The main road traffic in Siem Reap is like a medium level town in India. People are on bicycles, motorcycles, and three-wheelers. Cars run and occasional fancy ones flash by. I didn't see any public transport or group vans. There were no heavy vehicles moving that transport goods. I learned later that most food stuff used are locally produced. Farmers drop them off in the market. The storage facilities have not come in. The factory goods get delivered once a week or less frequently. I saw a lot f restaurants of different kinds.
Mr. Kushal seemed like a happy young man. He waved at people as he was driving by. Possibly he indicated that he was busy. He had spoken to me a of a plan for me as to how I might spend my three days in Cambodia. I have heard of the ruins, but this is the first time I was going to visit some old ruins with a purpose to connect. I had seen big temple complexes in India, but I could not imagine what they would be if abandoned and broken down.
Tearing down old monuments is a byproduct of human conflicts. Structures are built only when the community remains insulated from the world, and prospers. Somebody outside gets a hint of the prosperity and invades with force. The invaders are mostly hungry and do not have any idea of the industry that goes into producing structures. Some invaders destroy monuments to look for gold, some others destroy for the fun of it in the name of religion or ideology.
In Mexico City, I came to know that the old Aztec temple was buried under ground and the current church was built over it. The temple lay in tact underneath that they discovered while digging for the subway. I learn that burying and building on the burial is fairly common in history. All mounds on earth bury something interesting!
We passed through the city settlements. Affluence of a society is measured by the amount of technology people might use. The ancestors here built massive structures using low level technology, but now the construction of a simple residential room looks rickety. Is it lack of organization or lack of mobilization? An artisan is not an engineer! Many old societies lack the process of collective labor. Kings and chieftains organized them. An artisan like a scholar needs support. Artisans can be taken as slaves to bury their ancestors' built-up structures. They bury as artfully as they construct. They produce objects, they do not integrate a system.
From the scientific dating, it is discovered that the area was built up between ninth and twelfth century AD. The citations in the monuments give credit to a King Jayavarman, whose name seems to tally with the Ganga rulers of the time in the old Trikalinga. The Gangas worshiped the Hindu god Vishnu and built Vishnu temples. Orissa history gives credit to the Gangas for the temple at Puri. The temples in Bhubaneswar are dedicated to Shiva and predate the Gangas. The style, the architecture, the design and the engineering however are similar. The "nagara" architecture was unique to Kalinga. The word Angkor is a distortion of this "nagara" as linguists establish. Shiva worship did come to Cambodia earlier and both Shiva and Vishnu co-exist.
I learned from Mr Kushal that there were three different types of structures in the area. Some are "vat" apparently distorted from "bATa" in Oriya, meaning "path" to an area or to a group of structures. One has to walk a distance to get there. Then there are "prasat" which I think is a distortion of "prasAda" meaning "temple food." These could be mini cities with residences, courts, temples, stables, dance stages and open assembly areas. One does see narrow alleys which appear like kitchen paths.
The third group does not have a Cambodian name, but are called "Temples." These are isolated structures where people visited for special rituals. Many of them have been converted to Buddhist shrines with Buddhas of different sizes decorating them. This nomenclature was created by the French who were in occupation from 1863 to 1953. They claimed to have organized an otherwise fully destroyed nation. The ills among various factions in the country are not fully resolved. Cambodians have to emerge to write their story. The story in India is just beginning to be written.
We were passing through green countryside with occasional huts on the side of the road. Two wheel and three wheel transports loaded with hay, goods in gunny bags, old utensils and rags were passing by. I did not see a policeman and any traffic watch. We stopped at a reception gate where a lot of people had assembled. Here we had to buy tickets to enter. The sites did not have admission charge for the local residents, only the "foreigners" had to pay. There was no rush at the window. I was told that in winter months, the lines could go a hundred deep. I bought a three day ticket and we proceeded.
We reached our first stop. As we parked a swarm of little boys and girls surrounded the vehicle. The ages of the children could range from 6 to 12. Their mothers waited at the stores in a distance. The children were peddling small inexpensive souvenir items like picture cards, mini plastic replicas, maps and printed books. They were competing to be heard. It was overwhelming to witness the stress on the children's faces. I was distressed to feel that I was a tourist there in stead of a social worker. I had seen children begging in India, but the sight of them as hawkers was new for me. I promised them that I would buy from them on my return. I wanted to settle my mind on my course of action!
The sun was getting hot. I walked towards the temple which used to be an old pilgrim site. I was told that the temple existed from the ancient Funan years when Hinduism entered the area. Brown silhouette gradually appeared surrounded by the green and the trees. It looked as though the buildings had remained unfinished after the foundation and walls were done.
The massive rubble has been cleared away to gain access to the area. Stones were scattered everywhere. Stone piles existed in the back. I walked through the ruins and reflected the possible past and the possible abandonment. I thought that India was lucky to have retained the old monuments in active state in spite of invasions and attempted destruction. Possibly commitment in faith comes with the duration of practice!
