Angkor
Wat: The Jewel in Cambodia’s Crown (cont.)
I spend the first day at the Bayan,
a ruin of surpassing beauty in the Angkor complex,
adorned with fifty-four huge faces of the Boddhisatva
Avalokisesvara. I wander the ruins in a daze, ignoring
the incredible heat beating down on me. The children
are a novelty at this stage of my journey, and I indulge
them as they try to sell me guide books filled with
facts I already know, and musical instruments I have
no desire to lug around. A few offer their services
as guides, and occasionally I take them up on their
proposal – though we must be careful none of the licensed
guides catch us, lest we both wind up in trouble with
the authorities (or more realistically, doling out
more money to grease the wheels of the law).
My second day I visit Angkor Wat. This is the jewel
in Cambodia’s crown, and for excellent reason. Though
the throngs of tourists are disheartening (this is
the most accessible of Angkor’s ruins, and therefore
the most frequented), I manage to find niches to hide
away and soak up the energy on my own. Every inch
of this place seems covered in facades, either of
apsaras (the dancers of Indra’s court), or else some
battle or hunting scene from the Khmer empire’s glorious
past. It is nearly nine-hundred years old, but still
has a living, breathing pulse so strong you can feel
it pumping through your veins. I find a window sill
at the top of the innermost temple, and sit meditating
for an hour or so. It is here I will spend much of
my next two weeks; here I will befriend the many monks
with whom I trade English lessons for Khmer lessons;
and here I will watch the sun set over the jungles
of Cambodia.
Time in this place ebbs and flows in a manner that
defies all explanation. The days pass by in the blink
of an eye, yet upon reflection whole lifetimes seem
to have elapsed. I spend days at Ta Prohm – a jungle
temple made famous by being a shooting location for
the film Tomb Raider – and yet those days could not
be expressed in an entire book, much less a few words.
A temple reclaimed by the jungle, Ta Prohm is filled
with a raw and primeval energy evidenced by the enormous
strangler figs that seem to grow forth from the very
stones.
The Khmer are the kindest and most gentle people I
have met in my travels, even in this tourist trap
and with all the Western lures these travelers bring.
Entire evenings are spent around a fire singing with
Khmer women and men, them laughing good-naturedly
at my broken Khmer, me simply trying to keep up with
their songs and fast-paced speech.
When it is time to leave Siem Reap, I feel as though
I’m leaving my home. My hosts have become my friends
- an ephemeral family - and our parting is a tearful
one. As I sit on the bus heading south, however, I
know I will be returning to this place. Two weeks
is not enough time to understand the resonance of
this holy place. A lifetime would not suffice. These
mighty ruins, and the amazing people that live among
and around them, are more than reason enough to brave
sweltering heat, mosquitoes, and kamikaze drivers
of all stripes – and after all, what fun would it
be if not for a little hardship?
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