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Siem Reap, Cambodia

This AM I took the boat from Battambang back up the river here to Siem Reap, where Angkor is, which I plan to make a return visit to tomorrow.  One day doesn't really do it justice.  The boat ran out of gas at one point and it looked like we were going to be sitting for a long time, but a helpful man in a canoe appeared in the right place at the right time.

Day 2 in Battambang meant a little bit of exploring in the area around.  There's one 11th C. Khmer temple (Wat Ek) that is worth seeing, it's not Angkor, but it's cool enough, and it's on top of a hill which makes it mildly impressive just for that.  One of the not-so-cool things about it is that local militant Buddhists have staked their claim to it and charge admission and collect donations to line their own pockets.  The thing about the Khmer buildings is, they're really not Buddhist in origin.  The Buddhists like to pretend they are, and hence demand a cut of admission fees, but anybody with a half a brain cell can tell you that  the pictures of  VIshnu, Ganesh,  the dancing Apsaras and the Shiva Lingams  render them about as hindu as it gets (Indian cham traders contributed this influence to the Khmers").  Of course the official khmer religion eventually became buddhism, but they didn't forget their hindu past.  The whole idea of militant buddhists is probably foreign to most westerners since our predominant buddhist imagery includes cuddly dalai lamas and zen rock gardens.  But they exist.  Particularly in the Hinayana/Theruveda form (the saffron robed guys you see in Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Sri Lanka) which is somewhat odd as the conventional wisdom is that their form is the more low-key form. (denigratingly referred to as the "lesser vehicle"  (that's what hinayana means)  by the Mahayanas - which are Tibetan/Himalayan buddhists found in that region as well as Mongolia)

The other, uh, attraction of Battambang is a chance to ride the bamboo train, which I took, as my moto guy called it the opportunity I would remember for an entire lifetime.   Since the roads were so awful and covered with mines, and the national train service frequently disrupted during decades of war, the Cambodians who lived along the railroads built their own trains, which are essentially bamboo boards with lawnmower engines and iron wheels. It's stil in use today and is a pretty ingenious form of local transit evn though motorbikes (5 or 6 to a bike) and pickup truck beds predominate in the dry season.

The final attraction of Battambang, that I did not see, alas, was its most famous part time resident, Ms Angelina Jolie, who conducts world-saving activities from a villa outside town part of the year.  To her credit, she picked a good place to do so, as it needs the help.  The countryside around Battambang (and pretty much everywhere in cambodia) is as poor as you would imagine it, skinny underfed cattle, scrawny children, naked kids running around.   And everywhere there are people and settlements.  Before here, I would say that Mongolia (and parts of India) were the poorest places I've seen, but this is up there with any of that.  This is pure specualtion, and I'm stealing the idea from Jared Diamond's "Collapse" again (the chapter on Rwanda), but I would not be surprised if malthusian/environmental  population pressures were as much a factor durning the savagery of the Khmer Rouge bloodletting as were politics.  I forewent to see the opporutnity to see mass graves and bones, though my moto guy promised me skulls, I decided I just didn't want to see it.

Despite it all, I must say Cambodians are a pretty friendly lot.  Oh, and the food is pretty good - like you would imagine, it's sort of halfway between thai and vietnamese food.  Also, I should note that the SE Asian obsession with lacquer.  Every damned place you go, from expensive hotels to cheap ones, everything that can be lacquered is lacquered.  Door frames, furniture, whatever.  I'm afraid if I stay in one spot too long I might get lacquered in place.