As I walked through Angkor Wat viewing more than 1000 square metres of bas reliefs, I developed a new threory. Where’s Wally was first played by Angkor artisans.
Etched on the stone walls of the corridors of Angkor Wat, the bas reliefs are delicately intricate and amazingly detailed. They depict scenes from stories like the Mahabarata and Ramayana and contain so much action that trying to locate a particular deity/demon amongst all the action is quite like playing Where’s Wally?
This is Vishnu on his garuda mount.
Imagine trying to find him on a wall full of similar characters. Characters that are same same but different.
Kids in those days must have had much fun spending their days playing the mega-sized Where’s ____ game.
We set off at 6am (SG time) for Angkor Wat to catch the sunrise. Despite the numerous tourists there, the atmosphere was serene and surreal. Angkor Wat in the light of dawn looks magical. The architecture is reminiscent of that which we saw at Ayutthaya and Sukhothai, but on a much much grander scale. The stone radiates centuries of gravitas. I think Angkor Wat would make an excellent CS map.
While Angkor Wat is good for CS, the Bayon would be great for Unreal Tournament. It looks like this.
The more than 2,000 faces that gaze around the temple give it a fantastic, other-worldly air. Very, very cool stuff. I guess they were the precursor to today’s Big Brother. Everywhere you go, someone’s watching you.
So we went to: Angkor Wat, Angkor Thom (the ancient capital of Jayavarman VII), Banteay Kdei and Ta Prom. After a while they tend to look similar, but it was still fun clambering up and down temple ruins. It felt very adventurish. “Roger Lim and the ruins of Angkor” has a nice ring to it.
The time I most appreciated today was, however, the rest that we had in the afternoon. For once, our itinerary ended early and we had much of the afternoon to ourselves. We went back to our guesthouse and showered! And chilled out and went souvenir shopping and eating at a leisurely pace. It was a good respite from our usual mad dashes.
It was, all things considered, a good day.
Note: We appear to be paranoid of landmines. Anytime we go off an obvious pathway, we will automatically form up in a single file to proceed, leaving the unfortunate soul in front of the line to step on, activate any landmines that may lie ahead and thus clear the way for the rest of us. Yesterday, at Banteay Srei, we found this shiny metal plate in the ground. Rationally we all agreed that it could not have been a landmine. Yet none of us dared to step on it. Most amusing.
