Author Archives: Ginger

Cambodia – Ta Prohm

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You recognize the picture, right? Or something like it?

The jungle creeps across the ruins, engulfing them in serpentine tree roots. There is a sense of slow-motion menace here, of inevitable decay.

It’s beautiful.

Even the entrance to the temple compound promises decay and grandeur on a romantic scale.

 

 

Construction of Ta Prohm, originally named Raja Vihara, was begun in 1186 AD and lasted for forty years. After the fall of the Khmer Empire in the fifteenth century, the temple was abandoned and fell into jungle-engulfed ruins.

But the romance of Ta Prohm is now somewhat disappearing. The place is being fixed up and made safer for its two or three million annual tourist visitors. It is a monument worth protecting, both from the trees and from the tourists, but I do hope that the moody atmosphere is not destroyed in the process.

 

 

 

Meanwhile, the army of trees continues its quiet, merciless invasion.

         

 

Cambodia – Rural life in Angkor

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Except for the town of Siem Reap, the Angkor region is generally rural, especially in the archaeological park near the wats. The geography is nearly flat, not far from the Siem Reap River (perhaps even in its floodplain), a good place for farming. Rice farming in particular.

 

But not just rice. There are also, for example, cashew trees.

We were not here during the tourist season, and although there were a lot more tourists than in Myanmar, the roads through the archaelogical park were not busy.

 

A few small shops offered their wares.

 

Home from school, children offered friendly greetings.

  

Houses were basically rectangular and built on stilts to keep them dry during the rainy season. This season had just begun when we were there, and so people were still able to use the “extra” room beneath the house, keeping cool in its shade.

  

There were also a few tourist-oriented shops along the road. Given the region’s increasing economic reliance on tourism (and the fact that vendors are not allowed inside the archaeological sites), I was surprised not to see more. And the few there were had a certain homey attractiveness.

 

Cambodia – Banteay Srei

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Banteay Srei, about fifteen miles northeast of the main Angkor Wat and Angkor Tom complexes, is small compared to those better-known temples. Small but really sweet. And perhaps this is why it came to be called “Banteay Srei,” which means “Ladies’ Citadel.” Some say this is because the structures, doorways, and so on, are small, as if they were built for women. Others say the name came from the fact that the stone was so delicately carved and in such detail that only a woman could have done it. (Ladies, watch out for those second sort of men…)

Banteay Srei was built in 967AD and used into the fifteenth century. Its original name (in Sanskrit) was (er, sounds like…) Shiri Tre Bhuvan Mahes Vara, which means “Sacred Home of the Great Lord of the World.” The Great Lord in question is Shiva.

The temple later fell into disuse and was then abandoned and lost, to be rediscovered by the French but not until 1914.

The temple was built mostly of red sandstone, which is amenable to detailed carving and strong enough to endure a long time. And indeed the carvings are still after all these centuries so breathtaking that I’ve had a hard time narrowing down the photos to include here.

       

 

Remember, these carvings are well over a thousand years old!

 

Here’s a detail of the above pediment.

 

  

 

My sweet little Garden City Beautification Award

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All unbeknownst to Dan and me, my mother submitted our garden to the Newton Community Pride organization, a nonprofit loosely affiliated with our city government, for an award. Each year, Newton Community Pride gives out a number of these. So behold, last week we got a letter in the mail saying that we’d won!

Our first thought was that there must have been some kind of mistake, and we’d have to give it back.

But no. They read me the description over the phone. “A steep hill was terraced into a gorgeous triple-decker garden complete with waterfall.” There aren’t too many like that. Definitely had to be ours.

 

 

Tonight I went with my mother and my delighted landscape architect Vicki Hibbard to the awards ceremony. Where I was presented with a professional-looking certificate suitable for framing, and my picture was taken for all posterity.

 

Welcome to Cambodia

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Dear friends and followers,

After something like six days of travel and six weeks of blogging, we now leave Myanmar for the wonders of Cambodia. There will be more ruins, many of them absolutely stunning, more friendly people, more (yes!) silk weaving, and more great food.

The first several posts will cover the area in and near Angkor Wat. Here, for your reference is a map from the Wikimedia Commons. The first place Dan and I visited is the ancient temple of Banteay Srei, which is not actually on this map, but instead is about fifteen miles northeast beyond Ta Som, off the top righthand corner. The rest of the places will be on the map.

Views near Golden Grove

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After a long summer off Block Island, with travel to faraway lands, I’m beginning to yearn to be back on the island again. So I went through my archive of September photographs to see where on the western skyline the sun would be setting this time of year.

Looks like it will be setting over Sachem Pond when we return in a week or so.

Inle Lake – The Five-Day Market, Part 2

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The wholesale part of the market isn’t as picturesque as the retail part, but it’s just as busy. And interesting.

It’s not just food that’s for sale, but also other items that sometimes people need in bulk. Large baskets, for example, and woven bamboo mats.

 

In case you’re wondering why people need so many of these things, well, most of the houses have walls made of the woven bamboo mats. And sitting platforms, indoors and out. And as for the baskets…

Gotta have something to bring all that ginger root home in. And also the tomatoes.

Not everything ends up in baskets, though. Large sacks are also popular. Here, a man is filling a sack with green beans. It’s really good that he doesn’t pick them out like I do, examining each one individually.

In fact, large sacks are more common than baskets in the wholesale market.

 

In the wholesale market, merchandise is sold by weight, and the scale can be moved from village to village just like the market.

One of the more interesting aspects of the five-day market is the variety of different tribal people who buy and sell goods there. And just people-watching in general.

        

After the market, we caught a plane at Heho airport and flew to Yangon. I’ve already posted about Yangon on this blog. That same afternoon, we flew from Yangon to Siem Reap, Cambodia. We bid farewell to Myanmar with some regret. We miss it.

Inle Lake – The Five-Day Market

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Markets in Europe in the Middle Ages may not have been much different from this. Oh, they wouldn’t have had trucks, of course. Or tomatoes, for that matter. But I imagine the look and feel would have been much the same.

Let’s start with the retail market. Later, we’ll see the wholesale market, too.

Remember those tomatoes they were unloading from the boats? Here they come to market.

And indeed, you can find tomatoes at this market. Along with many other kinds of very fresh fruits and vegetables.

    

 

Also, there were lovely flowers.

 

As you might expect of a market on Inle Lake, many vendors sold seafood, both dried and fresh; and also hearty fish soups and soup ingredients in addition to fish.

    

And here are some of the other things they sold.

Tomatoes and corn–just like the farmers markets here in New England!

 

Or then again, maybe not quite like the farmers markets in New England.

         

Yes, I do think that this last one is skewered grilled eels. Or maybe snakes. Bon appetit!

Finally, here’s a panorama of the market that Dan shot. It’s a big file (3mb). Click here if you’d like to view it; it should load in a new window or tab. It’s pretty cool.

 

 

I fear…

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I’ve been meaning for months now to do something that will make my WP blog less ugly. This means changing the WP theme. But so much could, in theory, go wrong. A backup would be a good idea, but this blog has so much information in so many files it’s almost impossible to do a directory-to-directory backup.

I need to act.

But I am afraid to act.

Must… get… over… this…