Notes on Angkor Wat

Exhibit 1

Early in the morning, crowds gather at the Angkor Wat enclosure, facing the temple, waiting for the sun to rise. Hundreds of people (it is low season), some of them deeply hung over from the night before on Pub Street, get out of bed very early, or never get in at all, to come witness this magic moment. The big photo op. As photo ops go, it is spectacular. See Exhibit 1.

It is customary to follow the process by walking through the compound snapping pictures, leaving no stone undigitized, with particular privilege given to the stone + pumpkin-robed monk combo, a sure candidate for the display wall. I was thusly occupied while I happened upon Exhibit 2 (note minuscule cross legged dude at the top opening of this structure) whose picture I took and who returned the favor by staring down in contempt.

Exhibit 2

My picture-taking offended his sense of the divine, which he of the lotus position experienced, while I of the iPhone did not. Probably from Fairfax, I thought. It makes one wonder how he would have handled my breakfast neighbor who dared declare that “all stones look the same to me.”

I suspect that Angkor Wat draws over two million visitors a year because everyone has put it on their bucket list—a concept I myself endorse, but which might require some rules, like including only places you’d actually like to see. This might cut the number of visitors. Probably not great for the Cambodian economy. But really good for an ancient city we are trampling to death.

Exhibit 3

When it comes to literature, the massive complex of Khmer structures owes a big deal of its popularity not so much to picture books (which get shoved in your face together with the Pol Pot genocide and the postcard sets by the numerous vendors,) or the growing crop of Angkor Wat based historical novels, but to a comic book – Lara Croft, Tomb Raider, particularly to its movie version with Angelina Jolie traipsing through Ta Phrom, the tree temple, see Exhibit 3, which is now in danger of getting further ruined in spite of all restoration efforts because of the excessive number of visitors it attracts due to its association with Hollywood royalty.

All of which to say that to get pictures like these:

You'll have to fight for position with crowds like these, including all my Japanese friends of the depopulated prefecture I've mentioned before.

One tiny recommendation. Skip the bike. Hire a tuk tuk. You may get to know a real Khmer, you’ll avoid sunstroke, and your legs will live to walk another day, for your second visit, or your third.

Because it’s that big. And it deserves repeated admiration from those who get a happy kick at the sight of the first stone, reassured by the knowledge that even the monks, see Exhibit last, pull out their iPhones and take a shot like the rest of us.

Exhibit last