Report from Cambodia and Thailand  We arrived late into Bangkok. We were met by the conference organizers who drove us to a hotel that cost $15 a night - almost as nice as the one that cost $120 a night our last night. In Bangkok what you know is directly relevant to who you know.
In the morning we took a brisk walk past many street vendors and people going to work. Sizzling shish kabob, bubbling coconut macaroons over open fires, boiling soups, and fresh fruits mixed with the other smells of Bangkok. Three women sitting on a curb held up a puppy for us to admire. We waved.
The bus to Pattaya was comfortable and decorated with green and red scalloped curtains, hanging flowers and baseball caps framing the view. Most gas stations looked just like ours except for the ornate spirit houses in front. The spirit house is decorated with offerings of incense and flowers designed to ensure troublesome spirits would rather hang out in the spirit house rather than bother the business. We passed paddocks of water with bamboo paddled water wheels that aerated the water. National Geographic photo ops everywhere, an old lady with a basket on her head, another man waddling down the road with two buckets dangling from the stick across his back, children with beautiful smiles.
The hotel was monstrous --thousands of rooms-- most of it closed. Pattaya is supposed to be the center of the sex trade. A brief tour downtown supported that – one drugstore had a huge lit sign that said “ We have Viagra here!” many “nightclubs” formed a backdrop for the balding accountants with strands of hair combed over their pates, leading young Thai girls or boys by the hand. We only went into town twice. That was enough.
Our conference was full of South Africans, Israelis, Germans, Indians, Chinese, Russian, Bulgarians, a Columbian, one Uzbekistani, and others I can’t remember. The Thai-run conference was formal, stiff and boring (to me anyway) except for the minister of commerce who publicly admitted that internal corruption is their greatest problem. The most exciting part of the conference was watching the election returns in the hotel restaurant beginning at breakfast and running until lunch. Yells of excitement rang through the hotel every time the lead changed. The politics of this group were definitely liberal – a bunch of social reformers.
The favorite breakfast of Thailand is Congee with Pork – a steaming rice gruel with pork, scallions and other curious tidbits reminiscent of grits with ham mixed in. Thai doughnuts were little pieces of fried bread served with a “sauce” straight from a can of sweetened condensed milk.
My highlight there, was a Thai massage ($15) from “my name Banyan” a sweet, sweet Thai girl who sang to me while she gave me a massage. She even kissed me on the cheek afterwards. I haven’t felt so nurtured in a long time. We heard laughter frequently and saw many smiles. Even if the Thai minister of commerce complained about the Buddhist religion breeding too much contentment - fatalism, he called it – I have to admit it makes for a kinder, gentler society.
In Bangkok we took a water taxi – a gondola length wooden boat with a big engine that zoomed and jumped waves down the crowded river passing the bus boats brimming with humanity taking a much less expensive and much slower route down or up river. At Wat Po I had my fortune told (he said I think too much…duh!) and had a Thai foot massage from the massage school on the temple grounds. I levitated several times out of my seat from the pain her little wooden doodad inflicted. I tried to concentrate on the forty meter reclining golden Buddha when the pain got too bad. It was truly beautiful – not quite beautiful enough though.
Cambodia shifted down a notch on everything, sometimes several notches. The security guards at the airport didn’t smile, it was hotter and more humid, the poverty reframed any definition we currently held of “poor.” Our hotel was luxurious by Cambodian standards – Ramada Inn-ish by ours. The Angkor Grand and Sofitel were the only 5 star places in Siem Reap (actually out of town) with their own lakes and reproduction ruins on site. The guesthouses were more plentiful and quite basic. A local restaurant served three of us a fantastic coconut fish soup for $5 USD – in contrast a single glass of champagne was $10 USD at the Sofitel. I had both.
The temples at Angkor defy description. Brahmas with four Buddha-like faces – one each for the values of loving kindness, sympathy, compassion and equanimity - towered over us. Forty-two towers of different heights symbolizing the forty-two provinces during one king’s reign. Some were four stories high, some two stories high, and every height in between - each face having uniquely different features in a subtle expression of the many faces of compassion, sympathy, loving kindness, and equanimity. There were hundreds of peaceful faces, looking north, east, south and west.
Most temples had long walkways with ornate banisters to ensure all visitors have enough time to contemplate the grandeur of the temple. My favorite walkway was flanked by the Naga – a seven headed snake on either side with fifty-four bodhisattvas (good guys) on left side pulling as hard as they could and fifty-four demons on the right side pulling as hard as they could, symbolizing the never-ending tug-of-war between good and evil. The snake’s body is their rope. Again each face uniquely different – those that had a face – most were headless. Stolen, probably.
The spiritual stories mixed Hindu and Buddhism and were told in bas-relief – each temple offering a complete work of literature. Many featured Vishnu (God of Preservation) or Garuda his bird/man mount, also Shiva (Creation and Destruction) on his sacred bull. Brahma with four faces and eight arms was sometimes male and sometimes female. Apsaras – the equivalent of angels flanked most passages with long graceful female beauty and loving arms draped around each other’s waists or across each other’s shoulders. Their beauty was sensual but not erotic. Other reliefs showed violent battles between monkey men, monster demi-gods, and warriors on foot or elephant. The battles balanced the beauty with shouts of anger and danger echoing across a thousand years from ninth century storytellers.
One temple had a very tall tower in the middle with stairs four inches across with an eight to ten inch rise. Climbing was irresistible and dangerous (“same, same” as the Thai would say). The view from the top through various doors and windows showed miles of jungle green and flat decorated with occasional palms sticking out of the flat green to add height. Sunset was magnificent. On one occasion I rode an elephant down the mountain after watching the sunset and rocked back and forth as the moon appeared and the jungle grew dark The elephant prod in the driver’s hand looked exactly as the motif found in the hands of the statues of Hindu gods – unchanged in one thousand years.
One temple was left over-grown so we could experience the discovery of the explorer. Jungle trees sat atop fifteen-foot walls with roots straddling and groping their way down to the earth. Vines and moss added green to the red and the sand colored stones. I got lost at one point. My curiosity and love of silence led me far away from the group, over a wall, through a narrow passage, scrambling up a mountain of fallen stones, to a dead end with at least eight different passages to nowhere. (no metaphor here!) Heart racing I retraced my steps as best I could and after a long enough time found the entrance once more. In my heightened state I was susceptible to the young man who in broken English urgently said, “your friend is lost – do you want me to show you where she is? She can’t find her way out.” It took a moment but I responded, “Then why didn’t you show her the way out?” He urgently repeated “She is lost. I take you to her.” Had I gone I can only assume that he would have led me to god knows where and either robbed me or charged me a hell of a lot of money to lead me back out. Scams are rampant in this part of the world. In Bangkok, the scam is to approach the wandering tourist on the street to ask, “Can I help you? What are you looking for?” And no matter what you were looking for -the Grand Palace, Wat Po, whatever – they would say, “Oh no, I’m so sorry, It is closed today.” – with a extremely believable explanation about today being some sacred day, etc. Then they would take you for a “tour” in their tuk-tuk--a very expensive tour.
The temples are surrounded by beggars. Many with limbs missing from mines. One woman had no feet or hands – a mutilation much too precise for a land mine. Torture? Probably. Pol Pot’s regime killed two million people. The food manager at our hotel lost sixty family members, pictures of his murdered parents still on his dresser. Literacy is around 35% since the ability to read; even the evidence of nose indentations left from a pair of glasses was enough to condemn a person to death. It is reasonable to assume that no one over fifteen years old has escaped a direct personal experience of death, killing, violence and true, deep, enduring fear. Even the younger ones have not escaped. The crime report in the Phnom Penh paper listed many domestic killings. AK47s seem to be the weapon of choice.
The beggars were children (mostly girls) and shouted “Hello Madam” with a French inflection as they shoved scarves and trinkets under our noses to buy. Some of the people on my tour were chased incessantly. I avoided this by making it clear whenever I was finished giving/buying and making deep eye contact with the children. It felt like they were equally satisfied with either money or being seen. I would bow in the traditional way to acknowledge the good in them (Namaste) and many would involuntarily bow back creating a symbolic end to our interaction. For these reasons and my willingness to deliver a clear “no more” message I was not inundated. When I had time to talk and could find a child who spoke English, I made some friends.
The tug of war between good and evil was evident everywhere in Cambodia. It will take a long time to integrate the new reality I must now carry for the rest of my life. The tug of war continues. |
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