Just after I left my hotel, I was stooped in the street by a guy walking by. He noticed my USA hat and wanted to chat. Normally I would have kept on walking, but something about this guy made me stop. He said he knew the capitals of all fifty states. And he did. In fact he could do them in alphabetical order. After we got to about "I", I asked him about his knowledge. Turns out he had a fascinating story about being in school in 1965 taking a test on the US capitals when the bombing in Vietnam commenced. This US bombing changed his life. From trying to escape the communists, to becoming a prisoner of war, to escaping and working in a casino in Macau, I was engrossed! We made some loo plans to meet up against I could hear the rest of the story. I hope I see him again.
It was a perfect start to a day of understanding Khmer culture and lifestyle, learning pre 1970s history. The Khmer were a powerful people in southeast Asia. Their culture was infused with both Buddhist and Hindu beliefs and this is represented in almost all there art, and architecture. One of the most prominent sculptures you will see (besides various renditions of Buddha, Vishnu, and Krishna) is Naga. Naga is a serpent with a whole bunch of heads. Naga seems to be at the entrance to everything. The National Museum is full of statues and sculptures that have been rescued from temples and unearthed all over the country. It is an open air museum, and it's collections somehow escaped total destruction by the Khmer Rouge regime. Not large, but certainly noteworthy.
A walk north brought me to Wat Phnom, set high ( relatively speaking in this very flat city)on a hill. It is a favorite of locals. The come to pray of help and then bring offerings of flowers for thanks.
The Royal Palace: it was remarkable. It has everything a palace should have: throne room, kings residence, Banquet hall, temple, etc. and it is beautiful. The throne room is a large open air building with itching in it but a throne. The architecture is so different and so impressive. But the most impressive part of this collection of buildings was the Silver Pagoda. Why silver? Well the floor was made of 5000 plates of silver. Some were on display but the majority were under rugs for protection. Inside this pagoda was a majestic Jade Buddha. He sits atop a large dais and is stunning. But what I found ore interesting was the solid gold Buddha statue. This statue was about my size...both in height and weight. It was adorned with about 10,000 diamonds. The largest being about 25 carats. Really impressive.
After enjoying this and a really expensive (but delicious) cup of coffee, I headed back to the hotel to reorganize, shower and head to dinner. I don't think I had conquered my jet lag, as I ended sleeping at 7:00ish until the morning!
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