I was so excited to visit the grounds of Angkor Thom, and most especially the temple of Bayon because I would be viewing the exterior in one of the coolest ways imaginable - from the back of an elephant!
I'm getting ahead of myself though - let me first explain that Angkor Thom, according to Wikipedia, was "the last and most enduring capital city of the Khmer empire..." Of course, the Khmers were ruled by King Jayavarman VII, as I mentioned in my earlier post on Ta Prohm.
Well, King Jayavarman thought of himself as the "husband" of the city, and decided that the best way to protect the grounds was to ensure he could view everything from every possible angle. There are 54 towers in the temple of Bayon, and all four sides of each are constructed to look like King Jayavarman's face - that's 216 faces!
This is the front of Bayon - you can click on the photo to expand it, but there are closer photos of Jayavarman below.
Like this, for example...
Or this one - he's peeking at you from the most unexpected places.
The temple has the most amazing carvings on the exterior, showing everything from warriors to domestic farmers. I had over a hundred photos from this tour alone, but lost most of them when my old hard drive crashed. Thank goodness I had uploaded the best ones to a photo sharing website - or all of them would have been lost forever. Please, use my mistake and remember to back up your photos! It still stings when I think of what I lost... Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, the amazing carvings...
Isn't it just incredible? Like Ta Prohm, people still view Bayon as a religious temple and there are monks and nuns throughout worshiping statues of Buddha. You can pay a small fee ($1) to place some incense there and say a prayer.
There was also the (slightly less sacred) option of posing with some traditional dancers (also $1). I chose to forgo that opportunity because, frankly, I thought it was a little cheesy.
Once I finished the walking tour of the temple, it was time for my elephant ride! One of my clients was traveling alone, so we decided to ride together.
Please ignore my ugly work polo shirt and totally illegal jean capris. (According to official uniform policies, jeans are strictly forbidden). At first I felt really sorry for the elephants & thought they must get tired and bored shuffling around the temple all day - but then my tour guide explained that the elephants are a source of income so they are treated amazingly well. I felt a little less guilty after that.
One of my favorite pictures from the whole trip was taken while riding an elephant around the temple of Bayon...
I almost can't put into words how amazing this moment was. I forgot about the heat and the stress of keeping the clients happy and malaria-free. I forgot that I was halfway around the planet from my family and paused for one quick moment to take in the beauty of Bayon. I wondered about the thousands of people who had lived there and built this amazing structure out of stone. I wondered why such a prosperous empire had left behind nothing but poverty in today's society. I marveled at the historical timeline... For goodness sakes, this civilization existed only 1,000 years ago! The city and temple were built around 1180 AD but seemed as ancient as dinosaur fossils to me. And, after all this time, we still have this piece of history to see and touch and explore. Amazing.
