14 December 2008

Naga Wat? (The Temples of Angkor, Cambodia)

Hello everyone. Some may have noticed that Max's influence was absent from the last blog. He was watching "the Unit," with our hosts in Phenom Penh while a tired and frustrated Kara narrated our entrance to Cambodia. This entry is dedicated to the week we spent at the temples at Angkor, commonly referred to as Angkor Wat. Angkor Wat is only one of over 40 ancient temples in the Siem Reap area. Our time spent in this area was divided between sunrises at the temples and slideshows and mini events at the Angkor Photography Festival (www.photographyforchange.net.) We have never felt more in touch with our closest star, the sun. We were there for you sun, every morning and every night.

p.s. the title of our entry: "Naga Wat?" Nagas are a seven headed snake from Hinduism which has special significance in Khmer (Cambodian) culture and is present everywhere throughout the temples and in much of modern Khmer architecture. A Wat is a Buddhist Temple. Many of the Temples at Angkor were built as Hindu temples, which were later converted to Buddhist. Some were built as Buddhist temples, later converted interestingly enough, to Hindu temples. Khmer Buddhism retains many symbols from its Hindu predecessor and these Nagas are present at all temples. Funny enough, they didn't make the photo edit. Next post. Onto the temples and the base city of Siem Reap...


Pretend lost en route to the Temples. Its about 6 am and the light was beautiful. Kara is getting good at the timer function and impromptu tripods.

A lake sized moat surrounds Angkor Wat, the most visited temple of the Angkor site. Most of the temples had moats, which are now used for recreation by the locals.

Riding out to the temples. These bikes cost a dollar a day to rent, which was way too much considering their quality, or lack there of. Kara's pedal fell off a lot and Max's ass was sore for days. The closest temples to Siem Reap town were about 10-15 km away; the furthest we rode out was about 25 km.

Checking out the tourist map on the bridge across the moat to Angkor Wat. The gateway to the temple blocks its famous emblematic towers.

Hall of "1,000 Buddhas" inside Angkor Wat. One of the concentric plazas leading to the central altar.

One sunrise at Ankor. The mornings were freezing (probably only 65 degrees but after traveling in Asia for a few months that IS freezing.) The days quickly warmed up to around 90 or so degrees by 11am.

Sleeping rasta girl in front of Angkor Wat.

Early morning Tuk-Tuk. We were planning to ride our bikes the 50 km to Bantei Srey and Kabal Spean (two far flung Angkor spots), but after the first day on our bikes, we realized we would need motorized transportation. We spent the day with Bo, who is Gary Knight and most of the VII Agency's Cambodian fixer. Photo people: small world, no? Everyone else: VII agency? Google them- really amazing photojournalism agency.

Kbal Spean. A kind of "outdoor temple" with lingas and religious iconography carved into the living rockbed of the stream. There are over 1,000 lingas here. It was also a beautiful hike.

Cheesy cam on the tuk tuk.

Kara with monk.

Our bungalow we stayed in. Usually bungalows are outdoors. Ours was on the roof of a popular backpacker hotel. It was 3 bucks a night and was a great spot to catch the sunset and hang out after a long day of everything. Garden Village guesthouse, for those of you headed to Siem Reap. Indoor rooms available too. In the background, you can see what used to be the roof balcony.

Bizarre to see this here. Tones is a well known NYC graffiti artist, and happened to have been commissioned to do several murals for a Siem Reap nightclub.

Bayon. So amazing. One of the few originally Buddhist temples, that was then converted into a Hindu temple, and then reconverted into a Buddhist one.

Photo opening in Siem Reap for the Photo festival. Temples by day, Photos by night. Repeat.

A nightly screening at the Photo Festival.

Kara's friend and photographer, Kelly Fajack www.kellyfajack.com sent us to meet up with his monk friend in Siem Reap. We hung out with him for an afternoon. He gave us a dharma talk and we gave him a LCD headlamp. It was really nice spending time with him and learning about Cambodian Theraveda Buddhism.

Our friend, the monk, Yorn Chea.

Max sits with Yorn.

Filling up. These gas "stations" are omnipresent throughout Cambodia. It is hard to see how they compete with each other, let alone regular gas stations.

Ancient Brahmi writing at one of the temples. A Sanskrit derivative, but you can see the roots of modern Khmer in this beautiful script.

Kara taking a picture. A group of such children swarm tourist outside every temple at Angkor. They sell knick-nacks and most don't go to school. They are both heartbreaking and irritating. Many Cambodians claim it is good that these children are working because they are able to provide a good income for their families as many tourists take pity on them and buy their "handicrafts," however, we had a hard time with this rationalization of child labor.

Taking a photo of tourists taking a photo, of tourists taking a photo. Angkor Wat.

Max is amazed by the intricate bas-reliefs covering the walls of Angkor Wat. Many of them depict stories from the Ramayana and the Mahabharata with a very noticable Khmer artistic and cultural influence.

Bas reliefs at Bayon.

"No dogs allowed."

This temple was situated, as you can see, in the middle of a man made lake.

Reading up on ancient Hindu mythology.

One of the kids who makes his living hanging out at the Temples.

Palm candy...so delicious.

Finished product. The ants like the candy just as much as we do and got ahold of the majority of our candy before we got home that day.

Max taking a photo.

We are a cheesy tourist couple.

Ta Prahm. This temple has been left in its "original preserved" state of decay. There are beautiful trees that have "invaded" the temple ruins. They are magnificent and often are as impressive or more than the temple itself.

Last night at Photo Festival. WpN photographer Will Baxter to the right of Max. Nice to meet you in person, Will! Will is an awesome photographer -- www.willbaxter.net.

Until next time.
K and M



Slow Boat to Cambodia

We took a slow boat to Cambodia. 8 hours-ish, of riding along the Mekong River from the border town of Chau Doc, Vietnam to Phenom Penh, Cambodia. We got there, eventually. A lot of things happened in between dock below and setting foot in the capital.


This is the dock where our international boat was departing from.

Mekong River. Most of the Mekong looked like this for the 8 hours we were on the boat.

The vessel. We left the dock without anyone but the boat driver and the man who insisted he take our passports. We refused, because we didn't know why he wanted them and he was a stranger. More on that in a minute. A half an hour into the boat ride, we picked up some tourists who were taking an early morning boat ride along the river.

We arrived at the border town of Vietnam and Cambodia. Here, all of the passengers were ordered, by the sketchy no named man who previously wanted to take our passports, to sit and wait for one hour. Above is the Cambodian animal quarantine area. Some kids were playing outside with dogs.

Here is the man who wanted our passports. We are pulling up to the Cambodian border.

After waiting one hour at some overpriced fried spring roll "restaurant"with the rest of the passengers, we were instructed to walk overland to get our passports stamped for Cambodia.
Everyone passed through but us. Apparently the reason the man wanted our passports was because he was going to get an exit stamp for us. There was a big controversy, and frankly we are too tired to write about it right now. Ask us about it when we get back. We got across the border eventually.

There's Kara, happy to be on the new Cambodian boat without any futher issues.

And there is Igor, our Slovenian friend. Not Slovak, but close enough when you're traveling in Cambodia.

Max discovered the top of the boat. He played games with this kid. We applied lots of sunscreen and watched the sun move throughout the day over the Mekong.

Sleeping on top of boat, 20 minutes to the port at Phenom Penh.

01 December 2008

Leaving Vietnam via the Rice Bowl

When we read that the Mekong Delta was "Vietnam's Rice Bowl," we wondered what that made the rest of the country. After traveling the whole length of the country, we had not seen a single province without an abundance of rice fields. But apparently we hadn't seen anything yet. The Mekong Delta is a series of rivers broken up by small patches of land and lots of space that is neither river nor shore. People live on all parts of the Mekong: on boats, barges, and houses. We spent a few days exploring two provinces of the Mekong before taking the slow boat up the river to Cambodia. Our first experience in the Mekong was in Can Tho, which is the region's largest city and is home to approximately 2 million people. We visited the floating markets of Can Tho before heading up to the border town of Chau Doc.


Sunrise on the Mekong. Worth waking up at 4:30 in the morning to experience the light on the water. Before we even saw the water, we were approached by a little old woman offering her boat for hire to visit the famous floating markets and cruise down the river. We spent 8 hours on the water, floating past the every day life of the people who live on the sprawling Delta.

Max.

People buying coconuts from the coconut boat.

Kara.

Between markets our enthusiastic boat driver pulled up to a small island and led us to a barn where they make rice noodles. She stopped along the way to pick flowers for us.

Kara shooting.

Rice soaks in water for several hours, turning it into a white paste.

Here the paste is spread over metal steamers.

The rice pancake is laid on racks of straw and bamboo to dry before being cut into rice noodles.

Another floating market.

The floating markets consist mostly of boats this size filled with various produce.

Typically the boats sell one item per boat. We stopped at the banana boat and the dragonfruit boat. We saw a duck boat next to us, selling live fowl by the kilo.

Kara looking dorky while steering the boat. Max doesn't endorse the use of the word "dorky" to describe Kara.

Really? Not dorky? Kara in between shots, getting her game face on.

The next day we took a bus to Chau Doc, a border town 2 kilometers from Cambodia. Upon arriving, we went up to Sam Mountain to get a better look at our new surroundings. Our motor bike got a flat on the way back.

Sam Mountain. Lots of locals come up here regularly to watch the sunset as well as tourists. Many pagodas can be found on this mountain as well. Although the tallest thing for miles, it is really more of a tall hill. It still gives a commanding view of the Mekong and we were able to see the border of Cambodia from here.

At the base of Sam Mountain is the international sculpture garden. It was also conveniently located across the street from our favorite vegetarian restaurant in town.

Last Day in Vietnam:

This road divides Cambodia and Vietnam. People lay their rice out to dry on the road. Everyone just drives over it. When in Rome....

Ducks. These were the cleanest ducks we saw all day.

Vietnamese countryside. Strikingly beautiful. Rice paddies for miles in more shades of green then we thought existed.

Rice piles. The straw is gathered around a central wooden pole and is stored outside in these piles.

Dirty ducks. We saw lots of these.

We had heard about the Khmer Rouge invasion of Vietnam and a monument to the victims in a nearby town. We searched for it for a long time without success. When a girl stopped us on the side of the street and asked if she could practice her English with Kara, we asked her if she knew of the "Khmer Rouge Skull Glass House" and she took us there.

Inside the small museum to the "Skull Glass House," we learned about the 1978 massacre of over 3,000 Vietnamese civilians by the Khmer Rouge. The killings happened over the course of two weeks. When we asked our new friend why this happened, she said she really didn't know. We really don't know either; we want to know more about this.

Graphic content.

"The Skull Glass House" is a monument that holds the skulls and bones of some of the people killed in the massacre.

They are arranged by age and gender, from under 2 years old to over 70.

Pagodas surround the monument. In one of them we found an altar to Ho Chi Minh. Kara says, "Yikes". Max thinks this is just as creepy as any other Ho Chi Minh personality worship.

More countryside.

We found this Buddha on top of an actual mountain late in the day. We had heard about it and had to pass through some bullshit authorities to get there. A motobike driver was trying to tell us that we needed to get off our motorbike so that he could drive us up there himself. He followed us a quarter up the mountain before realizing we weren't getting off and the real police didn't care if we were on our own.

This Buddha is massive. 30 meters tall to be exact. Birds fly through his nose and gigantic belly button.

Last look at the Cambodian border before crossing. Cambodia starts where the green rice paddies end and the water begins (right).

We learned a lot here and came to love this country. Its beautiful landscapes, relaxing beaches, historical significance and plentiful vegetarian food will be missed. Goodbye Vietnam.