A Holiday in Cambodia….

An early start and trip to the airport began the day. With sad goodbyes to our guide Tri, we shuffled off to the Vietnam Airlines counter. Our attendant promptly informed us that our flight had been changed to Cambodia Angkor Airlines and we were herded across the floor to another attendant that hadn’t opened yet. We were obviously waiting for the desk to open, two young boys and a girl with an obvious foot injury requiring carrying by her parents. The desk next to where we were standing opened and no sooner had it done so than some self-absorbed overweight family of Swiss decided it was more important for them to jump the queue and approached the counter first – even when I said ‘Hey’ to alert him to our being there first, didn’t seem to make a difference. To make it worse, we moved our gear over to the initial desk line and within a couple minutes the next desk opened with some French fellow and his three girlfriends again budding in front – not even batting an eye towards our obviously overloaded hands of kids – it was unbelievable! We must be too Canadian or perhaps wearing a sticker on our foreheads indicating that we are push-overs – that or other people are simply completely unaware of what it’s like to try to occupy 3 young children in an airline line up. Wasn’t a great start to our Cambodian adventure but things were to improve considerably.

Our dual prop 30 or so seater with only a dozen or so passengers, some quite video camera overzealous, capturing everything from airport gates to grandchildren sleeping or walking the corridor of the plane. Our inconsiderate French friends from check in weren’t much better, filming or snapping virtually everything they encountered. It’s funny how we wish to capture these moments in time either as a badge to acknowledge passage to these incredible areas of the world and their sights or as a seemingly visual recording of our life’s novella. Sometimes it’s simply the beauty or aesthetic of the object being witnessed that compels me, like photographing it somehow makes it partially mine – perhaps it’s the same with others? Once landed in Siem Reap we found our new guide, Mr Kimh, and driver waiting patiently for our arrival. They dropped us at our hotel, the Somadevi Angkor Hotel, in the middle of town and we quickly checked in, got caffeinated and joined Mr Kimh for our tour through some of the temple structures around Angkor Wat and Thom.

The history of this place is actually quite interesting spanning centuries, numerous invasions, entire religious conversions, abandonment and rediscovery. The whole area of temple and ancient structures spans some 410 square kilometres. Angkor means ‘capital’ and Wat – ‘monastery’ and it is the largest religious temple complex in the world, occupying 81 hectares of grounds within its walls. Thom means city and within the city walls there are a number of different temples and historical structures relevant to different Kings and eras. The earliest temples we visited were from the 10th century – over 1000 years ago – and contained amazing bas reliefs depicting stories and images of Hindu or Buddhist symbols and motifs. Symbolism was incredibly important it seemed during their construction and all the temples either face the East or West depending on the beliefs of the King who had contracted to have them built. Angkor Thom has gates at each of the cardinal points, a massive moat that surrounds the inner grounds (dug by hand and previously inhabited by crocodiles) and a number of different temples built by different kings. The Wat is as impressive, with a moat 100 metres wide surrounding it and a myriad of gradually escalating buildings which peak towards the rear of the complex. Most of the windows are decorated with 7 pillars to represent the days of the week, 12 central staircases represent the months and there are exactly 365 stairs (although I didn’t count) to represent the days of the year. Again, it faces west to take in the rising sun. The carvings along the walls are incredibly intricate and span from floor to ceiling for 100s of metres at a time – it is almost inconceivable how such incredible works of art were fashioned and survived the tolls of time. Many of the outer temples have been ravaged by the forest with trees and roots gradually causing the structures to collapse. Due to different invasions from Siam (now Thailand) and other neighbouring countries the majestic kingdoms of Angkor eventually fell and these sites were abandoned and forgotten in about the 14th century. It wasn’t until the 19th century when a French elephant hunter was chasing an elephant through the jungle and noticed that it went around a corner and disappeared from sight as if it had gone into a cave. As he rounded the bend and had a look, he discovered remnants of a temple complex with trees and foliage essentially covering and poking out through the bricks. Restoration of the different temples began shortly after this discovery but was abandoned again during the Vietnam War when incursions began to spread into Cambodia. Currently there are a number of different countries funding and working on restoring the various structures as close to their original majesty as possible. It looks like one massive jigsaw puzzle with large, broken sandstone and volcanic bricks (which formed the core structure) lying haphazardly both inside and around the different temples.

By the end of our first day with Mr Kimh we had visited about 7 or 8 sites and were completely exhausted. We returned to our hotel to get cleaned up, write some journals and prepare for dinner at a local Cambodian Culture Buffet restaurant just up the road. It was a great way to sample a number of different Cambodian dishes, listen to live traditional music and view some classical dances. It was interesting though as the male dancers looked like your average good looking socialite you’d expect to see playing footie or surfing rather than engaging in traditional dance ensembles. The people here are incredibly accommodating and seemingly content with a perpetual smile on their faces despite their hardships and poverty and I would gesticulate that the reason these fellows have taken to the dance isn’t necessarily for a love of their culture or dance per se but rather that owing to their coordination and sporting finesse they can earn a much healthier salary this way plus bask in the glory of masses of foreigners transfixed by their abilities. During our visits to the temples we have not infrequently encountered small mobs of very persistent children selling bracelets, reed-woven ornaments and other knickknacks. Their persistence is such that they will even threaten crying and may offer their entire stock for a US Dollar if necessary while clawing at the window of your van. Needless to say we’ve essentially got Christmas presents for the family covered now.

Day two started with a short helium-filled balloon ride just outside of Angkor Wat. The balloon was tethered to the ground by a large cable which would winch it down to the ground to let people on and then allow the balloon to rise about 100 metres in the air. From the apex of the ride we could look out over the entrance of Angkor Wat and take in some of the surrounding countryside in its classically quilted texture of rice fields. From there Mr. Kimh guided us through Angkor Wat and the other half of Angkor Thom with its Elephant and Leper Terraces, the Red Palace and adjoining King’s swimming pool which he provided for his 7 Queens and 100 or so concubines. Sweaty and spent again, our guide took us back to town past some silk-weaving and silver jewellery artisans and through the main market/restaurant/pub area of town. Back at our hotel we donned swimming gear and popped into the pool for a refreshing dip, having competitions on how long we could hold our breath under water. We still had an afternoon to wander so ventured out into the markets, had our feet massaged and exfoliated by fish in large tanks, suffered the accosting of a few more street urchins selling their wares and ended up at a Cambodian BBQ restaurant to sample some snake and crocodile amongst other meats and veg. With darkness falling we caught a ‘tuk tuk’ back to the hotel and called it a night. This touring of Southeast Asian countries really takes it out of you.