Experiência Cultural Privada de Meio Dia na Vila Cambojana de Siem Reap

I highly recommend the "Day in the Life" tour. We were picked up at our hotel on time by So Kheoum (guide) and our driver. I recommend the tour to everyone visiting Cambodia. We were able to talk to a 67-year-old grandmother who had lived through Pol Pot's regime. So so so humbling to see how hard they work, how resourceful they are, how happy they are. The program included: 1. Local market visit 2. Visiting a non-touristy buddhist pagoda 3. Riding a buffalo cart through rice fields 4. Threading up palm leaves on a bamboo stick for a local woman to use as wall insulation for their houses 5. Cooking a delicious Cambodian curry. Best curry I ever had! So yummy. We used mortar and pestle to make the curry paste ourselves. Dietary restrictions were respected (vegetarian, don't like coriander, etc) 6. Visit HUSK school and play with the children. They are sooo cute and happy to learn.

A great way to experience a bit of Cambodian life. Ride in an ox cart, visit a host family, and see the school and monastery. We made roofing tiles and then visited another home to make curry for lunch. A great eye-opener to life for locals.

We were worried when booking this tour as the last review was in 2019, and we were booking for December 2023. "A Day In Life" is a legitimate eco-tour operated by Beyond Expedition. I was there with two city teenage boys, and it was an excellent learning experience for them to understand life in another part of the world. For the first stop, we took an ox cart to the village and stayed at a home for about an hour, where we helped weave walls using dried leaves for them to build a new kitchen. They are currently cooking under a temporary umbrella. There is a lack of clean water and nomadic living conditions. Second stop, we cooked local Khmer curry with the help of a locally trained cook and ate at the base, where you can see how water is filtered. The food was clean, as we did not experience any diarrhea or similar issues after cooking and eating in the countryside. Lastly, we visited a local school and observed how they built the school using recycled water bottles filled with trash. Overall, it was a meaningful tour with a very good guide, Sopkar, who explained the hardships of the villagers. By joining this tour, part of the proceeds go towards building the school and supporting the family we stayed with. Employment is also generated as they hire and train locals as cooks, not to mention the income for the ox cart driver. Highly recommended for city kids to get a taste of life in another world.

Este fue el mejor tour al que nos unimos y un punto culminante de nuestro viaje en Siem Reap. El pueblo estaba a unos 30 minutos de la ciudad. En el camino, nos detuvimos en un mercado local y un templo budista para un recorrido rápido. En el pueblo, nos mostraron las casas del pueblo y nos sorprendió saber que muchos allí todavía viven con ingresos inferiores a 2,5 USD al día. Tuvimos la oportunidad de ayudar a tejer paredes de paja para las casas y también a preparar la comida para el almuerzo (estaba deliciosa). Las familias anfitrionas que permiten estas actividades reciben un pago directo del costo del tour. El tour terminó con una visita a la escuela benéfica local HUSK que ofrece clases gratuitas a los niños del pueblo. Sin embargo, nuestra experiencia no habría sido tan buena sin nuestro guía, el Sr. Fasi, quien es increíblemente profesional, conocedor y abierto a cualquier tema que le preguntamos, desde la historia de Camboya hasta los restaurantes locales. Creció en un pueblo similar y ha trabajado muchos años con HUSK para llevar a los turistas a ver esta otra cara de Siem Reap. En general, un viaje muy significativo y agradable. Muy recomendado para cualquiera interesado en saber más sobre la gente y el lugar más allá de los templos de Angkor y los mercados nocturnos.

The guide's explanations were incredibly thorough, and I learned so much from hearing about the actual market, the schools children attend, their class content, teachers, and the scenery! Also, the curry they made for lunch was absolutely delicious! This kind of valuable experience is hard to come by on a typical trip, so I highly recommend it!

It was a unique experience to witness the daily lives of people in rural areas. We also had the opportunity to prepare lunch together with the locals!

This is a fantastic tour! This tour is arranged in conjunction with Beyond Travel Agency. You travelled in a private group with a guide. In my tour, my guide Lee who works with Husk Organisation. This non profit organisation assists people in the village by providing them with education, help them build their house and provide a place for the women to make some merchandise. Our guide Lee is very experience and very patient to explain to us the programme. The tour takes you to a temple and then you will be transported by the buffalo's to the village. You will visit a family for an hour to help them with their needs. In my case, to help them to repair their house. After that, Lee will take you to the school and them you can participate to cook a very delicious lunch. I travelled with my wife and 2 young children age 6 and 9 and they have no problem with the tour. Walking is not much. Please make sure you wear long sleeves shirt and long pants (for sun protection and mozzies). Bring a hat and plenty of water. The tour does not require you for any donation or to buy anything and the tour did provide water but if you can help by bring your own reusable water bottle and water, that will save them some money and have less plastic. I highly recommend anyone visiting Siem Reap to join the tour.

We had a great and very educational experience in the village. We should encourage our children to help out and go as part of a cultural exchange program. A big thank you to Mr. Lee for guiding us through this whole journey. I have helped spread awareness of the HUSK non-profit organization on my Facebook. We hope to come back again in December next year 👍🏻☺️

It was really an eye-opener for my Friend and I as we get to experience a day with a host family, the situation that they are living in, the activities they do to make a living. This is something different from the touristy spots in Siem Reap, and it left a great impact on me to be contented and appreciate the things around me. One point to note: if you want to have a chance to visit the kids in school, book this activity only from Mon to Sat, as the school will be closed on Sun.

Today's itinerary was more unique than usual. We experienced the daily lives of people in local first and second-tier poverty and helped them. We visited a community center built with the support of the local government and various countries, where we saw innocent children happily attending classes and playing games. Although the classrooms were converted from abandoned buildings, they had no walls, allowing people outside to see directly in. There were also classroom walls built from a large number of plastic bottles donated by local volunteers, all so that children from impoverished families wouldn't have to worry about earning money for their families. This institution also allows some parents in the village to make handicrafts here, selling them to foreign markets to supplement their household income and partially fund the institution's maintenance and development. We rode ox carts into the homes of people with varying degrees of poverty; they were simple and pure. The women here had many children, much like Taiwan's early agricultural society. We helped make handicrafts and participated in local cooking. The mothers who welcomed us into their homes had put on simple makeup and their brightest clothes to greet us. We learned that we were the first Asians to participate in this activity; typically, Asians come here purely for vacation, shopping, and massages, while Europeans are usually the ones who participate in such activities, always showing extra compassion and a more noble spirit.