Heat and History

Over the course of two days, in ambient 96 degree weather, I explored Angkor Wat and the many other ruins nearby. I can approxinate I saw around 15 sites. The first day me and my motorbike driver tackled the outer site. The make-or-break experience at a site is, decidedly, the number of other tourists there. (Second priority is the time of day - to get the best light :-). Being able to walk through a huge vaulted stone hallway, following the bas relief stories on the wall, accompanied only by the sound of your feet shuffling on the sandy floor and the sun shining through the archways, is meditative and inspiring. To be in the same place with other tourists (especially the dreaded tour bus groups!) is completely another experience, and one I would almost rather not have altogether. The outer temples are more green and tourist concentration is more random, so the 10-hour day breezed by.

The ruins are fascinating on many levels. The visual appearance is overwhelming: monstrous sizes, amount of damage, interwining of the jumgle, etc. One of a kind. But the real intrigue comes when you engage your imagination : What did this building and city look like in its prime? Who walked in these halls and on what business? Then the ultimate question: How could it all come to this - a pile of ruins, practically forgotten and arguably irrelevant in the modern world?

It seems unfathomable for a massive civilization to fall. But it's happend time and again and the world hasn't ended. We are still here after Rome and Egypt's fell. It seems like any event that huge must have some important lesson. The only one that stands out is the seeming fact that our civilization isn't protected or special either. The concept of life, and all aspects of it, having cycles is one of the most basic and undeniable truths. (this applies outside the realm of living things....the earth revolves around the sun, after all). Like seeing a ghost, we are reminded of our own numbered days. In face of our own death, we can decide how to live differently, but what about for a civilization? Such a huge system is not easily controlled. Can we control it at all, even if we knew what we wanted to do with it? Or decline just an inevitable truth that we are better off forgetting about?

The second day I spent at the hardcore sites: Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom. I arrived at Angkor Wat at 7:30am and it turned out to be a perfect time- I was glad to have some of Angkor Wat to myself. The rest of the day I saw the numerous structures at Angkor Thom, which is (was) a huge walled city. While amazing (some of the most impressive structures here), the mid-day sun and number of tourists and touting wore me down. Touting from children selling books, jewlery, following you into the temples, woman selling pinepples, cold drinks, and amputees asking for money. It's not like in America where we have welfare and social security, and where many people are the creators of their problems; these people really have nothing and you can't blame them. I gave a lot of money, on a Cambodian scale, to the people throughout the two days. After 7 hours, a mere halfday for the diehards, I was ready to say goodbye to the temples.

My days are numbered in Cambodia: 5. I am trying not to think about it :( Off to Battambang tomorrow, then Bangkok for my flight to Rome...where I am spending 10 days in Italy with Frank!