Day 2 (24/9) - Siem Reap: Angkor Wat; Angkor Thom (Baphuon, Bayon) (Part 2)
Because we had a Hindu in our group, she could correct the guide, who became quite embarrassed and prefixed his future statements with lines to the effect of the following being his opinion, or local mythology.
I was surprised to find almost no modern graffiti. They must police the site very well.
Me preening
Descent and ascent
At this point, a mini-spectacle unveiled, witnessed by us from our resting place on a ledge. This PRC idiot had spurned the usual ways of coming down and had clambered out onto a ledge (at least 5m high). He dropped his waterbottle onto the floor with a big bang, and then launched himself off it - with an even bigger bang. Not least because he seemed to have landed on one foot, he broke some part of it. His friend was chiding him: "你发疯了你?!" (Are you mad?!) Perhaps the worst bit, though, was that as he jumped he took off a large block of stone, damaging the structure.
Illustration of the height he jumped from
Idiot being carried away
Procession
The 37 Heavens and 32 Hells
Demons churning the sea of milk.
Vishnu refereeing the tug of war, above the mandura (mountain). This is a lot more interesting than Abrahamic Mythology.
Way out via the side
Hair on the ground. Apparently someone had a haircut at Angkor Wat.
I ordered "Fresh milk with honey" and got Sterilised milk with watery syrup.
Ben and Black Iced Coffee
zhen and her coconut (and hat)
A horde of monsters waiting to assail us as we ran the gauntlet after leaving the protective confines of the restaurant. I got out and opened my umbrella, held it in front of me and charged, clearing a way to the bus. Even when we were on the bus, we were still harassed, with the denizens of the forest waving their weapons at us and shouting through the glass. It was a spine-chilling experience, I aver.
One other trick the kids tried on us were to draw on pieces of paper and try to sell them to us. Also, they all seemed to be parroting scripts: "You want to buy ***?", "You remember me okay, my name ***", "Next time you buy my ***" and even emotional blackmail ("You bluff me, you say you would buy from me just now"), mostly prefixed with a "Sir" or "Laday" (sic) and delivered in plaintive voices, making it reminiscent of a horde of prostitutes hawking their wares.
It was said that it was bad that tourism had come to the area, since the kids were hawking their wares (even if not themselves) instead of going to school, but the alternative to besieging tourists would've been picking in rubbish heaps, or some such.
We then visited the Ecole Française d'Extrème Orient (the more than 100 years old French Institute for the Far East). Although it was a public holiday (the Paris Peace Accords anniversary), one of the staff talked to us.
Kun
ACBC
UNESCO has no money, so they coordinate the international teams rather than do restoration work per se.
Although there has been a big rush in the post-war era, before the Khmer Rouge period, only 2 non-French teams worked in Cambodia - one Indian and one British, The guy said that the British team came, cleared 1-2 trees and then left. Given that he also took a potshot at Anglo-Saxon scholars in the 80s who theorised that the water in Angkor Wat's canals were for the Gods' but not daily use without visiting Cambodia, I'm quite sure this was one of the usual anti-British snipes.
[A passage on the canals:
"As Higham (2001: 160) neatly summarizes, scholarship on Ankor’s irrigation network falls into two distinct camps. Eminent researchers like Bernard-Philippe Groslier and Jacques Dumarçav argued that the city’s success as a hydraulic society stemmed from its elaborate water infrastructure of rivers, canals and two vast reservoirs, or barays. This approach provided the foundations for a more recent study conducted by the University of Sydney, which concluded that the decision to abandon the region was based upon the catastrophic failure of the canal and reservoir system. The other camp, to which it appears Higham subscribes, argues that despite containing millions of cubic meters of water. the barays were totally inadequate for extensive rice cultivation. Instead, it is suggested an explanation for these expanses of water lies in their symbolic value as earthly representations of the oceans surrounding Mount Meni"
- Post-conflict Heritage, Postcolonial Tourism: Tourism, Politics and Development at Angkor, Tim Winter]
They earn US$50 million a year in ticket sales. A few years ago 30% went to the company managing the place and 70% to APSARA ("Authority for Protection and Management of Angkor and the Region of Siem Reap" - I just found out it stood for that as part of some 'clever' wordplay; this momentarily puzzled me since the acronym didn't fit, till I clicked "Français" on the website). Now this 70% goes to the Ministry of Finance which gives the lion's share of revenues to APSARA.
Even before Europeans discovered Angkor Wat, it had been a place for pilgrimage not just for locals but other Asians.
They were using aerial reconnaissance as early as the 20s to look at old rice fields and the sites of wooden temples (which have long disappeared but have left distinct soil patterns).
They've found Bronze Age remains from 2000BC at Angkor Wat.
Apparently there's been neo-Colonialism at the site. For example, a Jap team spirited away some statues and hit them in their office (instead of bringing them to a central collection agency). They then got a private Jap businessman to donate money to build a Jap-run museum to house the statues, asking the King to name the museum for appearances. But then, some claims of neo-Colonialism are problematic, since the people who lived there 3000 years ago were not 'Khmer' or 'Cambodian'.
There are very few locals involved in archaeology in Cambodia. Some expressed concern at this, but given that it requires a lot of study and doesn't pay well I'm sure most people can see why people in developing countries rather get jobs to feed their families.
Kampongs opposite EFEO
For lunch we went to a restaurant which was very slow. My rule of thumb is that if you can seat a certain number of people, you better be able to feed them within a reasonable length of time.
We then went to Baphuon in the huge site of the city of Angkor Thom (sadly apart from the South gate and the temples little seemed to be left of the rest of the city) where they're reconstructing a temple. It used to house a gold linga of Shiva. Since the temple was built on a pile of sand, this causes problems when there's rain. And this being the tropics, it rains a lot. No wonder they need to reconstruct it and add concrete to protect the sand layer. The stones of the temple were also rough-hewn and didn't use mortar.
There're a lot of missing parts at Baphuon. Because of the way the place is structured, this results in a weak embankment and low resilience, so they need to hew a lot of new blocks. Furthermore, without new blocks, people would be able to imagine what it looked like.
There was also a giant reclining Buddha at the site, but it was built by the cousin of the King dates from a later period than the rest of the monument. Since it was built using part of the material of the monument, it would be dishonest in a way to reconstruct the monument in full and include the Buddha, so they're going to leave the East (IIRC) Wall (which was plundered for material) unreconstructed.
Approach
A giant Buddha
We then split into 2 groups - one went back to the hotel and the other spent an hour exploring the ruins of Bayon, which was really only a hop, skip and jump away.
North Gate
Quotes:
[On a group using corrosive chemicals on sites] Their work was heavily criticised, not because they were Indians but because it was shit.
He's so French... He's like a French stereotype come true.
I use my sunglasses to check out guys. I look in their general direction. 'I'm just looking at that direction'. Actually I'm not.