Cambodian (Khmer) Culture & Language

Language
Khmer is the official language, but especially in larger cities many Cambodians
have at least a basic knowledge of English. French is spoken by some older
Khmers.

Khmer phrases I'm trying to learn
Hello - jum ree-up soo-a
Goodbye - jum ree-up leah[formal] / lee-hai [informal]
Yes - baat
No - a-dtay
Please - soam-un-jern
Thank You - arkun

Sampeah - Cambodian Greeting
The sampah is used as a greeting, show of respect, way to say thank you or
apologize. While performing the sampeah, the person places his palms together in
a prayer-like fashion while bowing slightly and, if it is a greeting, saying
Chum Reap Suor (Hello). One should address Cambodians by Lok (Mr.) or Lok Srey
(Mrs.) along with their name.

It is also important when one sampeahs to elders as a sign of respect and
politeness. The higher the hands and the lower the bow, the more respect is
shown. When praying to the Buddha, the person places his palms together close to
his or her face and brings his or her hands toward the ground three times.

Cash conversion
Cambodia's official currency is reil. However, the US dollars is also widely
used in this country. One can actually buy stuffs, pay for rents and fares using
US currency. Right now the US dollar to riel is a little over 1:4200, but from
my understanding the merchants will use a 1:4000 conversion. Since ATMs are not
very common, and places like hotels can exchange the money, I plan on taking a
the money I think I’ll need in USD and having around 40,000 reil (about $10) at
a time for smaller purchases.

Cell phone use in Cambodia
This is assuming your phone and your plan work in Cambodia:

Dial locally within Cambodia - If you are dialing a place in Cambodia with the
same city code as which you are calling, just dial the number. If the number has
a different city code, dial "0," plus the city code, plus the phone number.

Calling the United States from Cambodia - First dial "001" (this is the
international prefix to dial outside of Cambodia). Then dial "1" (this is the
international code used to dial to the U.S.). Follow that by the city code and
phone number.

Cultural mores
• Showing someone the bottom of your foot expresses the same insult as flipping
them your middle finger.
• Ask Before taking someone's photograph
• Bring a gift when visiting someone's home
• Don't engage in public displays of affection
• Don't touch people on the head. This is considered rude in Buddhist countries
(the head is the crucial and sacred as it where the intelligence and spiritual
substance reside)
• Remove your shoes before entering a home of religious building
• Don't use your left hand for eating or shaking hands. In many Asian countries,
the left hand is used for toilet business.
• One should follow the basic manners in Cambodia wherein a native is supposed
to wake up before sunrise or else he is considered lazy.
• Make sure to sit with your legs straightened down and not crossed else it is
considered impolite.
• One should close their doors gently else one is known for its bad temper.
• Elders are highly respected as per their seniority.

Angelina Jolie Cambodian Tattoo
On her left sholder blade is a Buddhist Pali incantation written in Khmer script
to protect her and her adopted Cambodian son Maddox from bad luck. Here's the
translation:

May your enemies run far away from you.
If you acquire riches, may they remain yours always.
Your beauty will be that of Apsara.
Wherever you may go, many will attend, serve and protect you, surrounding you on
all sides.

2009 Portland Baconfest

It was a crisp early afternoon on the first weekend in October when I made my way to one of my favorite drinking establishments the EastBurn. They're supposed to have good food too, but I'm always too distracted by the large whiskey selection and constantly rotating beer taps. However, today I was there for the "Baconfest" block party. They blocked off 18th between Burnside and Ankeny and set up a series of booths along each of the sidewalks.

After dropping off my cans of pork and beans for the Oregon Food Bank at the entrance, I made my way to the back because that is where Laurelwood Brewing Co. was serving there special for-this-event-only Bacon Beer. It was a full-bodied and smoky porter that was just a little too heavy to have too much of. As the name implied there was plenty of bacon flavor.

With plastic beer mug in hand, I turned around to checkout the halfpipe that the guys from Bacon Skateboards were playing on. However, I was quickly board by the lack-luster skills on display and was way more entertained by the t-shirt they were selling with Bacon written in bacon over a head shot of Kevin Bacon.

I then sampled a "Bacon Pop". This was half a slice of very thick cut bacon, cooked in maple syrup and fried till it was just firm enough to be put on a stick. It was delicious but I started to have images of my self at the county fair and had to sit down, giving me a chance to do some people watching. It was a fairly standard mix of 20-30 something Portlanders which meant there were some event appropriate humorous t-shirts. My favorite was the "Meat is murder. Tasty, tasty murder." Although the "Everything tastes better wrapped in bacon" t-shirt with circles of bacon provocatively placed over her bust did make me laugh and also thing of the Bacon Bra.

Getting up to checkout what else there was lead me to the Bacon Salt booth for some free samples of their various salts. They are also the makers of Baconnaise, a product that I have yet to be able to bring my self to try. Fortunately, before I could think to much about what a bacon and mayonnaise combination might taste like, The J&D mascot showed up (a guy in a gigantic slice of bacon costume) and distracted me.

Going down the line, I found a booth for Inagadda Glass where Davida Fernandez made some realistic looking glass bacon and egg ornaments. Then it was over to the Red Cross booth to spun the wheel and find out what category about emergency preparedness I would answer a question about. It was Tsunamis, appropriate since there was a tsunami warning off the Oregon coast that morning due to an underwater earthquake near Samoa. Turns out I grossly underestimated the speed of a tsunami wave. Turns out it goes between 400 and 600 miles per hour.

I deiced to drown my sorrows from getting the question wrong by trying the Bakon Vodka bloody marry. I couldn't taste any bacon due to all the tomato juice which was disappointing. Had I known what he was going to serve me, I would have tried to talk him into a strait shot of the stuff. Then it was off to the Parkers

Parkers Waffles & Coffee booth for one of their soft, moist waffles, smothered in bourbon butter, wrapped into a funnel then filled with bits of bacon. It was a long wait but it was delicious. However, I had reached my limit; my taste buds had reached bacon overload. Fortunately, Rouge Brewing was there with their Sesquicentennial Ale and while my sense of taste was being rejuvenated I was able to get a front and center position for the bacon eating contest.

It wasn't really so much of a contest as it was a line of people eating things covered in bacon. It started off all right with round 1 just being a BLT. One guy was really into it and had his plate on the ground and got on his knees to better shovel the food into his mouth. One lady decided she wasn't going to have any of it and didn't take more than a bite of her sandwich before leaving the contest. Next came the Voodoo Doughnut maple bacon bars. Those looked good. Next it got little weird with it just being a pealed banana with a strip of bacon wrapped around it. The penultimate task was to down several peeps covered in Bacon Salt. This one just about got a few of the contestants to loose it. Finally, it was the bacon ice cream sundaes. This round actually did have a goal of seeing who could finish first. Emily Gibson of The Meat Show won, but the prize was given to the guy who competed on his knees since she was the organizer of the event.

I left at this point, but there was more on the schedule and I thought it was entertaining enough to hope that they would do it again next year and see what sort of meat mayhem gets caused as the sun goes down.

Theravada Buddhism

In the last post I mentioned that Theravada Buddhism was the dominate religion in Cambodia in 1296, however I didn't go on to point out that it is still the dominant religion today with 96.4% of the population clamming to be Buddhist.

Buddhism is primarily based on the teaching of Siddhartha Gautama who lived and taught in Nepal and India around 400 BCE and is regarded as the Buddha (The Awakened One). The central premise of his philosophy was to find a path to salvation by attaining insight into the ultimate nature of reality. There are two major branches of Buddhism. The first, and older, is Theravada ("The School of the Elders"). The second is Mahayana ("The Great Vehicle"). Both schools believe in the teachings of the Buddha, but there is disagreement on the expression and implementation. Unlike the Catholics and Protestants of Northern Ireland however, there is no animosity born out of this disagreement. Since Theravada is dominant in Cambodia and Southeast Asia, I'm focusing on that one.

Legend has it that King Asohka of India sent out a couple of monks to SE Asia in the 3rd century BCE where it spread, mingled and coexisted with Brahmanic religions that were introduced through trade with India. Sanskrit inscriptions and Chines reconds show that Buddhism was prominent in the Funan and Chenla Kingdoms, but around 600 CE the tide started shifting towards Hindu. While Hindu was the state religion of the Angkor Kingdom (except during Jayavarman VII), Mahahana Buddhist practices, strongly influenced with Tantric tendencies, were widely accepted.

Cambodia transitioned to Theravada Buddhism in the 13th Century after Tamilinda (Jayavarman VII's son) returned from Sri Lanka as an ordained Buddhist monk. This form of Buddhism was much more disciplined and orthodox being based only on the earliest teachings of the Buddha. One reason Theravada became so popular so fast was that it was inclusive of all members of society and not just the elites. This relatively sudden ground swell of ideological change may also have had a hand in overthrowing the "god-king" and bringing the Angkor Kingdom to an end.

Cambodia Trip Planning - A closer look at Angkor

Since Angkor Wat is the "big deal" in Cambodia, and one of my primary motivations for going, I thought I would take a closer look at it. As previously mentioned, The Angkor Empire started in 802 CE when King Jayavarman II broke away from Java. He set up his capital in Hariharalava (today called Roluos), just southeast of Angkor Wat. Harihara is the name of a deity that combines the essence of Vishnu (Hari) with that of Shiva (Hara). He also started a trend of associating the ruler with the power of Shiva by proclaiming himself a devaraja or "god king" (deva = god, raja = king). A title he felt he deserved after unifying several political factions in the area.

Side note: Connecting the king to Hinduism was started 300 years earlier by the first Khmer ruler, Rudravarman, who's name comes from adding the name of a powerfull Hindu deity (Rudra = Controller of awesome powers) with varman (protected by). Jaya and Vijaya were the gate-keepers of Vaikuntha, which was Vishnu's dwelling and means "place or eternal bliss".

In 877 Indravarman I comes to power and builds the empire's first "baray", a giant artificial body of water used for irrigation.

His son, Yashovarman I, then comes to power in 889 and moves the capital to the Angkor area. The new capitol is called Yasodharapura and is centered around a temple on a low hill known as Phnom Bakheng, surrounding it with a moat fed from the East Baray. In this case the baray not only irrigated the rice fields, but also represented the mythological oceans surrounding Mount Meru (Phnom Bakheng), the abode of the Hindu gods.

Typically, a lingam served as the central religious image of the Angkorian temple-mountain. Usually set in an open base (the female yoni), the lingam was anointed by priests with milk and other libations as the source of life. The temple-mountain was the center of the city, and the lingam in the main sanctuary was the focus of the temple. The name of the central lingam was the name of the king himself, combined with the suffix "-esvara" which designated Shiva. Through the worship of the lingam, the king was identified with Shiva, and Shaivism became the state religion.

Over the next 300 years, the Khmer empire produced some of the world's most magnificent architectural masterpieces in the Angkor. There was a short period where Jayavarman IV moved the capitol to Koh Ker in 928, but Rajendravarman II moved it back to Angkor in 944. Some 72 major temples or other buildings dot the area. King Suryavarman II built the most famous temple, Angkor Wat, between 1113 and 1150 as his personal temple mausoleum.

Beautiful nymphs called apsaras arose from the foam in a Hindu creation myth, Churning of the Sea of Milk. They dance and sing for the gods and mortals who reach paradise. Some 1700 apsaras are carved on the walls of Angkor Wat alone; thousands more - individual in dress, hairstyle, and ornamentation - appear in almost every Angkor temple, Hindu and Buddhist alike. Classical Cambodian dance echoes an apsara's graceful gestures.

Breaking with the tradition of the Khmer kings, and influenced perhaps by the concurrent rise of Vaisnavism in India, he dedicated the temple to Vishnu rather than to Siva. With walls nearly one-half mile long on each side, Angkor Wat grandly portrays the Hindu cosmology, with the central towers representing Mount Meru, home of the gods; the outer walls, the mountains enclosing the world; and the moat, the oceans beyond. However worship of Vishnu was secondary and always pressant.

After Suryavarman, thinks went downhill for a bit. Internal strife opened the door for the Cham (now southern Vietnam) to invade and destroy Yasodharapura. The future King Jayavarman VII rallied his people and defeated the Cham. After he was crowned in 1181 he built Angkor Thom over the ruins of Yasodharapura. He also shifted the state religion from Hinduism to Mahayana Buddhism. He built the Bayon at the heart of Angkor Thom, and on the face towers, the king represented himself as the bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara (Buddhist hero who renounced nirvana to save all sentient beings) moved by compassion for his subjects. Hindu temples were altered to display images of the Buddha, and Angkor Wat briefly became a Buddhist shrine. But after his death there was a Hindu revival and most of the Buddhist images were desecrated.

In 1296 Chinese diplomat Zhou Daguan visited Angkor and the journal of his experiences are the most significant source of information about everyday life at Angkor. He also observed tree separate religious groups: Theravada Budhism (the dominant one), Brahmans and Shaivites or lignam worshippers. It was around this time that the Angkorian civilization began to decline and officially came to an end when Thai invaders sacked Angkor in 1431. Only Angkor Wat remained occupied as a Buddhist shrine.

Cambodia Trip Planning - The Sites

For the most part I'll just be tagging along, but if someone asks what I would like to do today, I've put together a list of things that caught my eye.

Things to do in Siem Reap
Angkor Archeological Park - Home to the magnificent Khmer temple ruins of Angkor, including the legendary Angkor Wat, Bayon and dozens of other ancient ruins of the Angkorian-era (9th-13th century) Khmer Empire. The Park encompasses more than 400 square kilometers just outside Siem Reap City in northwestern Cambodia and is a World Heritage Site.

Suggested three day itinerary: Day 1 (morning): Angkor Thom (south gate), Bayon Temple, Terrace of the Leper King, Terrace of the Elephants, Baphuon Temple; Day 1 (afternoon): Angkor Wat, Phnom Bakheng (for sunset); Day 2 (morning): Prasat Kravan, Banteay Kdei, Srah Srang, Ta Prohm, Victory gate, Thommanon, Chau Say Tevoda; Day 2 (afternoon): Pre Rup, Eastern Mebon, Ta Som, Neak Pean, Preah Khan; Day 3 (morning): Kbal Spean, Banteay Srei, Banteay Samre; Day 3 (afternoon): The Ruluos group

Land Mine Museum - The Land Mine Museum is run by Aki Ra, an ex army Land Mine casualty. He started off by turning the garden of his home into a museum of mines and other ordnance. The museum is now located in a purpose built location approximately 12 miles from Siem Reap in the direction of Bantay Srei.

Angkor National Museum - In a beautiful building, you will discover the Golden Era of the Khmer Kingdom, through state of the art multimedia technology, to provide visitors a full easy to understand story of the legend.

Tara Riverboat – Largest riverboat on the Tonle Sap Lake. Explore the floating village of Kompong Phluk, flooded forest and great lake.

Psar Chaa - Old Market - This flea market offers Khmer antiques, Cambodian food and tourist souvenirs.

Puok Silk Farm – A silk farm and factory with a free tour.

Things to do in Phnom Penh
Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum - This former torture and detention center is now a museum dedicated to the victims of the Khmer Rouge.

Russian Market - The Russian Markets (Phsar Tuol Tom Pong) are busy and full of life, as well as being able to buy thousands of things you don't really need, and gifts for people who don't really need them but...

The Killing Fields (Choeung Ek) - These were the execution grounds for the Khmer Rouge.

National Museum - This beautiful sandstone museum was opened in 1920 and showcases many fine examples of Angkor Wat statuary.

Wat Phnom – The temple on the hill. The only hill in town. According to legend, the first pagoda on this site was erected in 1373 to house four statues of Buddha deposited here by the waters of the Mekong and discovered by a woman name Penh.

Independence Monument - This obelisk commemorates Cambodia's freedom from France in 1953.

Royal Palace - Still the dwelling place of the king, this palace contains the Silver Pagoda (Wat Preah Keo Morokat), whose floor is made up of 5329 silver tiles, each weighing 1.125 kilograms.

Wat Ounalom – Headquarters of the Cambodian Buddhist patriarchate and the country’s pre-eminent center of Buddhist education.

Bon Om Touk (Water and Moon Festival) – The first through third in November this year. One of the biggest and most extravagant festivals in Cambodia. Brightly-colored boats do battle in highly competitive races.

Other places and activities
Mekong River – This is the major river running through Cambodia. I would love to be able to take a boat trip up the river and see the freshwater Irrawaddy dolphins.

Kompong Cham – This is the town where Steve's wife's family lives, and the third largest in Cambodia. Near by is the 11th century sanctuary Wat Nokor, the bamboo bridge across the Mekong to the island of Koh Paen is suppose to be impressive and there are a couple of hilltop pagodas to the east (Phnom Pros and Phnom Srei) that might be worth exploring.

Recommendations from the host of Tasty Dog in the Kingdom: Kampot and Kep, a couple of laid back coastal towns; Battambang, the second largest city in Cambodia; Mondulkiri, located in a uqueqe area of Cambodia and home of some beautiful nature hikes.

Preah Vihear Temple - This would have made my list, but due to a dispute with the Thai government, both sides currently have a hefty military presence there and I would get shot if I got near it.

Cambodia Trip Planning - A Brief History

Stone tools dating back 1.83 million years have been found in Malaysia and the oldest human-like person found was the 500,000 year old "Java Man". Although Homo Floresiensis (aka the Hobbit) has been making headlines lately and is dated between 95,000 to 13,000 years old. The Khmer people (the original Cambodians) seem to have move down to Cambodia from South Eastern China around 1000 BCE and quickly set up organized agricultural societies harvesting rice, fish and domesticated animals, especially in the Mekong River valley. It was about this time when most people of Southeast Asia became heavily influenced by Indian traders and scholars, adapting their religions, sciences, and customs and borrowing from their languages.

The earliest known kingdom in the area, Funan, flourished from 68-550 CE. It reached its peak under Fan Shih-man in the early 3rd century, extending as far south as Malaysia and as far west as Burma. The Funanese established a strong system of mercantilism and commercial monopolies that would become a pattern for empires in the region. Fan Shih-man expanded the fleet and improved the Funanese bureaucracy, creating a quasi-feudal pattern that left local customs and identities largely intact, particularly in the empire's farther reaches.

The Khmers formed Chenla, a vassel state to Funan, in 550. The Khmer Kingdom of Bhavapura was lead by Ishanavarman who completely conquered the kingdom of Funan during 612-628. He chose his new capital at the Sambor Prei Kuk, naming it Ishanapura. The weakening of the Funan state at this time can largely be explained by distant events: the collapse of the Roman Empire and subsequently trade routes between the Mediterranean and China. After the death of Jayavarman I in 681 the kingdom broke up into many principalities.

In 802 the kingdom of Kambuja (which gave Kampuchea, or Cambodia, its name) began in the Angkor region in western Cambodia. Under Jayavarman VII (1181–ca. 1218), Kambuja reached its zenith of political power and cultural creativity. Jayavarman VII gained power and territory in a series of successful wars against its close enemies; the Cham or Vietnamese. Following Jayavarman VII's death, Kambuja experienced a gradual decline. Important factors were the aggressiveness of neighboring peoples (especially the Thai, or Siamese), chronic interdynastic strife, and the gradual deterioration of the complex irrigation system that had ensured rice surpluses. The Angkorian monarchy survived until 1431, when the Thai captured Angkor Thom and the Cambodian king fled to the southern part of the country.

The next 400 years are known as Cambodia's "Dark Ages". With the exception of a short time in the sixteenth century where they were able to establish trade with other parts of Asia and the Spanish & Portuguese "discovered" Ankor, Cambodia was a pawn in the power struggles between Siam and Vietnam. Siam started off with the upper hand, but when the Vietnamese annexed the Mekong Delta, cutting off Cambodia's access to the sea, Vietnamese absorption of the Khmer people seemed inevitable.

In 1863, King Norodom singed over Cambodia to the French where the French tried, till WWII to create a Union Indochinoise (Union of Indochina). In 1940 the Japanese displaced French authority in Vietnam. Thailand saw this as an opportunity to squeeze the weakened French for control of Cambodia, and after the French-Tai War, walked away with a couple of provinces. In 1941 the French made Norodom Sihanouk king (19 at the time), seeing him as inexperienced and easy to manipulate. While this seemed to work for a while, he took direct control of the government from June 1952 until February 1955 (shredding the constitution he ratified in 1947) where he pushed the French into letting go of Cambodia on November 9th, 1953.

During the first administration of Sihanouk Cambodia tried to have a neutral foreign policy, but by the mid '60s the Viet Cong had bases in parts of the east. In 1969 the USA bombing runs along the border and the Khmer Rouge insurgency, helped to destabilize Sihanouk's control. Eventually he was driven abroad for medical reasons in January 1970. This allowed General Lon Nol to take control with a military coup d'état. Cambodia then allies with the United States and used joint forces to try and drive out the NVA, with very little affect. On October 9, the Cambodian monarchy was abolished, and the country was renamed the Khmer Republic.
In 1972, a constitution was adopted, a parliament elected, and Lon Nol became president. But the government was to week and corrupt and Pol Pot and Ieng Sary asserted their dominance over the Vietnamese-trained communists eventually collapsing the Republic and taking control in April 1975.

Immediately after its victory, the CPK forced everyone to work as farmers in order to shape society into a model that Pol Pot had conceived. A new constitution in January 1976 established Democratic Kampuchea as a Communist People's Republic. Khieu Samphan would chair the State Presidium and Pol Pot would act as PM. Prince Sihanouk was put under house arrest. The CIA estimated 50,000–100,000 were executed and 1.5 million died from 1975 to 1979.
A December 1978 Vietnamese invasion drove the Khmer Rouge into the countryside, began a 10-year Vietnamese occupation, and touched off almost 13 years of civil war. The US tried to launch a relief effort, poring $400 million through UNICEF and the World Food Program between 1979 and 1982.

The 1991 Paris Peace Accords mandated democratic elections and a ceasefire, which was not fully respected by the Khmer Rouge. UN-sponsored elections in 1993 helped restore some semblance of normalcy under a coalition government (90% turn out). Factional fighting in 1997 ended the first coalition government, but a second round of national elections in 1998 led to the formation of another coalition government and renewed political stability. The remaining elements of the Khmer Rouge surrendered in early 1999. Some of the surviving Khmer Rouge leaders are now on trial by an UN-sponsored tribunal for crimes against humanity.

Elections in July 2003 were relatively peaceful, but it took one year of negotiations between contending political parties before a coalition government was formed. In October 2004, King Norodom Sihanouk abdicated the throne and his son, Prince Norodom Sihamoni, was selected to succeed him. Local elections were held in Cambodia in April 2007, and there was little in the way of pre-election violence that preceded prior elections. National elections in July 2008 were relatively peaceful.

Cambodia Trip Planning – The Flight

The dates are set for the Cambodia trip: October 30^th to November 20^th 2009. Looks like I’ll be an airline passenger for Halloween this year. Doesn’t get much more terrifying than that!

Looking around the various flight booking websites, it looks like the cheapest and fastest way is to take a Horizon Air shuttle from Portland (PDX) to SeaTac (SEA) then get on an Asiana Airlines flight (maybe my first Boeing 777?) to Seoul (ICN) and finally in to Phnom Penh (PHN). Total travel time is about 24 hours, but since I’ll be going east, local time to local time with be about 41 hours. That will be a new record for me. Naturally taking the train or even driving (leaving my car with a friend) up to Seattle was considered, but it turns out that the time added vs. money saved comparison was a wash and the convenience of just checking our bags at PDX won out. Checking the old Beer Lover’s Airport Guide, it seems like the Seattle Taproom in Concourse B is where I’ll be waiting for my connection.

Kayak.com was search engine of choose for this trip. It was my first time really using it and I really liked its functionality, search options and chart of historical flight prices around the date of my trip. Normally, I would take the flight information I liked and go directly to the airlines which usually get me a better deal, but in this case Steve booked everything through a travel agent friend of his. I was happy to learn, however, that my method yielded the same flight for the same price.