The Khmer Empire, reigning from 802-1432 A.D., is at the heart of every Cambodian; and Angkor, the empire's opulent capital city, remains their most impressive and enduring legacy.
Angkor Wat, still the world's largest religious building despite being built in the 12th century by Suryavaram II, holds an incredible importance and sense of pride for Cambodians.
It is featured on their flag, their currency, has a beer named after it and was even spared destruction unlike many other religious temples during the murderous reign of the ultra-communist Khmer Rouge.
In fact, Pol Pot and his fellow homicidal maniacs named their party Angkar, as a nod to this magnificent place and its incredibly powerful empire.
Because Josh and I knew so little about these temples and the Khmer Empire, we decided to hire a guide along with a tuk tuk to take us from site to site.
We were met by Amad and our driver at 5am in order to be at Angkor Wat for sunrise: a rite of passage at these temples.
The ancient city was surprisingly far from Siem Reap and the air temperature felt like it was hovering above freezing as we approached the entrance gate.
On our boat trip from Battambang to Siem Reap, I somehow lost my voice and on the ride there and for the rest of the next few days, I squeaked and squawked my words trying to ask Amad questions, much to Josh's amusement.
We bought our 3-day passes and followed Amad through the darkness to the famous Wat.
Although his English was somewhat hard to understand, he described the imagery and symbolism of Angkor and how the Wat was originally a temple devoted to the Hindu god Vishnu.
As the sun began to rear its fiery head, the true grandeur and magnificence of this holy building became apparent.
The temple symbolizes Mount Meru, a sacred mountain to the Hindu faith, and its central tower rises 31m.
To add to its already formidable size, it is surrounded by a 1.5 by 1.3km moat that is 190m in width and was dug by hand!
What was also apparent as the sun rose in the sky, was just how many people were gathered around us. I'd have to estimate at least several thousand.
As the sunrise crowd began to leave, we had breakfast and took some photos with the wat in front of the photogenic reflecting pond and its water lilies.
The only disappointment is that the German team working on the restoration decided to drape half the facade in an ugly green tarp.
But hey, what can you do?
From there we toured the interior of Angkor Wat and marveled at the details of its sculptures and reliefs.
We stopped briefly at the southern gate of Angkor Thom, the last great capital of the Khmer Empire, and made our way to one of Angkor's most magnificent temples: Bayon.
Bayon was the state temple of the Khmer king Jayavarman VII. It has over 50 towers and most strikingly, is decorated with 216 faces of Avalokiteshvara, looking over every aspect of this temple from the high perches of each tower.
The only thing more numerous than the sculpted smirking faces, was the number of Chinese, Japanese and Korean tour groups, who were oh-so-courteous and orderly around the temples.
I'm only kidding, they were their usual rude, pushy and irritatingly-loud selves.
A short walk took us to Baphoun, which was formerly in a terrible state of disrepair until an incredibly dedicated group of archeologists painstakingly rebuilt it, piece by millions of pieces.
After Baphoun, we passed a large statue of Buddha and briefly explored the Terrace of the Elephants: a beautifully sculpted viewing-stand used for public ceremonies.
Our final stop of the day was Ta Prohm, known to most tourists as the Tomb Raider temple because of its inclusion in the movie starring Angelina Jolie and her enhanced chest in the role of the beyond-busty Lara Croft.
One can easily see why this temple was used for the film because the temple was left in its discovered state, complete with moss, tree roots and vines growing on the walls for centuries, seemingly consuming the temple ever-so-slowly.
This temple was incredibly popular with tour groups, and to find an undisturbed corner of it rather difficult.
After our tour, we thanked Amad for his service and returned to our hostel, HI Siem Reap (site).
We lounged around for the rest of the day, briefly checking out Siem Reap's market and restaurant district centered on 'the alley'.
That evening we went to one of the many Pub Street restaurants offering 50-cent draft beer.
Once there, we started playing some drinking games with an Australian couple and ended up dancing on picnic tables at the aptly named bar Angkor What? Our final hazy destination was Hip Hop club before stumbling back to Hi Siem Reap.
Josh didn't feel like going to temples for 2 days in a row, so I hired a tuk tuk and went exploring by myself in the afternoon.
My first stop was Preah Khan, a temple dedicated to Buddha, Bhrama, Shiva an Vishnu.
This is one of the largest complexes at Angkor and was once possibly used as a Buddhist university.
It, like Ta Prohm, was also in a charming ruinous state, with overgrown trees and vines galore.
I then went to Preah Neak Poan, which like Bayon and Preah Khan, was built by Jayarvarman VII.
The next three temples I visited were Ta Som, East Mebon and Pre Rup.
Each of these temples were impressive and unique, but what made them particularly great was the fact that since everyone else was visiting the heavy-hitters, I was almost completely alone at these once-sacred buildings.
It was one of those special moments walking around these imposing structures, wondering what life might have been like when this city of temples was full of life.
It is said that as many as one million people lived in Angkor at the empire's peak.
My final stop of the day was Phnom Bakheng, a modest temple built on the region's highest point.
It is most famous for its sunset views over Angkor Wat but I would wait to watch that the following day with Josh.
As I walked down, hundreds of people were making the slow climb up to watch the sunset.
To avoid the crowds on my third day and Josh's second, we headed out in the afternoon, starting at Preah Khan because I enjoyed it so much.
After a brief exploration of Ta Keo, we went back to Ta Prohm (aka Tomb Raider temple) to admire it with hopefully smaller crowds, but it proved to be so popular that that was not the case.
From there we went to the surprisingly large Banteay Kdel and admired this less-visited gem, before revisiting Angkor Wat, which now not only had less visitors, but also better lighting, pleasing my ever-present photo-snobbery.
As the golden hour was upon us, we made our way to Phnom Bakheng to watch the sunset.
Much like the sunrise, the sheer amount of people there made it a little less-than-special, but who am I to wish to deny others this great experience.
After spending 3 days exploring the Khmer Empire's incredible temples and timeless monuments, it is really easy to see why Angkor makes it on the best-of lists of everything written about Cambodia and South East Asia as a whole.
With its historical significance, beautiful craftsmanship, artistry and enduring legacy on the Cambodian peoples' psyche, it will surely be on my best-of list as well.
