Battambang Villages
ByWe were in Battambang to look at the lives and livelihoods of the rural folk in the area. It was a privilege to visit and chat with people engaged in a wide range of cottage industries, like the men in a rice mill cleaning and grading rice. That rice was further ground down into rice flour and used to make noodles and wrappers for spring rolls. The rice husks were sold to the villagers and used as the fuel for boiling water for noodles and distilling rice wine to make a fortified liqueur. The rice itself was of course a staple food source but was also cooked to make a delicious sweet morsel called sticky rice. There was something fundamental and idyllic about sitting in the shade of a tamarind tree watching women in the yard of their stilted wooded house extruding rice paste through a perforated tin to make noodles. As we chatted they told us that their neighbours arrived on bicycles to buy noodles for their families. The extra of course were sold in market. During this time in Battambang we also spent a day talking with the Prahoc makers that we told you about previously.
Everyone was so friendly and welcomed us with twinkling eyes and broad smiles. They encouraged us to visit some of the interesting sights in the area and told us about the roosts of the big bats, called flying foxes, and of the caves where millions of small insect eating bats streamed out every evening.
