Angkor Day 1: Angkor Thom and the Bayon

This post is part of a series on our recent trip to see the temples of Angkor in Siem Reap, Cambodia. You can see our first post here.

After spending the morning touring the temples of the ancient Khmer city of Hariharalaya, referred to by the modern name of Rolous - and after a lazy lunch and an early afternoon siesta to escape the brutal heat - Nana and I struck out for Angkor Thom, the holy city at the heart of golden-age Angkor.

Angkor Thom

Angkor Thom ("Great City") was built at the end of the 12th century by Jayavarman II. Jayavarman II, as you may recall, was the king who tried to add his own Buddhist faith to the Hindu state religion. The last great king of the Khmer Empire. Jayavarman II and presided over a golden age that included, among other accomplishments, a massive building project responsible for a staggering number of the most important surviving temples of Angkor.

The architecture of Jayavarman II's reign is characterized by a blend of Buddhist and Hindu motifs. This blend is most memorable in the "face towers" that mark the entrances to every major structure he built.

However, the south gate of Angkor Thom is perhaps best known for a major work of Hindu monumental art: a causeway flanked by an elaborate naga balustrade depicting the Hindu story of the churning of the ocean of milk (generally believed to represent the Milky Way). 

To make a long story short, in the early days of the present universe the demigods and demons learned that they had to churn this cosmic ocean of milk in order to obtain the nectar of immortality. However, they were unsuccessful so long as they refused to cooperate. Vishnu eventually got the demons to take the head of a giant naga, and the demigods to take the head. Using a mythical mountain as a pivot, with some help from Kurma (Vishnu in the form of a giant turtle), they succeeded, spawning a bunch of other cool stuff, like  and dancing apsaras and Lakshmi, the wife of Vishnu. (Caution: this is not the last you will hear of this tale.)

Each entrance to Angkor Thom includes a balustrade depicting the demons and demigods pulling on he naga, with the south entrance - being both closer to Siem Reap and pretty well preserved - by far the most popular spot. Here, the right side depicts demons, and the left demigods.

Demon: bulging eyes, curly hair.

Demigod: placid face, pointy hair.

Cool fact: no two demons or demigods look alike. This one helper is particularly unique:

Unfortunately, many of the heads are missing - stolen, most likely, and sold on the black market to collectors. These days, there's an ongoing project to restore some of the missing heads, sometimes by locating them in museums overseas, and sometimes by replacing them with the work of local stone carvers.

At the end of the balustrade stands a face tower, simultaneously representing (did you study?) Brahma, the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism, and Jayavarman II.

Brahma-Buddha-Jayavarman is flanked by images of Airavata, the three-headed elephant ridden by Indra, who figures in both Hindu and Buddhist mythology.

The south gate face tower is especially nice because you can walk up the sloped ramparts behind the city wall and get pretty close to the tower itself.

Today, the land inside the city walls is mostly forest, dotted with temples. In the reign of King Jayavarman II,  however, the land would have been filled with a bustling wooden city that was one of the largest in the world at the time.

The Bayon

The Bayon was Jayavarman II's state temple, set at the heart of Angkor Thom. Built around 1200 AD, the Bayon is unique among Angkor state temples. Most state temples were temple mountains built to impress, like Bakong in Hariharalaya, or of course Angkor Wat. The Bayon is a much more intimate setting, a tangled jungle of galleries and face towers with short sight-lines, surprising corners, and a pair of Brahma-Buddha-Jayavarman's eyes watching over you wherever you turn.

Furthermore, the Bayon is the only surviving Angkor temple dedicated to Buddha (most were dedicated to Shiva, with a handful dedicated to Vishnu).

We spent the first part of our visit poring over the galleries, whose walls are covered in a seven-foot bas relief.

These carvings are unique in that, alongside the usual historical and mythological fare, they also illustrate scenes from everyday life in the Khmer Empire. As a result, they're one of only two remaining sources on what life was like for the regular folk in ancient Angkor. (The other is an account by a Chinese envoy named Zhou Daguan, who visited Angkor Thom in 1296-1297.)

A procession of Chinese soldiers, identifiable by their  eyes and beards.

In this particular conflict, the Chinese were allied with the Khmer against the Cham, a kingdom in what would now be Vietnam with ethnic ties to Taiwanese aborigines and Pacific Islanders.

Khmer soldiers, identified by their long earlobes and the crossed ropes, which were sacred and therefore supposed to protect the wearer from harm.

A family with an oxcart full of provisions follows the conquering army.

Butchering a pig.

Blowing on the fire to get the rice going.

According to our guide, this turtle has just bitten the soldier in the butt.

Hunting in the forest. The apparently flying fish are from the "panel" above, which depicts a battle on Lake Tonle Sap.

Childbirth.

A theraputic massage.

A man being eaten by a lion.

Cockfighting, with Chinese merchants on the right and Khmer merchants on the left. Again, the giant airborne fish is from another "panel" of the illustration.

Khmer soldiers training for battle.

A Khmer soldier killing a Cham soldier. The Cham soldiers are identifiable by their lotus-flower headdresses.

Cooking for the troops.

A fallen soldier being eaten by a crocodile.

In all honesty, I may have become mildly obsessed with these bas reliefs. Like so many of the carvings at Angkor, the Bayon reliefs are just full of life and humor - a quality that seems to have been passed down to the Khmer people through the generations. Every minute spent staring at these reliefs shows you something new and, half the time, funny.

After leaving the galleries, we began ascending the modest temple mountain of the Bayon, stopping for frequent photos of the countless faces peering down at us.

I think in this case, it's best to let the pictures speak for themselves.

Sometimes, it's like Where's Waldo. The face is always there - if you haven't found it, it just means you're not looking hard enough.

Nana got a little frisky with this one.

As you can tell, each of the faces is slightly different, and those slight differences add up to a major change in expression. This is by far the happiest of the faces - check out that developing smirk!

Fun side note: as we were leaving the Bayon, we stumbled on two heart-warming hints of modern activity on the site. (I say this to distinguish them from the hordes of shouting tourists, who were considerably less heart-warming.)

There cannot have been many Koreans left in Korea.

First, we came across a Japanese-led team working on restoring one of the lower levels of the temple.

Japan is among several nations heavily involved in conservation and restoration at Angkor. At the entrance to nearly every temple, you can see a sign describing the conservation team and its efforts. I hope to talk about this more in a later post.

Second, we see a modern Buddhist shrine in bright saffron. Had I been less shy about asking for their permission, I would have gotten a shot of the monks stepping barefoot through the ruins.

That's right - the Bayon, like many Angkor sites, is a modern place of worship for Cambodia's Buddhist majority. Kind of ironic, in a way: despite the efforts of Jayavarman II's successors to erase his Buddhist influence on the empire, it was Hinduism that eventually died out in Cambodia, with even the most Hindu of Angkor shrines being used as Buddhist temples to this day.

Another empty niche, another defaced Buddha.

Baphuon


After the Bayon, we made a couple quick stops at other Angkor Thom sites. First up was Baphuon, sometimes called the world's greatest jigsaw puzzle.

This temple-mountain, which pre-dates the rest of Angkor Thom by more than a century, was in almost complete disrepair as recently as fifteen years ago, and was only partly opened to the public in 2010. Baphuon has been the focus of a massive reconstruction effort led by the French, which concluded (for now) in April 2011.

You can see evidence of the restoration work everywhere. For instance, the grounds around Baphuon are covered with sorted and numbered sandstone blocks from the original temple, some of which have been replaced with careful replicas, others of which might, sometime in the future, find their way back into the temple.

These fields of stone also provide a physical record of the original temple - in theory, it would be possible for someone with a knowledge of the numbering system to recreate a picture of where each stone was found in the original ruin.

The current structure is a kind of historical jungle gym. Thankfully, by the time we started climbing, a cloud bank had rolled in, giving us a little respite from the heat.

For reference, that structure is about 1.5 storeys off the forest floor.

Steep!

A gallery of restored columns, about 3-4 storeys up.

Looking down on the causeway, to the east.

You can see the difference between color in the restored and original stones.

The central tower has not been restored, though oddly enough the doorposts have.

A view from Baphuon to Phimenakas, the next temple over.

One side of Baphuon has been left untouched by the restoration team, as it features a later "reclining Buddha" image carved into the original wall.

It's a bit easier to spot after you've looked at the diagram.

Phimeanakas


Phimeanakas is what passes for a minor temple in Angkor Thom: you know, only about four storeys high, and older than everything else in Angkor Thom by a couple measly centuries. It was originally the state temple of Suryavarman I. It later served as the palace temple for a series of Khmer kings.

We climbed it, of course. Because we're masochists.

A fallen stone roof on the penultimate level.

The Royal Square


East of Phimeanakas, at the edge of what used to be the royal palace, are two huge terraces overlooking an empty field. These two terraces, the Terrace of the Elephants and the Terrace of the Leper King, along with the adjoining field, are referred to collectively as the Royal Square of Angkor Thom.

It's assumed that the square was used for public addresses and other ceremonies, possibly including royal cremations and the launching of military campaigns.

Atop the Terrace of the Elephants.

The Terrace of the Elephants is so called because it's, well, covered in elephants, and especially in images of Airavata.

The Terrace of the Leper King is named after a later statue of Yama, the Hindu god of death, who apparently looked a bit leprous after centuries in the jungle.

The base of the Terrace of the Leper King features more wonderful relief carvings, including some unfinished patches that both hint at the hard times that befell the late kings of Angkor and give some insight into how the carvings were made.

Apsaras and concubines.

A vivid naga.

An unfinished carving of the king, flanked by concubines.

A finished image of the king, being fanned by concubines. (Lots of concubines on the Terrace of the Leper King!)

If you love ancient temples, if you hate ancient temples, or if you're completely ambivalent to ancient temples . . . stay tuned for lots, lots more!

Slate: Wheat vs. Rice in the Japanese Diet

A country's food always looks a bit different to outsiders. For example, Westerners usually think of Japan as a nation of tea drinkers, though in reality coffee is the stimulant of choice. Ditto with rice: while the Japanese agriculture sector is devote almost entirely to producing rice, and while rice is still a staple of much traditional Japanese cuisine, the Japanese actually consume far more wheat, almost all of which is grown in the United States.

In an article on Slate.com today, Nadia Arumugam looks at the interesting history of how wheat has superseded rice in the Japanese diet - and how the Japanese government is currently looking for ways to increase consumption of domestic rice crops. Arumugam's article focuses on the complex cultural politics surrounding wheat in Japan, driven in part by generational shifts in taste following the American occupation. But I was most interested in how obvious the wheatiness of the Japanese diet to someone living in Japan - so obvious, in fact, that I never really stopped to think about it.

The culprit? Noodles. Though Arumugam's article makes much of imported Western baking techniques, Nana and I both agreed that the explosion of the noodle in postwar Japanese cooking has probably been the main driver in Japan's growing appetite for wheat. (Note: Arumugam does give noodles a fair shake, but in my humble opinion she slightly over-emphasizes the impact of Western bread.) 

Simply put, any modern Japanese noodle dish, soba excepted, is based on wheat noodles. Udon, ramen, the misleading-named yakisoba - all wheat. And all, in fact, among the most popular items for a quick Japanese meal.

Bonus cool point connected to the article: a lot of modern Japanese dishes actually come from WWII and the ensuing American occupation. Ramen? Took off thanks to soldiers returning from China, where the dish originates. Gyoza (Japanese dumplings)? Same deal. Japanese curry became popular because of its widespread use in rations by the Imperial Navy. Even modern preparations of udon, which was traditionally a savoury snack in Japan, owe something to the Chinese concept of using soup as a meal.

Japanese Baby Swag

My sister is currently overdue with her first child, which will be a boy named Davy. I bought a shirt for him in Cambodia and then went totally nuts in the clothing section of a Japanese baby store the other night. Justin shot a video of me attempting to use these goodies to bribe Davy to hurry up and get born already. So if you're curious about the sort of stuff you can find in a Japanese baby store, or if you just want to watch me be a complete goober, click on the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hp7Xq6QW8nM

Now, of course, I have to tackle the post office and actually mail these things...

Angkor Day 1: Rolous Group Temples

Our first day in Siem Reap, Nana and I didn't do much beyond relaxing in the hotel. We'd had a late flight, and a heck of a couple months at work.

On our second day, we spent the morning at a group of brick temples near modern-day Rolous, site of the first Khmer capital at Angkor. That capital, called Hariharalaya (literally, "the city of Harihara," a combined deity representing both Shiva and Vishnu), is home to the oldest surviving temples of Angkor. Founded along with the Khmer Empire by Jayavarman II around 800 AD, Hariharalaya was the proving ground for many of the architectural styles and engineering technologies that would become the hallmarks of Khmer construction.

Lolei

Dedicated in 893, Lolei is actually the youngest of the Rolous temples. It used to be an island temple, built in the middle of a large man-made reservoir, or baray, called Indratataka (literally, "the reservoir of Indra," in this case Indravarman I). 

The water would have come all the way up to the terrace
in the rainy season.

These reservoirs were a major source of Khmer power: by harnessing the monsoon rains, these reservoirs provided a reliable source of water for rice farming. Their related canals also provided a means of transportation and trade. 

Typically, each baray had a small temple built at its center. Like many Khmer temples, these baray temples  were meant to represent Hindu cosmology. The central structure represents Mt. Meru, the home of the gods, while the surrounding water represents the world ocean.

Lolei is a relatively simple temple, dedicated to Shiva and to the four grandparents of Yasovarman I. It consists of four towers, with the eastern towers representing each grandfather, and the western towers representing each grandmother.

Those are later Buddhist stupas (burial monuments) in the foreground.

The towers are, generally speaking, in a style common to the earlier temples of Angkor: mainly brick, originally decorated in stucco, with statues, relief carvings, ornamental door frames, and other features in carved sandstone.

One of the lintels is a brilliantly garlanded image of Garuda, the bird-man vehicle of Vishnu.

Keep in mind that this carving is 1100 years old.

Each tower is itself a small shrine decorated with images of Hindu deities in the likeness of the ancestors being honored there.

If I remember correctly, this is both Sita (Shiva's wife)
and Indravarman I's paternal grandmother.

At the center of the four towers stood a large linga. Water that flowed or was poured over the linga was considered holy; it would be collected and used to treat a variety of physical, spiritual, and karmic ailments.

We're standing on one of the four channels that radiate from the linga.

Today, Lolei is also the site of a Buddhist monastery, which anywhere else might have been a minor attraction in and of itself.

Two much more recent stupas, where the cremated remains
of Buddhists are interred.

Preah Ko

Preah Ko, dedicated in 879, is the oldest major temple in the Angkor region. It was built by Indravarman I, the same fellow who built the Indratataka reservoir and the temple-mountain of Bakong (see below). 

He dedicated the temple to his ancestors: its six towers represent his parents (in the center) and his grandparents on each side.

Scholars presume that the large outer precincts of the temple likely included a royal palace built of wood, but no trace of the structure has been found.

(By the way, it was pure dumb luck that we were visiting all these ancestor temples on Nana's dad's birthday. Luckily, we'd come prepared to wish him a happy birthday.)

The name Preah Ko ("sacred bull") comes from three well-preserved statues of Nandi, Shiva's steed, lying in wait for the god at the entrance to the temple.

Nandi is usually depicted in this half-rising position,
indicating his readiness to bear Shiva away.

Given its age, some parts of this temple are really well-preserved. Nana and I dug these lions - often, ornaments like this are among the first things stolen and sold off to antique dealers.

In addition, there are a number of surviving stucco fragments that show how the brick would originally have been decorated.

Keep in mind that the stucco, and probably the sandstone, would have been painted in Khmer times. Though like the classical art of Greece, Khmer art is also pretty beautiful in its unpainted form.

Finally, Preah Ko is a great place to see the effects of Cambodia's climate on the temples of Angkor. You see, during the rainy season, the winds come in from the southwest. As a result, the southwest corner of each structure erodes faster than the rest, with the southwest tower typically showing the most wear and tear. Contrast the two photos below: one of an east-facing wall, the other of a southwest-facing corner.

The southwestern corner almost looks like it's melted away. Sucks to be the maternal grandmother, whose tower (I think) this is!

Bakong

Bakong, dedicated in 881 to the god Shiva, was the state temple of Indravarman I. It's the first temple-mountain built by the Khmer using techniques Nana described in an earlier post, and the first Khmer temple to be built primarily of sandstone and laterite (as opposed to brick). 

Like most Khmer temple-mountains, Bakong is surrounded by a big moat. 

Not only was this practical, it was symbolic: temple mountain, Mt. Meru, world oceans, yadda yadda yadda. 

Bakong, however, is the oldest temple with a surviving causeway which, bordered by a naga baulstrade, represented the passage between the mundane world outside the temple and the sacred world within.

Naga!

Bakong, like many of the Khmer temple mountains, is primarily designed to impress - fitting, as this was where Indravarman I established himself as god-king. 

In its efforts to impress, Bakong still succeeds.

From that point forward, each king's state temple would serve as both a religious site and a testament to imperial power. I like to think it was also a kind of gymnasium: to make the tower sturdier and taller-looking, the builders made those stairs really, really steep!

To add insult to injury, they get steeper
as you get closer to the top.

A final note: the more open temple-mountain architecture does mean that the detail work is much less well preserved. Compare the Nandi below to the one from Preah Ko above.

Rough day at the office.

That said, there are still some neat little details, like this doorstep that doubles as a footwiper . . .

. . . this library with its false windows . . .

. . . and some decorative lintels on the east-facing walls of the outlying towers.

Indra!

Ganesha!

 If you love thousand-year-old temples, there's plenty more where these came from. And if you don't love thousand-year-old temples . . . there's plenty more where these came from.

The Gods of Ancient Angkor

A few days ago, Nana introduced us to Khmer temple architecture. The hope was that we could link back to that post as needed so our readers wouldn't have to hear an explanation of what laterite is every time they visit the blog. This way, we could focus in later posts on what makes each individual temple unique.

Today, I'm going to attempt something similar: a brief introduction to Khmer religion, with a short roll call of the deities most commonly found in carvings around Angkor.

Religion


The religions of ancient Angkor were Indian in origin.

Officially, the Khmer Empire was a Hindu state with the god-king at its head, and the surviving state temples were almost all dedicated to Hindu deities and built in honor of the king himself or of his ancestors. Sometimes, there's evidence that the carvings of the gods in these temples are actually likenesses of the royals in whose honor the temple was constructed. Thus the temples often doubled as mausoleums for the royal family, whose ashes would be interred there.

In addition, the largest state temple complexes were also capital cities - their huge, empty precincts, many of which are now forested, would have been packed with wooden homes and buildings. This is another way of saying that there was no separation of church and state. Essentially, the church was the state, and the state was the church.

At the same time, we don't know much about the everyday religious practices of the Khmer people. What we do know is guesswork, based on fragmentary information and the assumption that locals worshipped at smaller, wooden temples and shrines that have not survived the intervening millennium. Most scholars suppose that the Khmer people practiced a blend of Hinduism, Buddhism, and local traditions of animism and ancestor worship.

At the very least, we know that Khmer Buddhism was strong enough to allow for Jayavarman VII, the major exception to official establishment of Hinduism in the Khmer Empire. Jayavarman VII is widely regarded as the greatest of the Khmer kings; he was also the last great king before the empire's decline. He was a Buddhist, and sought to establish Buddhism alongside traditional Hinduism as the new dual state religion of the empire.

The many temples built during the reign of Jayavarman VII symbolize in stone his efforts to reconcile the rival  faiths. His efforts failed in the short term - his successor, Jayavarman VIII, was a reactionary Hindu who destroyed the most overt Buddhist carvings of his predecessor's reign.

In the end, Jayavarman VII has had the last laugh: even the Hindu temples of Angkor have long since been taken over by Buddhists, and some have been in continuous use as sites of Buddhist worship for almost eight centuries.

The Gods


There are three main gods in Hinduism, collectively called the Trimurti. These three gods, like all Hindu gods, are actually just manifestations of a single, unfathomable God. Thus in practice, they tend to blend together, and in a sense a temple to one is a temple to all three.

Brahma


Brahma is the Hindu god of creation. He has four faces. He creates the new universe at the beginning of each cosmic era, but after that he doesn't really do anything. Hindus, practical folk that they are, don't spend much time on Brahma. There isn't a single temple at Angkor dedicated to Brahma's worship.

At Angkor, Brahma usually appears on a lotus blossom sprouting from the resting Vishnu's stomach, ready to launch the next cosmic cycle.

Sadly, after you've heard these stories a few dozen times,
they almost begin to make sense.

He's also represented by the face-towers strewn about in the reign of Jayavarman VII.

These towers have four faces, just like Brahma. However, they're not pure Brahma symbols: they also represent Jayavarman VII himself, watching over the four cardinal directions; and at the same time they represent the Buddha, which makes them the largest Buddha images to survive the reign of Jayavarman VIII.

Vishnu


Vishnu is the god of preservation or stasis. He's enshrined in a handful of temples around Angkor, including Angkor Wat. He is usually shown with four arms.

Often, he's riding Garuda, a god who's shaped like a man on top and like a bird on the bottom.

Chhaiy, our guide, was very careful to remind us
that Garuda does not fly.

Often, Garuda himself is used to stand in for Vishnu. It's common in Khmer art to use the god's vehicle as a symbol for the god. Garuda was also co-opted as a Buddhist symbol of intelligence and social cooperation.

Vishnu's wife is Lakshmi. She usually appears as a depiction of the real-life wife of the king (or king's father) honored by the temple.

Shiva


Shiva is the Hindu god of change or destruction. One of his primary aims was the destruction of evil. He was the most popular focus of worship in the surviving temples of Angkor. Accordingly, he shows up in many forms - too many to count, really, though the most common is definitely the linga or lingam, an abstract phallic statue on a pedestal that simultaneously represents Shiva, Vishnu, Brahma, and female fertility.

Here's a linga without the pedestal.

Nana's looking at a pedestal without its linga.

Shiva is often represented by his vehicle, the sacred bull Nandi.

Here's Nandi, about to wish a happy birthday to Nana's dad.

Shiva's wife is Sita. Like Lakshmi, Sita usually appears as a representation of the wife of whichever royal dude honored by the temple.

Indra

Indra is the Hindu god of the sky. He controls the weather. He rarely appears in person at Angkor - instead, he's represented by his steed, a three-headed elephant named Airavata (also Erawan).

Here's Indra riding Airavata.

Indra is one of the Hindu gods later co-opted by certain Buddhist traditions, in which he serves as the guardian of heaven. Jayavarman VII used Airavata frequently to symbolize harmony between the Hindu and Buddhist faiths.


Yama


Yama is the Hindu god of death and the dead. He's not common at Angkor, though you see him in a couple important bas relief carvings, and there was a statue of him on the misleadingly-named Terrace of the Leper King. (The statue there now is a replica.)

Naga


In the Cambodian tradition of Hinduism, the naga is a mythical serpent with a bunch of heads.

They're all over Angkor, and they're important both to Hinduism and to Buddhism. The naga is a key part of the Hindu creation story, as a huge naga is used by the angels and demons to churn an ocean of milk in an effort to achieve immortality (trust me, this is not the last you'll hear of this). According to some traditions, a naga also sheltered Buddha from rain and flood while he was meditating to achieve enlightenment.

Traditionally, the naga is the enemy of Garuda (above), but Jayavarman VII often depicted the two together, again symbolizing cooperation between the Hindu and Buddhist faiths.

Buddha


Buddha's not technically a deity, but we won't get into that here. At one time, during the reign of Jayavarman VII, there were probably as many Buddha images at Angkor as there were images of any Hindu god. Nowadays, most of them look like this:

Empty niche = former Buddha.

That's because Jayavarman VIII, who reverted to Hindiusm as the state religion, had most of the Buddha images at Angkor destroyed.

However, the famous face-towers of Jayavarman VII also represent Buddha.

It's likely Jayavarman VIII declined to destroy these images because they also represented Brahma and, at the same time, the personal power of the Khmer god-king. In fact, while all the obvious representations of Buddha have been destroyed, most of Jayavarman VII's layered Hindu-Buddhist imagery survives, giving many of the later Angkor temples a distinctly Buddhist vibe.

Note to family: Yes, we will be appearing in these photos, eventually. Stay tuned for some posts about our actual visits to the temples, once we've laid the groundwork with all this historical stuff.

Putting the Red-Eye in Red-Eye

Nana and I got back to Fukuoka this morning via a bumpy four-hour red-eye flight from Siem Reap to Busan, South Korea. We promptly fell asleep for several hours, and hope to sleep fur about a bajillion more before we head back to work tomorrow.