A dusty heat. Hot and dry, but speed turns air pulled through the tuk tuk’s open frame into a welcome breeze. We are cruising a long road heading due north from Siem Reap and Angkor Wat. Where we are going exactly, I cannot say, but I am told it will be well worth the trip.
I have asked my tuk tuk guy (when you arrive in Siem Reap, whichever driver ferries you to your hotel becomes your “guy” for the rest of your trip, he will give you his number and it is understood that if you would like to go anywhere, you call him) to visit the some of the lesser-known or easy-to-miss sites in the area. So, where I go today is fully up to him.
After some time, we arrive a large, shallow marshland lake with a plank wooden walkway set across a narrower edge of the waters. My guy points where the walkway turns and disappears beyond some wetland brush - a wide cigarette-yellowed smile, a missing right canine - “Follow path, good place there,” he says.
And how right he is! Crossing the water and passing through a canopy of mangroves, the jungle clears and Banteay Srei, the Citadel of Beauty, explodes into view. A magnificent place, carved of rose sandstone - flowing hues of weathered red, pink, and orange intertwined with the verdant green of tropical foliage committed to the long task to grinding the entire places into agate-tinted soil.
Built in the 10th century, Banteay Srei is a temple to the Hindu god, Shiva, The Destroyer. He who creates, transforms, and protects the universe, also known as The Dutifully Husband of Parvati. Father of sons Ganesha, the Remover of Obstacles and Kartikeya, the God of War.
Compared to other more famous Khmer sites like Angkor Wat, Angkor Thom, and Bayon, Banteay Srei is tiny. I am told this is owed to it being one of the only major sites on the Angkor plain not built under the name of a royal. Yet this only belies its grandeur. For whatever humility is signaled by its small area, there is a ruddy and palpable pride, almost arrogance, to the artistry and stonework, brazen in its majesty, intricacy, and endurance – this is certainly no mistake.
Nearly every inch of stone here features some sort of carving, most cut in deep, stunning three-dimensional relief. The temple is filled with scenes from the Hindu epics, stories of Shiva and his rivals in the pantheon, and depictions of battles and combat between the gods. That such beauty and grace is assigned to this small, out of the way place, and somehow missed the other royal Angkor sites says more than words could about the social stature of its patron, royal or not.
But really, Banteay Srei a place where there is little to be said, and much to seen, walked, felt. It is a place overflowing with textured, tactile beauty for the eyes. It is truly something to behold.
Returning from the temple, I find my guy hanging out and chatting with a few other drivers. He waves me over and starts up the engine. I jump in and shut my eyes looking forward to resting on the long ride back into the city, but only a few minutes later we have stopped again. He taps me on the shoulder to wake me and gestures, more serious this time, at the building across the road.
Approaching, I notice that the building I’m walking up to appears to be littered with, no, decorated with, the hollowed and rusted shells of man-sized thousand-pound bombs. A teenage girl in camouflage fatigues, smiles at my arrival, finishing the last few bites of her lunch. She points to the doorway, where just beyond it a young man inside greets me, “Welcome to the Museum of Landmines!” he says with a bright smile.
He gives me a tour. I learn that he and the girl both live and work at the museum as it provides shelter and care for landmine orphans and victims. I read the deeply inspiring and utterly insane story of the founding volunteers that created the museum - former Khmer Rouge child soldiers and concerned citizens taken to landmine disarmament with only the most rudimentary homemade tools - literally broomsticks and kitchen knives.
The space has several galleries detailing the story of the founders, the dark industry of landmines, and the history and human cost of landmine use in Cambodia and around the world. But in the central courtyard beyond the galleries is the museums most striking “exhibit” …
A huge pavilion filled top to bottom with hundreds of disarmed mines across a terrifying spread of makes, models, and sizes. It is surrounded by a moat, or a small pond, filled with water flowers, something like Calla Lilies - a space designed to project a certain strange tranquility, both macabre and unexpected. Perhaps an attempt to create something of beauty out of the “death” of so many landmines given ugliness they bring when they are live.
In all, the museum is a singular place. At once a full display of the horrors of landmines and the hideous, arbitrary, and indifferent violence they inflict, but then also a monument to the resilience of the human spirit, with the museum itself being a labor of love and deep care. Similarly, the attitude of the two attendants there was not dour or self-pitying but rather, matter of fact, jovial, and kind – people seemingly more hopeful about the future than mired in sadness from the past.
The young man even sneaks in a bit of humor as he sees me cautiously eyeing the piles of landmine casings strewn about the place, “Don’t worry,” he says, slapping me lightly on the back, “Everything here is disarmed…well, probably anyways.”
Banteay Srei. The Museum of Landmines. Siem Reap. Cambodia.
There are secrets to be found. Go there.
(Photos shot on Sony A6000)
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