Blogging Pubbitch

We spent three days walking around temples and being ferried between them by the ever affable Mr Mab, who had lost a leg and then his job in Phnom Penh when he'd walked on to a landmine, and had been reduced to carting westerners around his national treasures. We woke up more than once before 5 in the morning in order to see sunrise at some temple or another, and frankly, if I tell you much more you're going to fall off your seat in boredom.

No, I think it best if I mention a couple of highlights of our visits, even though all the temples were interesting at least. My favourite temple was Ta Keo, which most guidebooks and guides will tell you to spend only a small amount of time at. This is because the thing was never finished and so lacks the ornate carving that are viewed as the hallmark of the Angkor temples. In reality, the sheer massiveness of the structure is enough to render a sense of mild impressedness in most people. Wandering around it simply serves to enforce the scale of the thing, IMHO. If the ancient Cambodians had finished (or even started) the decoration, it would have been one of the must sees in everyone's book.

Quite why Ta Keo was never finished is still a matter of debate. My favourite theory, of the ones that I heard, was that it had been struck by lightening on an inauspicious date, so everyone simply left it. More likely, the king who had been building it had died and his successor didn't think much of the temple.

Holly's favourites were Ta Prohm, because it gave you a taste of the feeling the French explorors had when they stumbled upon it buried in the forest. Unlike many of the rest of the temples, this one has had only minor work done to it to prevent collapse and has otherwise been left alone. Consequently, it's full of trees that are both pulling everything down and also holding everything up. Very strange, and the thing that gets in everyone's photos (including the Lonely Planet, you'll be thrilled to hear)

Other temples that we're very glad we saw were Bayon (famous for the sheer number of enormous carved faces that adorn it --- there must be hundreds) and Banteay Srei, which was probably built by a merchant. It's miles out and a lot smaller than most of the other temples, but the carving in it is perfect, and the restoration work has subtely avoided concrete. Oh, and Angkor Wat, obviously. Just to be different, the thing that I liked most was the so called "echo chamber", a little porch just inside the second level where you can stand and gently thump your chest, causing loud echos to propagate for a few seconds before dying away.

The other memorable time in our trip was a visit to the mine museum. This is run by a man who spent his early years laying mines for the three different armies that controlled parts of Cambodia, and who now spends his later years trying to undo part of that damage. Single-handledly he can clear mine fields using only a long pointy stick (!) and lots of knowledge at a fraction of the cost and a multiple of the speed of the major charities. He also uses the donations that are made by tourists to look after a group of children who have all been injured by mines. He is so successful in caring for them that charities are now referring cases to him. Holly had been taking the complimentary tooth brushes from the rooms that we had stayed at, and handed them out to children who were overjoyed to recieve such a simple gift.