Cicadas chirp as the fragrance of jasmine wafts across dappled corridors. With each step the tropical heat prickles my skin. Shadows play catch behind pillars and along the backs of statues. I’ve come to live out some childhood fantasies among these inscrutable relics. My hopes run wild as I clamber over exposed roots and crumbling staircases: perhaps I’ll unearth a mysterious amulet whose powers can alter our universe; or one of these arches will transport me to another dimension; or I’ll suddenly encounter the ghost of a tragic courtesan. Anything seems possible in these stuccoed galleries overtaken by tangled jungle.
Yet, what I find most often are fellow tourists running, jumping, screaming, taking endless selfies with their plethora of equipment. The muggy stillness is continuously broken by quotidian humanity invading my sought-after privacy. It’s breaking the spell I want cast over me. I flee from children chasing each other across fallen slabs; I try to escape the cries of an unhappy baby; I hide from people unaware I’m trying to evade them. Where’s my secret temple ruin? What happened to the romance of undisturbed sites proffered me by fiction?
True that once these passages probably teemed with devotees, laborers, and merchants equally cacophonous. True that in their time the newly built structures peacocked in gilded towers and radiant colors. I’m not interested in reality. I’ve been bamboozled by tales of enchanted castles and lost civilizations rediscovered on mist-infused expeditions. I wish to partake of that world.
I come across someone staring at a particular bas-relief as if it will vanish should they leave. I watch them study it with intensity for forty-minutes before moving away. I shuffle forward, intrigued. What was so absorbing? Two bejeweled apsaras in joyous contortions of dance improbably balance on the slenderest of lily pads. I snort. “Well!” I think, but then it’s not just their smirking faces or their voluptuous physiques that capture my attention. The level of detail on lotus buds and pearled necks is exquisite. I sidle over to a parade of meditative figures upholding a cornice. Each face so specific it’s as if I’m being welcomed by their earthly counterparts. Each hand gesture a message from the past, fingers signaling meaning.
I learn to look differently. To gaze deep and hard at one piece of art instead of doing a survey. I don’t want to forget this kind of paying attention. I come upon stone creatures, half-human, half-more-than, and I give to them the same concentration. It’s almost like I can see through that veil into how the stone appeared to the artist. Almost like I am breathing the air they exhaled while cautiously setting chisel to slab. Almost like I can detect the minute grooves that created this guardian of the sanctuary.
I sniff appreciatively of that long ago aromatic incense, before realizing the scent is literally coming from the praying monk across the aisle. Seeing with this focused ferocity has allowed me to realize this is still a place of worship, a space where locals gather to celebrate life. More than just a setting for my quixotic dreams. A custodian emerges from the shadows, sweeping dust from a doorsill. A dragonfly flits in front of my face. I follow it to a carved window frame displaying nothing. Like the work of a European surrealist painter, it is both illusion and subtext.
Sometimes travel can be like this parapet aperture, opening up meanings we didn’t know we needed, shoving endless lemonades down our throats when all we want is cake, then gifting us candied cherry just as the sourness grows familiar. In the cocoon of travel it’s possible to consider how to spend our days, if we have time and money. It can even be possible — for short spasms — to think and act as if what mattered most was tenderness not desperation. I ogle a half-erased tale of devas battling asuras keenly as the sun sets behind the snarled figs until my legs tingle from being immobile. I don’t know if I’ll remember to appreciate craftsmanship in this manner again. When I stumble out these gates I’ll probably return to my frantic self, vexed at how the world doesn’t move according to my desires. But, it’s encouraging that somewhere in a humid jungle a handful of ancient artifacts exceeded my expectations and forced me to contemplate life in ways I hadn’t before.
Bespoke Traveler Note:
ព្រះអាទិត្យថ្មីរះលើផែនដីចាស់: “A New Sun Rises Over the Old Land” by Surind Sūn traces the life of a young couple during a period of profound transformation in Cambodia.
Thank you for listening. “Great Expectations” was written, narrated, and produced by Atreyee Gupta. For more, head to the website at www.bespoketraveler.com.
