Tuk tuk, trishaw or rickshaw, which do I want and does it matter?

Problem
I can't tell the difference between a rickshaw and trishaw and a tuk tuk.

Answer
A technically minded friend tells me:

Rickshaws In Singapore
A rickshaw - the forerunner of the others was pulled by hand.

Usually one man, who could only pull a cart containing one man. An unskilled job, in the early days of Singapore, extremely hard labour.

Horse Power UK
In the UK the rich would have a horse, or a horse and a cart for business, or a pony and trap. Very rich, two horses and a permanent driver. A stage coach would have two or four horses, room for two or four passengers, and driver at the front, and space for luggage.

The horses would race over the ruts and be exhausted. So at the stages or stage posts, the horses, as well as driver and passengers, would stop for water and food and a rest. If passengers did not stop overnight, but were in a hurry, the carriage continued the journey. You would take another set of horses to go back and forth over their section of the road.

A trishaw - was a seated cart pulled by a bicycle. Does it have three wheels? Actually, it often has two under the passengers and the bike has two, so that makes four.

Tuk Tuks
A tuk tuk is motorised, like a motorbike with a passenger cart, which we enjoyed in Cambodia. In Siem Reap the tuk tuks are the cheap form of transport as there are no buses in Siem Reap. It is the second city - but most popular for tourism - being a half hour tuk tuk ride from the city to Ankor Wat. Buses run from one town to another but not within Siem Reap.

As you see from my picture, our driver wears a helmet because he is using a motorcycle, quite fast. The tuk tuks weave in and out of traffic, do U turns, cut across oncoming lanes to turn left

Auto rickshaw - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto_rickshaw
An auto rickshaw (in India) or rickshaw (in Pakistan), also known as a baby taxi (in Bangladesh) .... Tuk-tuks, introduced in Durban in the late 1980s enjoyed growing popularity in recent years, particularly in Gauteng.

Tips
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickshaw
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickshaws_in_the_United_States

For more about travel to Ankor Wat and temples and what to see and do in Cambodia see previous posts.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.
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