Cambodia, the Angkor Temples

[Guest]

Hi all, what follows below is an adaptation of a narrative I did for part of a video I made. So please allow for the 'jumpiness' of style. And whilst this could, by some, be seen to fall outside the definition of 'Sanuk', I can assure you that this was fun to make and that the temples are some of the most amazing things I've seen.

 

 

 

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Cambodia is bordered by Thailand to the West, Laos to the North and Vietnam to the East. The area is also known as Indo-China, a reference to the merging of the Indian and Chinese cultures in earlier times.

 

 

 

To get to Cambodia I first travelled to Bangkok, thence to Phnom Penh, then to Siem Reap, the home of the historic Angkor Temples, and some very interesting history.

 

 

 

Cambodia is now recovering from years of war and disruption

 

 

 

River travel is common in Cambodia because the most of roads have been wrecked

 

 

 

Air travel is now commonplace into and around Cambodia, especially between Bangkok, Phnom Penh and Siem Reap.

 

 

 

With air travel being what it is there are however, the attendant delays and waiting at the airports.

 

 

 

To get to the temples of Siem Reap, an enjoyable way, to see the country, is to take a fast boat up the river.

 

 

 

The tourists prefer to sit on the roof of the boats, both to escape the heat of the cabin interior and to view the sights on the way.

 

 

 

Tourism in Cambodia is now becoming well developed, with people from all over the world, visiting what is, from the tourist point of view, an unspoilt and interesting country.

 

 

 

The main thoroughfares in Siem Reap, are little more than dirt roads.

 

 

 

There is very little good roading in Cambodia but construction is going on all the time, with projects from the international community, helping bring Cambodia back from the devastation of war.

 

 

 

The local shops sell most things including petrol from plastic soda bottles.

 

 

 

On the way to the temples there is rebuilding to be seen. Including a torture center for Pol Pot, now a Monumental Masons

 

 

 

All along the 7 kilometre journey to the Temples there are stalls and homes in the countryside.

 

 

 

Siem Reap province covers some 10,000 square kilometres, most of it Jungle and rice paddys. Many of the temples are covered in the Jungle.

 

 

 

Angkor Wat is the largest and most famous of the numerous temples in the Siem Reap area. This view is from the nearby Phnom Bakheng temple.

 

 

 

To get to the Phnom Bakheng temple you must first climb a near verticle hill. Even at dusk it is 35 degrees Celcius here. The Temple is built on a natural stone mountain and this hill is very steep.

 

 

 

Once you are up, there are some very steep steps up the Temple itself, I nearly had a heart attack getting to the top.

 

 

 

Phnom Bakheng was built in the 10th century by Jassovarman the 1st. There are 12 religious sanctuaries on each of the levels of the complex.

 

 

 

The Kingdom of Kambuja really got going in the 7th century, each successive King building one or more temples in his lifetime.

 

 

 

Bayon Temple was built in the 12th century, by Jayavarman the 7th. One of the more recent temples, it is located in what was the middle of a very large city, now gone as the wooden buildings did not survive the passage of time.

 

 

 

There are many representations of the four faces of King Jayavarman the 7th looking over and protecting the people and facing towards the four cardinal points.

 

 

 

These four faced statues are common throughout the Khmer culture.

 

 

 

Griffon and snake motifs are commonplace...though a lot the statuary has been looted over the years.

 

 

 

Bayon temple is very large and has it's own team of security guards. There is a lot of reconstruction underway here and this is also a very popular temple with the tourists.

 

 

 

Stone ballustrades portray the body of snakes, most of these are now gone.

 

 

 

At various places throughout the ruins you can see small shrines to Buddah that can date back some thousand years.

 

 

 

Pillars are very prevalent in this complex and are often decorated with Bas Relief

 

 

 

Royalty and high priests use to frequent the upper levels of the temples, now they are a resting place for the ubiquitous back packer.

 

 

 

The majority of the large statues are made up of individual carved blocks, forming the whole.

 

 

 

Also constructed in the 12th century, by Jayavarman the 7th, the Elephant terrace is a long depiction of elephants in various scenes of battle. Parts of which are undergoing reconstruction.

 

 

 

Phimeanakas is the Celestial temple and was once cloaked entirely in gold.

 

Legend has it that the King slept at the top of the temple and that a Snake Princess would join him every night. If the King missed one evening, the entire Kingdom would suffer a terrible famine. And if the Snake Princess did not appear the King would surely die.

 

 

 

Preah Kahn is another by Jayarvarman the 7th, built on an battle field where he was victorious against the Chams. Surrounded by a moat, this was another city of some size and included a travellers rest and a hospital. It was overgrown until recently when re-building began.

 

 

 

Trees often take over the temple ruins, intertwining their roots with the stone blocks. Often, there are, in the midst of the overgrown temple ruins, other buildings, which though smaller are just as ornate.

 

 

 

Rajendravarman the 2nd built East Maybon in 952 as a sanctuary for his ancestors. It was once in the middle of a large Baray or lake and was only accessible by boat.

 

 

 

The Rolous Group temples date from the 9th century and are some of the oldest surviving examples of Khmer art. There are Brahmin cattle depicted here, indicating the earlier Indian influences on the Khmer culture. It is easy to see here the detail and artistry that the Khmers decorated the temples with, some of which is in very good condition even after more than a 1000 years. Many of the Rolous temples venerate Hindu Gods and are in close proximity to modern day villages.

 

 

 

The construction of the Rolous group is also an early example of using both pink sandstone and the darker granite which became more prominent in later temple complexes.

 

 

 

Ta Phrom is a facinating temple also known as the Jungle Temple. It has been left in the state that it was when it was rediscovered, with the jungle encroaching at every corner. It is easy to see how that despite the ornateness of the architecture, the simple block on block building methods have resulted in collapse over time. There are trees here that are supposedly some 300 years old, given that the temple itself is over nine hundred years old, that makes the trees relatively recent arrivals. It is difficult to see whether the stones are supporting the tree or whether the tree is supporting the stones.

 

 

 

The delicate bas relief are of Aspara, the famous Angkor dancing girls.

 

 

 

Ta Phrom was once home to over 72,000 people. Amongst those 72,00 people were 2 and a half thousand monks and 650 dancers in court.

 

 

 

All of the trees with these amazing roots are Banyan trees. Even though the sites have been opened to tourists, with most areas accessible, there are areas where it is too dangerous to go due to falling masonry.

 

 

 

There are numerous examples of ornately wrought bas relief, sometimes depicting daily life, sometimes myths and legends and sometimes of an instructional nature. It is unfortunate that most temples, including Ta Phrom have been heavily looted, with the spoils ending up in so called art collectors collections. When you see what little is left in the temples themselves you realize that there has been extensive pillage in the name of art.

 

 

 

Thommanon was built in the 11 th century by, ahem Uda-yadit-yarvarman and is dedicated to the Indian god Vishnu. Again, this temple has been heavily looted, only a few bas relief remaining.

 

 

 

Lo lei was built in 893 by King Yasovarman the 1st and was another temple located in the middle of a lake which has since dissapeared. The bas relief here are quite detailed and show warriors as well as dancers.

 

 

 

There is a large seven headed snake at one of the gates that are the entrance to Angkor Thom. Angkor Thom was a large city and the gates are guarded by giants heads. Each of the gates has four heads, again facing the four cardinal points.

 

Each terrace or layer of the temple is a step closer to nirvana and by worshipping the appropriate deities one progresses to the hearafter. Here you can see a succession of shrines ascending to heaven. It is quite common to see various pieces of decoration, reassembled on the ground, waiting to be re-sited. The seven headed snake commonly protects the entrances to most of the temples. I am reliably informed that there is a crematorium, placed at the base of the temple so the departed could begin the journey upward. And with the temperature in the late 30's, you can imagine that this is a very hot place.

 

 

 

This is Baksei Chamkrong a small Hindu Temple built in 921 by King Hasavarman the 1st. There used to be a golden image of Shiva inside, it's gone now.

 

 

 

Angkor Wat is undoubtedly the biggest and most famous of the temple complexes in Cambodia. This is the west gate and the causeway that crosses the huge moat. And as you can see, there are plenty of tourists. If you look into the distance you will see the distant spires of Angkor Wat itself.

 

 

 

Built in the beginning of the 12th century by Suryavarman the 2nd, Angkor Wat is styled as a funeral pyre dedicated to Vishnu. This is the main entrance through the west gate. Once inside the complex proper there is a walk of about a kilometre to the temple it-self. Angkor Wat is almost over-run by tourists and is undergoing reconstruction. It is interesting that Pol Pot didn't demolish this temple. There are galleries enclosing swimming pools in the outer areas of the temple buildings.

 

There are larger steep flights of stairs leading to the top levels and some of the intricate representations of Buddah are remarkably well preserved

 

 

 

There are many areas of the temples that have not been too devastated and the galleries in Angkor Wat are a good place to start when seeking out the more intricate carvings and bas reliefs.

 

 

 

There are part buddahs, still sacred after all these years. Many of the walls, pillars and roofs bear intricate decoration. There are depictions of various dancing poses. Here a depiction, or what's left of it, of court life

 

 

 

Back at the Bayon temple, though covered in lichen, the quality of the stone work is obvious to the eye, it's very detailed work and even the feet are pointed sideways to prevent the giving of offence. This reminds me of the descripton of an early chinese scholar, describing the King of Angkor when coming out of the temple. All the soldiers and elephants came first with column upon column extending out from the temples in great number. The royals would be perched high on the backs of the elephants. Following these there would be the courtiers and the dancers too numerous to count and finally the King himself resplendant in gold and finery.

 

 

 

On the other side of this entrance we see a repetition with many of the same figures and processions.

 

 

 

One of the great problems in the temples is the erosion caused by water, seen as dark patches on the Bas relief.

 

 

 

The proliferation of representations of the people and their day to day lives was said to bolster the reigning Monarch's position as God King.

 

We must remember that more often than not the carvings were decorated or covered with gold, was a direct display of the Monarch's wealth and Power. Much as it is today. There is a legend that is based in fact, that deals with the rise of the God Kings, as rulers of Cambodia. In the 8th century, the then Young King of Kambuja demanded the head of the King of Java, a much more powerful gentleman by the name of Zagab. As it happened, when Zagab heard of this, he invaded Kambuja and decapitated the Young King instead. But being wise, Zagab returned to Java with another young man from Kambuja, who he trained in the arts of Kingship. This young man was Jayavarman the 2nd, one of the first Khmer God Kings. There are Aspara from the 8th century. The term Aspara refers to the dancing girls that were part of court life in the ancient temples and palaces. In those days a kings wealth was measured not only in Gold and jewels but by the amount of warriors, dancers, courtiers, elephants and buffalo and so forth he could keep and provide for.

 

 

 

Throughout the centuries the Khmers were active invaders and recipients of invasion to and from the surrounding kingdoms and countries. When the Thais finally, after several successes and failures over the centuries, invaded and brought an end to the Khmer dynasties in 1594, they captured the entire corps de ballet, some 1500 Aspara, much like these shown here, and took them all back to Thailand.

 

 

 

The dances as performed by the Khmer Aspara then became what is now known as traditional Thai Dance and only now in the 20th and 21st centuries is the traditional Khmer dance enjoying a resurgence.

 

 

 

Almost every where in the temple complexes are works of reconstruction or piles of rock awaiting reconstruction.

 

 

 

At one temple, when the restorers began to re-build, they pain-stakingly dissassembled the whole structure, carefully numbering each block, and recording the position on paper. Unfortunately Pol Pot and company, destroyed pretty much all the paper in Cambodia, so now the blocks are a giant big jigsaw puzzle, Yet more interesting, is that with the Aid of computers they have completed the puzzle and are now ready to rebuild!

 

 

 

There are numerous water reservoirs, lakes, ponds and moats in the Siem Reap province. The main reason that Angkor Wat could maintain a population of more than a million people at a time when London England was approximately a tenth of the size, was that the entire region was crissed crossed with canals and irrigation schemes. Modern satellite imagery clearly shows the extent of these systems, the majority of which have dissapeared into the jungle and become over grown. Because of the extensive water supply, topped up each monsoon, they were able to get 3, 4, somtimes more crops of rice a year compared to a lucky one or two of their neighbours. Even today the fresh waterfishing industry in Cambodia is a significant resource.

 

 

 

Today there are fish and lotus farmed in the ponds and moats surrounding the temples.

 

 

 

Moats and reservoirs also contribute to the not inconsiderable humidity of Siem reap.

 

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[shotover]

Great description, makes me want to return there on my next trip. I wanted to rent a moto to drive myself last trip, but I was told foreigners cannot rent motos in Siem Reap!

[Guest]

Most likely a scam, I didn't but I saw plenty who did, trail bikes mainly.

 

 

 

Cheers

[Guest]

BULLFEATHERS !!!

 

 

 

Now taking out of town to somewhere else to leave is a different story.

 

 

 

They want their bikes back.....suggestions?

[BelgianBoy]

Coss,

 

 

 

Thanks for the great post, makes me want to go there, cant wait till december !

 

 

 

Cheers !

 

 

 

PS : your avatar is not showing anymore ( red x )

[Guest]

That's interesting, I got KS to put my avatar on the server, I'll message him and see what's up.

 

 

 

Cheers

[bibblies]

Wow! Coss, you're really making an effort to get the topics away from M6.875, aren't you! (Oops! mentioned it again..)

 

 

 

You didn't have many personal recommendations or tips in your report so here are some of mine:

 

 

 

1. The "fast" boat trip isn't as good as it's made out to be. It's cramped, uncomfortable and the view palls well before the 4 hours it takes to get there. Furthermore, it only sets off at the crack of dawn. If I did it again, I'd catch the plane.

 

 

 

2. I went in October. It was hot, damn hot, especially if you're doing a lot of clambering around the ruins. So the $20 a day for an air-conditioned car, driven by a local who knows his way around (the area of the ruins is HUGE) is money well spent.

 

 

 

3. For fatties/oldies/sloths/scaredy-cats: if you're the type that needs to see every inch of everything, it takes quite a lot out of you. The area of the temples is huge and some of the ruins you have to negotiate are steep. There are few paths or guard rails and, given the heat, I could imagine quite a few medical problems occuring if you're not careful. Cambodia isn't a good place to get those!

 

 

 

4. Surprisingly, most of the temples have very few tourists. Of course, Angkor Wat itself has a lot and there were a fair few visitors to Ta Prohm but there were many temples, including the beautiful, yet unheralded, Preah Kahn, where I found myself completely alone. There weren't many people at Bayon either.

 

 

 

5. My guide persuaded me to go to see the river of a thousand lingas, which was discovered relatively recently in the mountains 20-30km away from Angkor. Once again, I was the only visitor there and, while it was interesting, WOW! - with the heat, it was some climb to get there! I'm not sure that most people would find it worthwhile. I could imagine my dad wanting to see that and collapsing some way up..

 

 

 

6. Hawkers! Be prepared for the most desperate hawkers you've ever encountered. They're very, very, very persistent. Cambodia's very poor - ten times poorer than Thailand - and with very few tourists, they're desperate for your custom. Their stuff's not bad either - the disposable camera I bought from a hawker at Ta Prohm temple worked fine.

 

 

 

7. Accomodation in Siem Reap: I wouldn't worry too much about this. It's such a small town that you can easily walk from place to place checking things out. There's plenty of spare capacity in every price bracket. As I said, not many tourists yet..

 

 

 

8. Guidebooks - I picked up the acclaimed 'Angkor' by Dawn Rooney for a very (some might say suspiciously) cheap price in one of the bookshops across the street from the well-known Sharkey's bar in Phnom Penh.

 

 

 

9. Time. They say it takes 3 days to see most of the sights around Angkor and that's about right. I found myself taking a few hours at each of the smaller temples of Bayon, Ta Prohm, Preah Kahn. Angkor Wat itself took half a day. Even if you're the type that doesn't normally go for such sights, the temples are invitingly cool peaceful places to sit down and linger.

 

 

 

10. Take a M6.875 girl! You know it makes sense! (Sorry coss, I couldn't resist it. Some people did though. And why not?)

 

 

 

Edited by Coss (Converted kilometres to miles).

 

 

[Guest]

Hi there,

 

I agree with you about the hawkers they are so persistent. But what did you think about their English? I was amazed how good their English was, they would even argue back and had an answer for everything. I was so amazed with one little girl I eventually gave way and bought a Lonely Planet guide to Cambodia for US$ 5, absolutely the genuine thing, but a photocopy, so the pictures were in black and white but all I wanted was the info!!!!!!!!!!

 

Don't buy a Lonely Planet guide before u go u will get hundreds at the first temple u visit for a fraction of the price you pay in the USA or UK or OZ or wherever........germany norway france.........

 

Uniformguy

[bibblies]

The Dawn Rooney guidebook that I got was perfectly printed in glossy colour but sold at a tenth of the recommended retail price. I asked if it was a mistake but they said no.

[Guest]

Excellent description Being to Cambo for many times, but I never made it out of Phnom Penh.

 

 

 

The next time I will definitely visit one of the world wonders (and Snooky). Everybody told me it is breathtaking.