temples in the world--the Angkor temple complex. The most successful of Angkor 's kings, Jayavarman II, Indravarman I, Suryavarman II and Jayavarman VII, also devised a masterpiece of ancient engineering: a sophisticated irrigation system that includes barays (man-made lakes) and canals that ensured as many as three rice crops a years. Part of this system is still in use today.
As the Angkor period ended, Cambodia's capital moved south to Lovek, then to Udong and finally to the present-day capital of Phnom Penh. Among the main features of the post-Angkorean era, besides the movement of the capital, was a widespread conversion to Theravada Buddhism, illustrated on temple carvings, where Buddhist features gradually replaced Hindu features.
The 15th to 17th centuries represented a time of foreign influence, when expansionist Siam and Vietnam fought over Cambodia. By the mid-1800s, Cambodia, like most other countries in Asia, came under increasing pressure from European colonial powers. In 1863, the country agreed to protection from France. King Norodom signed a Protectorate Treaty between King Norodom and the French. There are two dynastic families within the Cambodia Royal Family -- the Norodoms and the Sisowaths. With the death of King Norodom in 1904, the dynasties switched. The heir apparent, a Norodom, was replaced instead with a Sisowath.
In 1941, the throne switched back to the Norodoms with the crowing of Cambodia's current king, Norodom Sihanouk. He was 18. In 1945, the Japanese briefly ousted the French. Encouraged, King Sihanouk campaigned tirelessly and in 1953 he succeeded in winning independence for Cambodia, effectively ending 90 years under French protectorate. King Sihanouk abdicated the throne to his father and took the reins of government himself as head of state. Throughout the 1950s and ' 60s Cambodia was self-sufficient and prospered in many areas. However, the quagmire of growing war in 
Vietnam spread relentlessly, and in 1970, as war spilled over into Cambodia, Prince Sihanouk was overthrown by General Lon Nol. Then, 17 April 1975, Lon Nol 's weakened government was itself overthrown by the Khmer Rouge. They immediately emptied the capital of its residents and brought Prince Sihanouk back, only to hold him under house arrest. The ensuing four years "reign of terror" under Pol Pot's Democratic Kampuchea resulted in the deaths of an estimated 1.7 million people.
In 1979 the Khmer Rouge was overthrown and the Vietnamese-backed People's Republic of Kampuchea was established. Throughout the 1980s Cambodia began to rebuild with the assistance of Vietnamese military advisers and under Vietnamese political advisers and under Vietnamese political protection.
In 1989 the Vietnamese withdrew the last of their troops and the government renamed the country State of Cambodia. The SOC ruled independently until the Paris Peace Agreement 1991 created the United Nations Transitional Authority (UNTAC). Supported by the presence of some 22,000 UN troops, UNTAC in May 1993 supervised general elections in Cambodia. A second general election was held in 1998. Cambodia today enjoys a parliamentary system with one prime minister.
A constitution was adopted in 1993, the same year King Norodom Sihanouk returned to the throne. His Majesty remains a symbol of national unity to his people.
Today Cambodia is still a poor country but there is reason to be optimistic about its future. The Cambodian economy is growing quite rapidly. The fastest growing industry in Cambodia is tourism. The country is politically stable and a safe place to visit to enjoy the wonderful Khmer people and the beautiful Cambodian attractions.
Further Resources
For an understanding of the recent tragic history of Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge you could simply watch the award winning movie "The Killing Fields".
Many books have also been written on the subject including -
"First they Killed my Father" by Loung Ung - a moving story about a young girls experience under the ruthless rule of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge.
"Brother Number One" by David Chandler - A biography of the Khmer Rouge leader, Pol Pot.
There are numerous books written about the Angkor temples and the history of Cambodia including -
"Angkor, Cambodia's wondrous Khmer temples" - an illustrated guide.
"Angkor and the Khmer civilization" by Michael D Coe.
"A history of Cambodia" by David Chandler for 2000 years of history.
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