The Great City of Angkor

OK, today is the day I finally fulfilled my dream to explore the ruin city of Angkor.

Few piece of advice / notes:
1. You need to hire a driver or a tuk tuk or rent a bicycle (only if you are damn fit) for the day to explore Angkor. This is because we are talking about a 30-50 km distance, and that is minus walking inside the temple.

2. The entrance fee to Angkor Wat is USD20/day and you will get a ticket with your face plaster on it. So make a little effort to look good so you can keep the ticket as souvenir.


3. If you don’t want to hire a tourist guide (USD25/day), make some effort to read about the temples you want to explore and bring a map. Otherwise you will be very lost or worst, lost in the ruins

And the journey begins ...
Angkor Thom meaning ‘The Great city of Angkor’ measures something like 10km square. Built by King Jayavarman VII, the city apparently supported like 1 million population. This is really unbelievable because we're talking about 1000 years ago. I think the Khmer kingdom are equals to the grandeur of Roman empire at that time.

Anyway Angkor Thom is enclosed by a city wall and encircled by a moat, believe to have been inhabited by crocodiles. The city has 5 gates in total but mostly tourists use the South Gate, North Gate and Victory Gate

This is the South Gate

54 gods on the left side of the entrance

54 demons on the right side of the entrance

In the heart of Angkor Thom, lies to me, the most interesting monument in Angkor, the Bayon.

Entrance to Bayon, let's go

Bayon has 54 gothic towers (I didn’t count to confirm this cause I was kind of disoriented in the courtyard) with the face of Avalokitesvara (depiciting Buddhism) on all four sides. That's like 216 faces and so it feels like you’re being watched no matter where you stand in the Bayon. Better not be naughty! We were there first thing in the morning to capture the best of Bayon.

Faces faces everywhere,

Some big and some small,
See if you can count them all!

Can you see me in the first picture on the left? The structure is huge so you kind of feel you are surrounded by it all.

Symbolically, when considered along with the wall city of Angkor Thom, Bayon is the pivotal mountain that the serpent Vasuki coiled around in the myth of ‘Churning of the sea of milk’. This is the belt that the 54 gods and 54 demons uses to pull the ‘elixir of immortality’ from the depth of the water/sea.

Simply beautiful!

Location: Siem Reap, Cambodia
Next, Still in the great city of Angkor Thom