Contents ISSuE 5.5

Contents I ss u e 5 . 5
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Nanotechnology: the new threat to food
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Crisis in the food chain
by Michael Braunstein
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by Brad Olsen
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The Magnificent Temples at Angkor
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Heartland Healing Magazine 7
Sacred Destinations:
CAMBODIA RISE AND FALL
Home to the Magnificent Angkor Temples
by Brad Olsen
W
Modern “Khmer” Culture Descends
to its Lowest Level
Contemporary Cambodian politics and
internal conflict have ensured that we are familiar with the name Khmer. In ancient times,
Khmer was the name of the people who built
the temples of Angkor, but in the late 20th
century the name mutated into the Khmer
Rouge, a band of guerrillas who wreaked havoc
in the jungles near the Thailand border. The
Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot, easily took control of the country in the power vacuum left
by departing US influence after the Vietnam
War. The Khmer Rouge intensely persecuted
the wealthy and intelligentsia class by draining
the cities’ populations and installing brutal
work camps in the country. The Khmer Rouge
was ultimately responsible for killing more
than one million fellow Cambodians during
their reign of terror from 1975 to 1979. Stark
reminders of genocide, re-education camps,
and the infamous “killing fields” are apparHeartland Healing Magazine 18
courtesy Brad Olsen
hen Europe was locked in the Dark
Ages, Cambodia was becoming a
major power in Southeast Asia.
The once-mighty Angkor Empire — which
800 years ago stretched into what is today
Vietnam, Laos, Thailand and most of the
Malay Peninsula — was ruled by a succession of strong-armed kings. Before the Angkor
kings, the first Cambodian civilization was the
3rd century CE kingdom of Funan, an early
trading center called Chenla located southeast
of the present-day capital Phnom Penh. The
successful Funan outpost acted as a buffer
between India and China, two mighty empires
that strongly influenced the development of
Cambodia. Pilgrims and traders traveling the
land and sea routes between India and China
brought new religious and architectural ideas
to Cambodia, eagerly adapted by successive
Khmer rulers. These early kingdoms of Funan
and Angkor paid tribute to China while adopting many elements of India culture, including
its style of dress, eating habits, Sanskrit writing
system and the elaborate Hindu religion.
Smiling Buddha at Bayon, one of many Angkor temples.
MARCH/APRIL 2009
ent at modern Cambodia holocaust museums.
Surprisingly, the Khmer Rouge was not completely disbanded and brought to justice until
the last few years.
The Sacred Mount of Northern
Cambodia
Before the Temples of Angkor were built,
Phnom Kulen was a sacred mountain proclaimed by the original Cambodian king. High
atop this hilltop location, in 802 CE, King
Jayavarman II declared independence from
oppressive Java kings ruling his land from
present-day Indonesia. The event gave rise
to Cambodian independence, and what
followed were five centuries of prolific temple construction at Angkor.
Although Jayavarman II was a
Hindu obsessed with the lingam-cult of Shiva, the summit of Phnom Kulen contains
the latter-built sculpture of
a large reclining Buddha
carved into the upper portion of a massive sandstone boulder. The mountain was originally named
Mahendraparvata, a dedication to the Hindu deity
Shiva. Atop this mountain
Jayavarman II held the first
“god-king” ceremony legitimizing his “universal kingship”
through the establishment of a
royal lingam-worshipping cult.
The lingam-cult would remain central to Angkorian kingship, religion, art
and architecture for centuries.
Buddhism Enters the Mix
During the reign of King Ang Chan I
in the 16th century, the mountain city
Mahendraparvata became a worshipping place
of Theravada Buddhism, a religion still practiced by most Cambodians today. The sculpted
Buddha near the summit, set inside a small
pagoda, remains a modern-day pilgrimage destination for Cambodian Buddhists. The summit contains Cambodia’s largest image of a
reclining Buddha. Phnom Kulen has been the
holiest mountain of Cambodia since the 9th
century, and it remains so today. This was also
the mountain where sandstone was quarried
for the construction of the sacred temples at
Angkor.
MARCH/APRIL 2009
Ancient Cambodian Culture Reaches
an Apex
The sprawling Angkor complex in northern Cambodia was first founded by King
Jayavarman II, who proclaimed himself “universal monarch” during his reign from 802
to 850 CE. It was this powerful ruler who
consolidated his kingdom and initiated the
first large building projects in his new capital.
Although few of his original buildings survive,
many depictions from classical Hindu mythology. Basically, each complex was built for and
commemorates the god-king who commissioned its construction. Each temple complex
of Angkor acted as the king’s capital during his
lifetime—then his tomb upon death. Possibly
the largest collection of religious edifices ever
built, nearly every temple at Angkor is a labyrinth of corridors and interconnected buildings
featuring elaborate carvings and sculptures.
The word Angkor literally means “Capital City”
or “Holy City.”
The Magnificent Temples of
Angkor
The most elaborate and best preserved of all Angkor temples is the
famous Angkor Wat, constructed
by King Suryavarman II at the
height of the Khmer Empire
in the early 12th century CE.
This massive “temple-mountain” is dedicated to the
god Vishnu, regarded by
Hindus as “the protector.”
Five huge beehive-like towers dominate the skyline at
Angkor Wat, while the long
causeways and wide pools
give the visitor a sense of freedom in space. Angkor Wat is
considered the best example of
Khmer architecture at its most
refined state. Composing a halfsquare mile (200 hectares), Angkor
courtesy Brad Olsen
Wat uses its massive proportions to
astonish any visitor. Similar to largescale monuments designed in Egypt, there
is a long approach to the temple, an imposing
entry foyer, followed by a central temple rising
pyramid-like on three superimposed terraces.
it was Jayavarman II who put the unique stamp Angkor Wat is a complex of great drama, utilizon Khmer religion and renamed the country ing various courtyards, reflection pools, towers,
“Kambuja,” an early version of “Kampuchea,” a large surrounding moat and various ancillary
buildings. The four towers on each corner and
or “Cambodia.”
Collectively regarded as the world’s largest the central tower in the middle replicate a
temple complex, successive kings added their mountain-like appearance, which most experts
own monuments in and around Angkor for believe to represent the sacred Mount Kailas
centuries. Covering more than 135 square miles in Tibet—the center of the universe to both
(220 sq. km), it is a patchwork of sandstone Hindus and Buddhists. Whatever Angkor Wat
temples, chapels, causeways, terraces and res- was modeled after remains conjecture, but there
ervoirs. Adorning many temple walls are thou- certainly are both liberal amounts of Hindu and
sands of carvings depicting battles between Buddhist elements represented, together with a
men and gods, sensual dancing women, royal robust quantity of king worship.
processions with kings riding elephants, and
continued on page 20 y
Heartland Healing Magazine 19
Those visiting the Temples of Angkor today
should not set their sights merely on Angkor
Wat. Although dazzling in its own right, Angkor
Wat is merely one of many highlights from this
prolific age of Khmer temple building. Another
capital site, Angkor Thom, has a fantastic temple
called the Bayon, which rivals Angkor Wat in size
and beauty. Bayon is most famous for the over
200 magnificent, slightly smiling stone faces.
Some 70 other temples and monuments adorn
the area, only recently opened to foreigners after
the removal of unexploded land mines from the
long decades of turmoil. Several temples still
retain old-growth trees firmly entangled in the
structure. The trees cannot be cleared because
the roots are so intertwined into the foundation
that the structures would collapse if the trees
were removed. Giant trees can be seen growing
out of the Ta Prohm, Banteay Kdei, and Preah
Khan temples, evoking the mood of 19th century
French explorers discovering the monuments for
the first time amid dense jungle foliage.
Universal Phallic Worship
The lingam-cult in 9th century Cambodia was
derived from a sect of the Hindu religion devoted
to the god Shiva. In this aspect Shiva is worshipped
in the form of a lingam, or phallic symbol. The lingam is typically depicted inside a square perimeter
called a yoni, representing the female vulva. Most
of the Hindu temples at Angkor housed stone
lingams, inside square yoni boxes, which were
attended and worshipped by devotees. In Hindu
tradition, water that passed over lingams became
sacred, even magical. It was believed that the lingams spiritually “fertilized” the waters that filled
the barays (reservoirs) which irrigated the rice
fields that fed the people.
Cutting through the upper plateau of Phnom
Kulen is the River of One Thousand Lingams,
fed in part by several natural springs. Less than
three feet under the river’s surface over 1,000
small carvings are sculpted into the sandstone
riverbed, interspersed by larger sections of
stone featuring apsaras (mythological celestial
nymphs), the god Vishnu, and other figures. In
the year 1054 King Suryavarman I ordered part
of the river diverted temporarily so that hundreds of phallic images could be carved into the
sandstone river bed. The water thus became
holy as it passed over the submerged lingams
before moving downstream to a series of tiered
waterfalls. At the top, where Suryavarman I
Heartland Healing Magazine 20
chose to bathe, he again had the river diverted
so that the stone bed could be carved with an
elaborate rendering of the Hindu god Vishnu.
Here Vishnu can be seen laying on the serpent
Ananta, with his consort Lakshmi at his feet
and a lotus flower protruding from his navel
bearing the god Brahma. This holy place must
have been favored during the Angkorian epoch
when its waters, after having been washed by
It is hard to believe that not long ago in 1995
Khmer Rouge terrorists still targeted foreign
tourists, but today the region is completely
safe for travel. Visiting Cambodia used to be
a bragging right for the intrepid travelers who
made their way to these fascinating temples,
but now large tour groups are streaming in and
transforming Siem Reap into a booming tourism town. The Phnom Kulen mountain road
gods and lingams, continued on to the spectacular royal cities of the kingdom.
has only just returned to government hands
after the fall of the Khmer Rouge and can be
inaccessible or slow going due to poor conditions, especially in the rainy season.
courtesy Brad Olsen
y continued from page 19
Getting to the Temples of Angkor
and Phnom Kulen
The many temples of Angkor are located in
northwestern Cambodia, situated a few miles
north of the tourist town Siem Reap. From
Phnom Penh, there are buses, trains, flights
and a boat route over the Tonlé Sap lake to Siem
Reap. Phnom Kulen is located 35 miles (50 km)
northeast of Siem Reap. Visitors can walk into
the water to take pictures of the lingams but
are instructed not to touch the underwater
carvings. The reclining Buddha atop Phnom
Kulen is the focal point of any Cambodian pilgrimage. It is respectful to remove one’s shoes
before ascending the stairs to the sanctuary.
© 2009 by Brad Olsen. Reprinted with
permission from Sacred Places Around the
World: 108 Destinations. His latest book,
Sacred Places North America: 108 Destinations
has just been released in a second edition.
Brad Olsen is the author of World Stompers:
A Global Travel Manifesto, and four other
travel titles. Websites: stompers.com, bradolsen.com, and cccpublishing.com.
Brad Olsen would like to thank the ASEAN
Tourism Forum and the Kingdom of Cambodia
for sponsoring his most recent voyage to
Cambodia. Olsen recommends the City of
Angkor Hotel when visiting Siem Reap.
MARCH/APRIL 2009