Cambodia: The Mystery & Magnetism of Angkor Wat
“We live in a wonderful world that is full of beauty, charm & adventure. There is no end to the adventures we can have if we only seek them with our eyes open” – Jawaharal Nehru
Angkor Wat is one of my favorite places on the planet and one of the best trips I have ever taken.
One of my life goals is to see & experience as many spiritual & sacred sites on the planet as possible and this is certainly one of them. After all of the reading I had done on Angkor Wat, to see it in person was beyond my wildest imagination. The “Churning of the Ocean Milk” bas relief at Angkor Wat is one of THE coolest things I have ever seen, as it depicts the story about the beginning of time and the creation of the universe. Both the idea & the craftsmen are equally unreal to me. It’s incredible.
The temples are magnificent. Our temple highlights included:
Ta Prohm
Angkor Wat
Angkor Thom
Terrace of the Elephants
Terrace of the Leper King
Phimeanakas
Baphuon
North & South Kleang
Bayon
Banteay Kdei
Preah Khan
From my journal entries while visiting Angkor Wat, Cambodia:
5/30 3:43 PM IT (Indochine Time) – Sunday
“Sitting at the bar in Cambodia, Siem Reap – at the Heritage Suite Hotel. I desperately need to write down my adventures since leaving Singapore! My brother & I have had a wonderful adventure exploring the temples of Angkor Wat.
Ta Prohm has been my favorite… there is such a peaceful quality to the whole place. I was thinking I would make a real connection with some part of the temple complex [as I have literally been drawn to this place my entire life] and Ta Prohm was definitely it. It’s literally located in the middle of the jungle. Vegetation has overrun the temple. It’s exactly what I thought all of the temples would be here. The temples have been taken over by two major trees… the ceiba pentandra – a silk cotton tree & a ficus gibbosa – a strangler fig. The strangler figs are huge and give the whole area a very surreal feel to the place. But I still go back to it, it has a very peaceful, tranquil vibe to it. Incredibly inviting! I really felt at home there. I would have liked to stay there all afternoon, listening to the birds call, the trees blowing in the slight wind, in the distance, Cambodian music… as I said, very tranquil. It took my breath away…”
[In truth, I felt like I had lived here in another life. I had such a strong feeling about it. Call it deja vu, a past life or just an instinct, but everything felt so familiar to me. In some moments I literally felt like I knew what was going to be around the corner; I could visualize the past moments. It was like a dreamlike state, where a white shiny like sparkles around an image like a dream.]
“It felt like a space filled with a strong spiritual energy… it was a very eerie meets tranquil feeling. It was if the ghosts of the past haunt all of the temples, watching & listening, ready to reach out and touch you… All of the faces of the Buddhas and the Bahamans staring at you; it’s comforting & creepy at the same time, like they’re always watching you.”
“…and yet these places are considered religious sanctuaries for Buddhists and Hindus alike… so much blending of religions and culture – Buddhist, Hindus, Cambodia, Vietnamese, Siamese… so much history, it hard to grasp… thousands of years of history going back to the beginning of recorded history, chiseled into the walls. It’s actually astounding. As Americans, we don’t readily have the exposure to that kind of history; but if you come with an open mind and a willingness to drop into the middle of a culture and ‘mix it up’ you can get it… a mix of openness, curiosity, humility and sincere engagement and I guess I would add, fearlessness, or at least having the ability to let all of your preconceived notions or expectations go…”
“…people in Cambodia are so friendly and open… they remind me of the people in Malaysia, Nicaragua & Costa Rica. In fact, similarities between Central America and Southeast Asia are incredible. So many of the cultural characteristics are the same. The way people live. The houses. The shops. The way they interact with tourists. I wonder if it has to do with the inter-relationship between first world & developing countries?”
“I sat on Pub St. in Old Market in downtown Siem Reap last night and watched the city come alive… with the lights, the sounds and smells – the chaos of sorts. It was a bit chaotic; unscripted and uncontrolled. All of the hustlers interacting with the tourists. The aggressive tuk-tuk drivers, the vendors, and seller calling out, ‘hello sir, would you like to buy a_____’, the prostitutes & she-boys, the hostesses calling at you from the entrances to the restaurants and bars; all the traffic, all the walkers, the horns beeping, et. al. I said to myself, ‘I love this!’ I love people watching! The mini dramas of all of these people, rising & falling. American life is missing this energy. This feeling of ‘aliveness.’ There is not this kind of energy in America life anymore – the necessity of community & connectedness. The economic & social reliance on one another. An implied interdependence for survival.
America is not connected to itself and we’re certainly not connected to the world around us. We’re out of touch. We’ve lost our vitality, our humanity and our humility; our compassion. America has lost its spirit, its soul.”
5/31 5:00 PM IT – Monday
“I love Cambodia. Love it! Love it! Love it! I don’t want to leave tomorrow. I would like to stay awhile… Live a much simpler existence; even more spiritual – earth & spirit.”
[As a note: I was so taken by my adventure to Cambodia, that I even talked about moving there and opening a restaurant when I initially returned from my trip.]
“Earlier, I was in the pool when a thunderstorm / rainstorm passed overhead. Since it’s rainy season, we’ve been told to expect these frequently & without warning. The rain was literally pounding down. It was a very beautiful sound, actually. I love listening to the rain come down… and watch the lightning strike! It’s a very calming sound for me… I was in the pool when the storm started and I watched the trees rustle with excitement as the wind pushed through and the great orchestration of the planet began to make music! Rain, wind, & lightning, beautiful.”
6/1 8:08 AM IT – Tuesday
“Sitting in the restaurant waiting for my brother, enjoying a wonderful cup of coffee, served to me by our regular hostess Sopheap.
So far, it’s been two days of hardcore temple exploring and a day out a Tonle Sap Lake to see the floating fishing villages. That was an interesting adventure yesterday, seeing the Vietnamese Cambodian fishing villages. What an absolutely fascinating experience. What an absolutely different way to live your life on earth… literally living on a simple houseboat with no electricity, living and fishing on the lake you live on. The pictures I took will not do the scene justice… children playing in the water, boats of all sizes serving all sorts of purposes – fishing boats, tourist boats, transport boats, boats that look no bigger than cut logs. All reminding me of the resilience, resolved and ingenuity of human beings.”
