Temples and Landmines

Cambodia is a country filled with contrast.  Great beauty sits beside great pain on a daily basis in a more poignant way than I have witnessed in the United States.  The third day Carly and I were in Siem Reap, we saw that contrast by visiting the Landmine Museum, as well as more beautiful temples and a lovely waterfall.  While the landmines were not all from one country, and many were laid by Cambodians in the Khmer Rouge time and during the civil war, as a US Citizen, I was particularly troubled by those coming from my country.  To my knowledge, the US has never acknowledged bombing Cambodia during the time of the Vietnam war and at times they have denied that they were actively laying landmines along the Ho Chi Minh trail as it passed through Cambodia, as well as dropping many, many bombs (some of which never detonated).  One of the statistics at the museum said 600,000 were killed by what the USA was dropping, yet we won't take responsibility. That, for me, was a disappointment,

 Below are more picture showing the contrast of the beauty and pain we experienced.

Have you ever been lucky enough to see a spider build a web?  Amazing!

Can you see the rainbow?

On our way to Banteay Srey, one of the most ornate temples, we passed this group of bikers.  They were likely going to work farming a field somewhere.  

More natural beauty.  Look at these ants!  We found them on our hike up to a waterfall that had many ancient carvings in it.  

Carvings in the waterfall.  How these were not worn down in hundreds of years is beyond my understanding.

Showing my Oregon roots at the waterfall.

Banteay Srey, the most ornate of all the temples. 

Traveling buddies!  I believe this was the library of the building...

 And, switching to the landmine museum,,,  This museum was put together by a man named Aki Ra who once was a Khmer Rouge child soldier.  He was recruited and worked for them for a number of years laying mines.  After a while he fled and joined the Vietnamese soldiers fighting against the Khmer Rouge.  He is a truly amazing redemption story.  He eventually started, on his own, with no training, removing active mines and un-detonated bombs from the country by hand.  He kept many of the weapons he deactivated and put together this museum, which was eventually formalized (as was his de-mining effort).  Mines can no longer be dismantled by hand, as many people were maimed or killed doing this.  Now, a trained team is called in if mines are discovered.  The mines are blown-up on site by the professionals.

Those red dots are all the places in Cambodia the USA dropped bombs between 1965 and 1973

History Lesson, if you can read it...

Some of the hundreds of weapons found and dismantled by Aki Ra

Beauty and pain are contrast in this found-art piece constructed from weapons found and dismantled

This is an example mine field

You can read more about the Landmine Museum here.

Carly and I did not end on a sad note in our adventures, we soon returned to temples that were constructed long before landmines were ever used.

The ancient shot-gun house

Story of my life is what I call this photo.  That carved rock next to me is called a Yoni and was used in many Hindu temples as a simple of the female.  Normally, there is a Linga, or the male representation, in the middle of it.  The water that would fill this trough would supposedly increase fertility.  Carly and I had a good laugh about how, as a single person, this carving so well represented me.

Throughout the temples, there were these moss drawings on the ground.  It appeared that an area had been covered by moss and someone removed the majority to leave these cool little doodles.  

Tiny frog!  Isn't it so cute!  That is my finger, to give you an idea of how itty-bitty froggie was.

Sunrise at Angkor Wat...

Rather anticlimactic, but the people watching was AMAZING :)

Everyone else seemed to think a selfie, with a selfie-stick was essential for the experience.  So, Carly and I took one, without a selfie-stick.  Truly, it made the experience.  Such a selfie is the most important part of visiting the temples.

After so much walking, we decided to feed the fish.

Weirdest feeling ever... The little fish ate all the dead skin of your feet.  It tickled and took some getting used to...

Swarming fish!  Afterwards,our feet were as smooth as a baby's bottom.