A friend urged us to see Angkor Wat in Cambodia while we were in Southeast Asia, and we decided we should. We thought we would probably make a long-weekend trip from Khemmarat after school begins, but that would be a complicated trip -- 1-1/2-hour car trip to Ubon Ratchathani, flight to Bangkok and another flight to Siem Reap and then the reverse to get back home.
On Tuesday, April 23, our first full day in Koh Chang, we walked around the town and saw tour shop signs for trips to Angkor Wat. As we thought about it, that made sense since Trat Province (where we were) is in the southeast corner of Thailand along the border with Cambodia. We checked it out and found we could do a 2-day/1-night trip, so we booked that for Wednesday/Thursday (April 24-25).
The travel turned out to be very interesting. A van picked us up at our hotel at 7:30 am. Most of the passengers were younger than we and were carrying large backpacks. The trip to the Cambodian border took a lot longer than we expected, in part because we stopped at a few places to pick up additional passengers.. Shortly before we reached the border, we stopped for lunch and to have our visas processed. A guy took our passports; we ate and saw other passengers getting their passports back but we still didn't have ours. George asked and was told we would have them shortly -- we were "VIPs." We did get them back and headed to the border. The van stopped and we all got out with our luggage. While we milled around, a guy came up to us and said to follow him. We did. We got to the departure area for Thailand; he asked for our passports (which we gave him), told us to wait there for him and walked away. George was a little flummoxed by that -- the guy wasn't wearing any sort of uniform, had not been introduced to us by anyone from the van and had just walked off with our passports; he began wondering what if that guy didn't come back. Mary was not concerned. Eventually, the guy (whose name was Ya) did come back and walked us on into the Thai departure area where we checked out of Thailand. (George noticed that Ya had filled out George's Thai departure card and in the block for a signature had printed "GEORGE;" the Thai official didn't comment on that.)
Then Ya led us into Cambodia, where we got our Cambodian visas, and then to a bus. That's Ya standing near Mary below.
We were only in the bus for a few minutes and then were led to a car with our own driver and guide. The other passengers had not bought the package tour we did and did not get cars at the bus station. It was another several-hour ride to Siem Reap and our hotel; we arrived about 6 pm and were told to be ready to go to dinner at 6:30. While we didn't always understand what was happening for a lot of the trip, we marveled after it was over about the many logistics and hand-overs and how smoothly it had all taken place.
George had tried to save a few Baht by opting for a 3-star (rather than 4-star) hotel. Mary was very skeptical when she heard that (she was raised to believe you get what you pay for). The hotel looked fine from the outside,
but we quickly discovered that the toilet seat sat on the toilet but the connections were broken so one had to hold the seat as one sat. Mary insisted on calling room service to get it fixed. We were taken to dinner, which was at a big buffet hall with long tables awaiting tour groups. There was some local music, but it wasn't soothing dinner music.
Fortunately, we were ahead of the crowd and got in and out quickly (forgoing the Cambodia dance entertainment). When we got back to our room a couple hours later, the toilet seat had not been repaired, so Mary called down to the desk. We ended up switching rooms. After a few minutes, Mary realized that the new room, unlike the first, did not have a hair dryer, so another call to the desk and she retrieved the dryer from next door. And, the light on Mary's side of the bed didn't work. George learned a lesson -- no more 3-star hotels!
We went down for breakfast at 6 am on Thursday and met our English-speaking tour guide, Luke. We started our tour of Angkor Wat at about 7 am -- it was still cool and there were very few other tourists there. He led us to the east entrance where, he explained, photos would be better with the sun at our backs. The temple is oriented to the west so that is the more frequently used approach by tourists.
We actually visited the Anchor Archaeological Park. Wikitravel describes it this way:
"Stretching over some 400 square kilometres, including forested area, Angkor Archaeological Park contains the magnificent remains of several capitals of the Khmer Empire of the 9th to the 15th centuries, including the largest pre-industrial city in the world. The most famous are the Temple of Angkor Wat and, at Angkor Thom, the Bayon Temple with its countless sculptural decorations.
"Angkor Archaeological Park was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1992. At the same time, it was also placed on the List of World Heritage in Danger due to looting, a declining water table, and unsustainable tourism. UNESCO has now set up a wide-ranging programme to safeguard this symbolic site and its surroundings.
"Angkor itself has no accommodations and few facilities; the nearby town of Siem Reap, just 6 km. south, is the tourist hub for the area."
Angkor housed over 1,000 temples -- Angkor Wat principal among them.
We had half a day to see Angkor Wat, the Bayon Temple, and Angkor Thom. We were to have lunch at that point and then set off for the trip back to Koh Chang. We spent some time wondering how we could spend that amount of time in the Archaeological Park and still make it back to catch the last ferry to Koh Chang when it had taken us all day to get to Siem Reap the day before. George figured the tour company had taken tourists on this package many times and they must have figured it out.
Some of the things that struck us about what we saw that morning were: (1) what an amazing complex this must have been back in the 12th century, (2) how much has been lost since that time, (3) what a great effort is underway to preserve and reconstruct as much of the complex as possible, and (4) what an amazing amount of art in the form of stone carving is there to be enjoyed today.
Angkor Wat
(Thanks to Wikipedia for much of the information presented below.) Angkor Wat is said to be the largest religious monument in the world. It was built as a Hindu temple by Khmer King Suryavarman II in the early 12th century. It is the best-preserved temple at the site. It represents Mount Meru, home of the gods in Hindu mythology, and is surrounded by a moat. In the late 13th century, Angkor Wat moved from Hindu to Buddhist use, which continues to the present day. Unlike most of the other Angkor temples, Angkor Wat was never completely abandoned and the moat provided some protection from encroachment by the jungle. The temple underwent considerable restoration in the 20th century, mainly the removal of earth and vegetation. The work was interrupted by the civil war and the Khmer Rouge during the 1970s and 1980s, but relatively little damage was done during that time other than theft of mostly post-Angkorian statues.
The Siamese (now the Thais) took control of the Angkor area in the 14th-15th century. With the help of the French, the Cambodians reclaimed the area in the 1860s. The model of Angkor Wat that we saw at the Wat Phra Kaeo is a memorial of Siamese control of the temple for many years.
Here is a picture of the moat and of the west entrance to Angkor Wat.
Back on the east side of the complex:
Inside the outer walls, there are a series of galleries before one reaches the central tower.
The galleries provide a close-up view of much of the carving in the sandstone walls.
Our guide Luke is very well-versed about the stories the carvings tell.
The gallery walls depict a series of large-scale scenes, mainly episodes from the Hindu epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. A number of them depict battles between monkeys and men.
The temple also has a "quincunx" of towers (I had to ask Wikipedia what that means: "a geometric pattern consisting of five points arranged in a cross, that is five coplanar points, four of them forming a square or rectangle and a fifth at its center.")
There are a number of courtyards like the one below with a depressed area in the center. The depressed area would have been filled with water so that pilgrims could cleanse themselves before entering the sacred spaces.
While it wasn't crowded while we visited Angkor Wat, there were a few other tourists.
The most sacred area in Angkor Wat is the shrine under the central tower. The very steep stairways represent the difficulty of ascending to the kingdom of the gods. The shrine itself, originally occupied by a statue of Vishnu and open on each side, was walled in when the temple was converted to Theravada Buddhism, the new walls featuring standing Buddhas.
Unfortunately (or fortunately if we had had difficulty with those steep steps), we couldn't go into the shrine because it was closed for cleaning the day we were there.
A group of young monks was also touring that day.
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Detail from the photo above:
This shows damage from bullets fired during the civil war in the 1970s that led to the Khmer Rouge regime.
As we were walking along this gallery, we heard temple music in the background, and Mary thought it would help our readers get a better sense of the experience of touring Angkor Wat if we made a video. We don't have a lot of experience making videos (and Mary a little less than George), but Mary made the video. It's a little rough but we decided not to try to edit.
So we invite you to take a virtual walk along a gallery at this marvelous place. See video at: http://youtu.be/c-ow96O2oZ0
View of the west front of Angkor Wat from outside the moat:
A large Naga (seven-headed snake that is prominent in Buddhist temples) defending Angkor Wat:
The Bayon
Our second stop in the Angkor Archaeological Park was the Bayon, the last state temple built at Angkor and the only one built primarily as a shrine to the Buddha. It was built in the late 12th-early 13th century at the direction of King Jayavarman VII. It's most distinctive feature is the multitude of serene and massive stone faces on the many towers that jut from the upper terrace and cluster around its central peak. Some say the faces represent Jayavarman VII himself. There were changes in the 13th century, including alterations representing a return to Hinduism, which were reversed (to Buddhism) in later centuries. The temple was eventually abandoned to the jungle. During the 20th century, first the French and then the Japanese have helped conserve and restore the temple. Still, the Bayon did not appear to be as intact as Angkor Wat; the restoration effort still has a very long way to go. But it does go on: we saw archeologists at work in an excavation in front of the temple.
Over the centuries, vandals stole images from the temples and, if they were too big to carry away, broke them up and took the heads or other parts.
Many of the buildings appear to be largely destroyed.
And the carvings are, to these visitors' eyes, even more impressive than those at Angkor Wat. A sign at the Bayon describes the galleries and carvings: "Almost all of the exterior galleries that are today without roofs, have bas-reliefs on the walls. The Chinese appear in many places, they form a troupe of foot-soldiers, shop-owners with Khmer women as wives, and in drunken dance aboard a boat. Other bas-reliefs show small stalls at the market-place, construction workers plotting a route, women preparing grilled fish on skewers, and women suffering sickness - such varied scenes eloquently portray the daily life of the people."
Here are Chinese foot soldiers.
Our guide Luke was particularly well informed and enthusiastic about the carvings at the Bayon. He said the Khmer people were depicted with long ears (although he and most of the Khmer people we saw did not have long ears -- Luke said he thought the picture of the Khmer people with long ears in the carvings derived from the fact that the Buddha is often depicted with long ears).
We believe this is a depiction of Khmer King Jayavarman VII riding an elephant being accompanied by Khmer soldiers.
Here is a Khmer woman in childbirth with a midwife.
The Cham people inhabited what is today Vietnam from as early as the 2nd century AD. In the 12th century AD, the Cham fought a series of wars with the Angkorian Khmer to the west. In 1177, the Cham and their allies launched an attack from the lake Tonle Sap (south of Angkor) and managed to sack the Khmer capital. In 1181, however, they were defeated by the Khmer King Jayavarman VII. Many of the carvings at the Bayon commemorate that battle.
Here is a scene of Khmer people being forced to row a Cham boat.
After the defeat of the Cham people, the Khmer people prepare a feast and serve the wine.
And here are construction workers plotting a route. (The figure on the right is reading a map.)
To put these in perspective, these were carved some 800 years ago and have survived wind, rainy seasons, jungle encroachment, and human abuse. What a marvel!
The stone faces:
An interior chamber -- we like this picture a lot. The bit of color in the distance is a gold sash on a figure in a chapel.
Ta Prohm
The final stop in the Archaeological Park was Ta Prohm. Ta Prohm was built by King Jayavarman VII in the Bayon style in the late 12th and early 13th centuries and originally called Rajavihara. It is located approximately one kilometer east of Angkor Thom, the walled city established in the late twelfth century by King Jayavarman VII, of which Bayon was the spiritual and geographic center. Ta Prohm was founded as a Mahayana Buddhist monastery and university. Unlike most Angkorian temples, Ta Prohm has been left in much the same condition in which it was found: the photogenic and atmospheric combination of trees growing out of the ruins and the jungle surroundings have made it one of Angkor's most popular temples with visitors. UNESCO inscribed Ta Prohm on the World Heritage List in 1992. Today, it is one of the most visited complexes in Cambodia’s Angkor region. The conservation and restoration of Ta Prohm is a partnership project of the Archaeological Survey of India and the Authority for the Protection and Management of Angkor and the Region of Siem Reap.
Interesting to note with respect to the decision to leave this temple pretty much as it was, according to Wikipedia, Cambodia's primary rainforest cover fell dramatically from over 70% in 1970 at the end of the Vietnam war to just 3.1% in 2007. Deforestation is accelerating at an alarming rate, with overall rate of total forest loss at nearly 75% since the end of the 1990s. In total, Cambodia lost 25,000 square kilometers of forest between 1990 and 2005, 3,340 square kilometers of which was primary forest. As of 2007, less than 3,220 square kilometers of primary forest remain, with the result that the future sustainability of Cambodia's forest reserves is under severe threat
We saw at work some of the forces that have attacked these ancient structures. Seed get in crevasses in the wall and sprout and grow during the rainy season. Their growth pushes apart the blocks of laterite.
Most dramatic is what the Thais call sponge trees. These trees (with very soft wood) grow over the walls and buildings and push them over.
Luke explains how the roofs of many of the galleries have collapsed over the centuries.
After the 13th century conversion from Buddhism back to Hinduism, many Buddha images were removed. One example is shown below -- note the empty space between the two figures in the center of the photo.
And nature continues her march.
But reconstruction is underway as well.
Lunch, Then Back to Koh Chang, Thailand
We finished the tour at about 10 am (3 hours). By that time, it was getting hot and the area crowded. We headed for an early lunch at a nice restaurant across from a lake -- we were the only diners at that hour.
Mary particularly liked the view of the lake and the rickshaw passing out front.
In Thailand (and Taiwan for that matter), there are a lot of motorbikes -- more than cars it seems. We were struck in Cambodia by the number of bicycles we saw.
Ya was there to meet us when we got to the border and got us through the Cambodian and Thai processes very quickly.
Mary was impressed by the heavily laden carts we saw near the Thai-Cambodian border both going and coming.
We got on the van and began the trip back to the ferry that would take us to Koh Chang. We worried that we would be there in time for the last ferry at 7:30 pm. Somehow we almost made the 6 pm ferry, only missing it by minutes!
It was quite a trip and a great experience seeing the antiquities at Angkor Archaeological Park. We hope this report gives our readers a sense of it all.
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