The day before we left Siem reap we were advised by the guest house to take a 'mystery tour' on the back of motor bikes. The tour guide was a lovely guy called 'Bunthorn' (Bun). He was great, spoke beautiful English had an enormous smile, laughed at his own jokes had a very happy face and was incredibly knowledgeable about the history of Cambodia and the local area. So off we went and as the name suggests we had no idea where we were going. Ray was a bit apprehensive about going on the motor bikes and wanted to do a mystery tour in a tuk tuk but I am glad I persuaded him as before we knew it we were heading off the beaten track and out towards waterlogged uneven farmland and there was no way a tuk tuk would be able to handle the crazy terrrain. We drove through paddy field pathways and dusty tracks, passing the occasional dopey looking water buffalo having a nice wallow in a muddy water hole in the heat. We passed shanty tumbledown farm buildings and villages made up of wooden shacks with palm leaved, corrugated iron rooves with stray dogs and scruffy featherless chickens scratching about.

After about 30 minutes of a very bumpy ride we stopped at a pagoda in the middle of nowhere and Bun began to tell his story. He explained that when he was growing up guerilla warfare continued to rage in Cambodia for 2 more decades following the downfall of the Khmer Rouge and 'Pol Pot's' tyrannical regime, mostly in the jungles and surrounding areas of the quiet cut off villages. Bun explained that he remembers scouring the jungle area for dead soldier's bodies, searching for food as his family were trapped in the middle of a very volatile area and were constantly hungry and the land they used to farm was unsafe to grow food. After the gun fire stopped Bun would head out and check to see if the soldiers had any food in their rucksacks. On one occasion he remembers prising a tin of sardines out of a dead soldiers rigor mortis grip....he was about 8 years old. . When he was older he managed to leave his village in search of some kind of work. He carefully chanced his way through miles of fields and jungles which were littered with landmines. Eventually he arrived at the pagoda at Siem Reap and the monks took him in. They gave him robes, food and water and allowed him to sleep in one of the temples stupa's (a little shrine where the ashes of the dead are kept)... he was about 16 years old. Bun learned the Buddhist ways and teachings from the monks and believes that his good fortune was due to being a good man in a previous life which is why he survived and received such kindness from them!? Since then Bun has managed to gain a scholarship and attend and gain a university degree. What little money he makes from his mystery tour business he sends back to his old village which helps to maintain the houses of the poor, elderly and disabled victims of land mines....he told us he is always smiling because he is now able to do this......such inspirational, unassuming guy..

As we walked around the pagoda we saw the monks and the destitute people who had sought help from them. Once the people have been accepted at the pagoda, each person is expected to work day to day in a communal way to ensure everyone is properly fed, watered and clothed. They pray daily and even have a very beautiful spiritual process for those who pass away. A beautiful ornate crematorium type shrine where the bodies are cremated. This means that the monks are on hand to bless the dying person and the body can then be cremated in the traditional way instead of just being left to decompose somewhere in the street or jungle or anywhere with no ceremony. A very big deal for a reincarnation believing Buddhist.

There are temples and pagodas all over Cambodia giving aid to those people still being affected by the war in a country that still has very little , virtually starting from scratch since the mid 70's and still struggling nearly 40 years on.

The next stop was a little dusty school. Again in the middle of nowhere, tin sheds with about twenty children in black and white uniforms sat at wooden desks. What a comparison with our educational system.! First of all I was amazed that we could just walk in, there were no gates, no fences or walls, no signing in, no one on duty, so in we went. There were children playing in the dusty playground, running, skipping, playing hop scotch and laughing..in fact it was the laughter I really noticed. These children were really happy, being children, playing old fashioned games and having innocent fun in the fresh air it was lovely to watch! We went past a classroom and the teacher came out..Bun explained who we were and the teacher asked if I would go and talk to the children...so I did ..bless them, they were attentive, polite and listened to what I had to say while Bun translated and as it was their English lesson, as I left they all chanted in unison..."goodbye Miss Laura, thank you very much"....aw.....no gobby disrespectful attitudes there!!

Outside some younger children came running up and we took a few photos of them and the delight on their faces was heartwarming when we showed them their piks on the digital camera again lots of bright eyes and giggling. After this they all lined up ready for the next lesson. A few cheeky girls asked Bun his name and when he told them his name was 'James Bun 'd' they fell about giggling!!....

Being at the school was great, so very very different from the education our kids get at home. Our kids have state of the art everything, from highly qualified teachers to virtual classrooms and generally have every chance in life , these kids have virtually nothing except some old battered overused text books passed down from one year to the next and an old blackboard but their attitude to learning is exceptional. These schools are desperate for people to work with them, volunteer for a while or go and just talk and share their experiences with these children.....really got me thinking......................

Our last stop before the sunset was another shanty village on stilts on the edge of a river. Again the people had nothing. The mothers sat crouched on the edges of their tumbledown shacks feeding their little ones by hand with sticky rice while the older children played in stagnant water by the side of the river as mozzies and midges buzzed around them. All around the village we saw litter, plastic bags, old tyres, vegetable peelings, broken boats and ripped rags, in fact anything they couldn't use was just thrown out of the shacks on to the dusty ground. Where does it go to? Who cleans it up?, there are no bin men here so apart from the flea bitten dogs and rats who eat what they can, everything else stays where its thrown and builds up into a germ, litter and disease ridden dangerous garden where these vulnerable people exist and where children play. It's very sad and generations of people have grown up in environments like this. We drove past one shack and were surprised to see they had a tele!! They seemed to be the only ones in the village who had one and a generator to power it. This family had gathered a crowd on the porch of their house a house whose wooden stilts were broken in half and looked as if they would crumble into the stagnant river at any minute!!!....still at least they had a tele I mean they would not want to miss 'I'm a Celebrity!'.....

Back on the bikes and we headed for the sunset passing lots of people on push bikes who had been working, gathering rice in the paddy fields, wearing what looked like pyjamas and pointed concical hats carrying huge bundles of firewood for cooking. Bun knew the best spot to watch the sunset, the top of the mountain, where we sat and watched the sun disappear, sinking serenely into the paddy fields below. As we sat there surrounded by the stunning Cambodian scenery I could not help but think about the sadness and devastation that this beautiful country and its wonderful people endured in the 70's, 80's and 90's and how on earth they find the strength to keep smiling while we in Britain have almost everything we need; warm clean houses, transport, educational, health care, new clothes and bellies full of unnecessary junk food and yet for the most part we in Britain are a bunch of unfulfilled, miserable , moaning Meldrews!!.....ironic eh?