FRANGIPANI VILLA HOTEL

Taking photos for Frangipani Villa Hotels was a main reason of my home returning last month. There are six hotels in Phnom Penh run by Frangipani Villa, but I need to work with the newly opened 2 hotels, the Royal Palace and Living Art located near Royal Palace and Tuol Tompoung Respectively.

The location of the Royal Palace facing the King Cremation site is both good and bad. It is good as you can have a commanding view of the cremation site where Cambodian historical event took place from its rooftop (sadly photo was not allowed from the rooftop during the ceremony, except by some privileged photographers). It is bad because the yellowish light from the building was too strong dominating the nearby National Museum and Royal Palace and the site blocks the exterior view of the hotel.

I had a few days for each hotel shooting, but frankly I could not get the photos that satisfy me. Even though the weather could be a reason, I feel I could have done better. I will surely have another try when I have chance to go back home again next time. Below are some shots from Frangipani Villa Hotel Royal Palace. I might upload some from the Living Art later

Thansour Bokor Photo Project

In December last year, I received an expected email from Thansur Bokor Highland Resort’s Market Department asking me whether I am interested in doing photography project with them. It was quite is big one and more importantly was just exactly the types that could enjoy doing it.

The project was divided into two phases. The Phase I mainly covers the shooting of landscape and landmarks of Borkor Hill, while the phase II’s shooting is about resort facilities and buildings. I spent about 5 days for the first project. Sadly I could not get all the required shots due to unfavorable weather. Personally I wished to overnight on the hill, but the resort management said no on the ground that it is not safe to do so.  

Here are some photos from the Phase I. I am expecting to start the Phase II someday this month.

The Old Church

Wat Sampoa Pram or Five-boat Temple

100 rice field, but what you find are just stones and stones.

A dam on the hill for water supplies to the resort

The giant stone face along the way up to Bokor Hill

PS: I was introduced to the Marketing Department by a staffer in the same company who have followed this blog for some time. I cannot thank him enough.   

 

Serei Sophorn Railways Station

Railways stations have became places of interest for me to photograph. I used to think of visiting all these old railways stations in the kingdom for my personal collection. However I just do not have time to realize my wish. The station in Banteay Meachey’s provincial town is my latest one I photographed in January 2012. I woke up early morning hoping for some good skies but it was NOT my lucky day. Here are two shots I snapped on that cloudy day.

A lady (I assume) riding motor on the station platform in the direction to the vegetable market.

A vegetable seller along the railways road not far away from the station. She said do bring her [photos] to the United States.

Urbex-Cambodia

Urban exploration (often shortened as urbex or UE) is the examination of the normally unseen or off-limits parts of urban areas or industrial facilities.[1] Urban exploration is also commonly referred to as infiltration, although some people consider infiltration to be more closely associated with the exploration of active or inhabited sites. It may also be referred to as draining (when exploring drains) urban spelunking, urban rock climbing, urban caving, or building hacking (Wikipedia)

I started shooting Urbex around 2010 after seeing some mind-blowing Urbex photos. Later on I started to look for abandoned building in Phnom Penh. If you pay good attention, you will find plenty of abandoned buildings here, yet it is relatively hard or impossible to trespass though buildings. So far, I could only trespass a few buildings in the Penh.

To my surprise, I also learned there are several ghostly buildings in Senmonorom, the Provincial Town of Mondolkiri Province, from Tom Windelinckx, a Belgian blogger living there.  Last month, I had a chance to visit Mondulkiri on my mission and was fortunate to have some time for my own. I decided to hire a motor taxi and hunting for the buildings I saw on Tom’s blog. And here are some of them.

Unknown Building Building. From its interior, I can tell this building was under renovation but for some unknown reason it was stopped.

I was told it is former military base.

My motor taxi said it is former Department of Social Affair.

PS: I have also created a facebook page for Urbex-Cambodian, please be my fans. You can also find more my Urbex photos at my flickr’s urbex set as well.

Busra, At Last

If my memory is correct I my first visit to Modulkiri was in 2004. We spent a couple days there visiting Domank Sdech, Romanea waterfall and other places that I cannot recall. Our plan to visit the renowned Busra waterfall was not realized since the road condition at that time was too much for our rented Pajero. It was only 8 years later in February 2012 that I had the second opportunity to see mountainous Modulkiri again. At the time of this writing, the roads from Phnom Penh to Senmonorom, the provincial town of Mondulkiri, have been completely paved and the construction of the 30 km roads from Senmonorom to Busra Waterfall is partly finished. Now you can either reach there by motorbike or sedan in less than one hour. As the proofs of my visit, here are some photos.