Written by Jonathan Smylie
He is available just 45 minutes after I request a guide and driver and instantly I like him. He is tall with a slender build but stands comfortably in his body. He looks like a runner and by the end of the day; I’ve learned he ran the 100 meters and the 4 x 100 relay in high school. Now, at age 31, he was born during the second year of Pol Pot’s reign, he plays volley ball three or four times a week. To accompany his easy, confident gate and lean, straight body is direct eye contact and a quick smile.
He is one of 400 specially trained tour guides for the temples of Angkor, which are called wats. They have guides trained in every language except Korean, but are now training some who know that language as well.
Virak, the name he goes by, speaks English and Cambodian. Most of his guests are English and Australian, few are American. He’s been at it twelve years.
His father was a college professor, teaching geography and French, but when the Khmer Rouge took over, he was sent away to work in the fields as a farmer. Virak, along with his mother and siblings were moved as well, but separated from their father. A two-year-old sister died of starvation. Another sister was murdered at age four. It was the time of the killing fields. “Every family lost members during those years,” he said. Today, his three remaining siblings are all teachers in secondary schools. His father, still alive, has had a stroke and is paralyzed on one side. Virak’s wife gave birth to their second son four months ago. Their seven-year-old son will start second grade in October. And his wife will bring the baby to school when she returns to teaching second grade in the fall.
He takes me to Angkor Wat first, the largest and most well known of the temples. In clear careful diction, Virak tells the story of the wat, the king who built it, and how it is being preserved. Like me, he likes wide open space and points it out every time we come upon some, the first being Angkor Wat’s moat, 190 meters wide and 1.5 kilometers long (more than a mile) by 1.3 kilometers --a giant rectangle. It is the first open space in this country of jungle that we enjoy together. Three or four times during our next three days, we pass this moat on the way to a different wat and each time he gives the dimensions and restates the fact that it has never been empty of water. He likes that truth.
Inside the first wall of Angkor Wat is a massive field large enough for landing a fair size passenger jet. It’s the second stretch of open space he acknowledges. Nine hundred years ago, this area was the site of hundreds of wooden houses where the citizens of the city lived. Each place Virak stops, I take a picture, then he points to a different subject and I take another picture. We move to the wat’s center section, a series of walled off square, each higher than the last as we move closer to the center. Along a tall wall, Virak points out a mural and recites the mythical stories of good, depicted by monkeys, fighting evil, represented by man-beasts.
At the base of the steep steps that lead to the highest level, (each wat was built with a central tower or mountain where the gods lived) he explains that the climb is steep and dangerous, the steps tall and narrow, because it takes work to reach heaven.
Virak tells me to climb, look around, and to find a nice quiet place to set and let the calmness of the place come over me. For 45 minutes, I enjoy yet another open space above the jungle canopy. Unlike much of America where a high vantage point reveals a distant skyscraper, radio tower, water tower or power line, the horizon here is a clean straight line of green tree tops.
Our time together runs about six hours the first day. For Thursday he insists we drive 18 kilometers away and visit a small wat, built by a priest, with what is considered to be the most beautiful detailed carvings. The place is called Banteay Srei and he is right. Examining the carvings fill me with a deep joy and a sense of privilege to be in the middle of a jungle, in the middle of Cambodia, on the other side of the world from my world.
We discuss everything from how Bush has seriously damaged the international reputation of America (a subject he brings up) to local drug and alcohol abuse to the wide spread poverty and prostitution in Siem Reap, the tourist town just a few miles south of the wats. He is open with the facts, careful with his opinion and always friendly. Over our second lunch, I find out his birthday is January 5th, my is the 4th, and I describe the steady emotional state of Capricorns and he agrees he is that way and we share another laugh.
He is available just 45 minutes after I request a guide and driver and instantly I like him. He is tall with a slender build but stands comfortably in his body. He looks like a runner and by the end of the day; I’ve learned he ran the 100 meters and the 4 x 100 relay in high school. Now, at age 31, he was born during the second year of Pol Pot’s reign, he plays volley ball three or four times a week. To accompany his easy, confident gate and lean, straight body is direct eye contact and a quick smile.
He is one of 400 specially trained tour guides for the temples of Angkor, which are called wats. They have guides trained in every language except Korean, but are now training some who know that language as well.
Virak, the name he goes by, speaks English and Cambodian. Most of his guests are English and Australian, few are American. He’s been at it twelve years.
His father was a college professor, teaching geography and French, but when the Khmer Rouge took over, he was sent away to work in the fields as a farmer. Virak, along with his mother and siblings were moved as well, but separated from their father. A two-year-old sister died of starvation. Another sister was murdered at age four. It was the time of the killing fields. “Every family lost members during those years,” he said. Today, his three remaining siblings are all teachers in secondary schools. His father, still alive, has had a stroke and is paralyzed on one side. Virak’s wife gave birth to their second son four months ago. Their seven-year-old son will start second grade in October. And his wife will bring the baby to school when she returns to teaching second grade in the fall.
He takes me to Angkor Wat first, the largest and most well known of the temples. In clear careful diction, Virak tells the story of the wat, the king who built it, and how it is being preserved. Like me, he likes wide open space and points it out every time we come upon some, the first being Angkor Wat’s moat, 190 meters wide and 1.5 kilometers long (more than a mile) by 1.3 kilometers --a giant rectangle. It is the first open space in this country of jungle that we enjoy together. Three or four times during our next three days, we pass this moat on the way to a different wat and each time he gives the dimensions and restates the fact that it has never been empty of water. He likes that truth.
Inside the first wall of Angkor Wat is a massive field large enough for landing a fair size passenger jet. It’s the second stretch of open space he acknowledges. Nine hundred years ago, this area was the site of hundreds of wooden houses where the citizens of the city lived. Each place Virak stops, I take a picture, then he points to a different subject and I take another picture. We move to the wat’s center section, a series of walled off square, each higher than the last as we move closer to the center. Along a tall wall, Virak points out a mural and recites the mythical stories of good, depicted by monkeys, fighting evil, represented by man-beasts.
At the base of the steep steps that lead to the highest level, (each wat was built with a central tower or mountain where the gods lived) he explains that the climb is steep and dangerous, the steps tall and narrow, because it takes work to reach heaven.
Virak tells me to climb, look around, and to find a nice quiet place to set and let the calmness of the place come over me. For 45 minutes, I enjoy yet another open space above the jungle canopy. Unlike much of America where a high vantage point reveals a distant skyscraper, radio tower, water tower or power line, the horizon here is a clean straight line of green tree tops.
Our time together runs about six hours the first day. For Thursday he insists we drive 18 kilometers away and visit a small wat, built by a priest, with what is considered to be the most beautiful detailed carvings. The place is called Banteay Srei and he is right. Examining the carvings fill me with a deep joy and a sense of privilege to be in the middle of a jungle, in the middle of Cambodia, on the other side of the world from my world.
We discuss everything from how Bush has seriously damaged the international reputation of America (a subject he brings up) to local drug and alcohol abuse to the wide spread poverty and prostitution in Siem Reap, the tourist town just a few miles south of the wats. He is open with the facts, careful with his opinion and always friendly. Over our second lunch, I find out his birthday is January 5th, my is the 4th, and I describe the steady emotional state of Capricorns and he agrees he is that way and we share another laugh.
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