A Weekend in Phnom Penh (or, The Fly meets Cyclops)

Well, I thought I was going to be able to post all my blogs for the past several days today (Saturday). As it was, I had computer issues that kept me from connecting at the hotel where we went to hop on the network. If Mark hadn’t been here, I would never have gotten on. But by the time he figured out what the problem was (Microsoft, as usual), the network was so crowded with users that the speed was so slow that I couldn’t do anything much. Fortunately, I had used a café hot spot earlier in the day to IM my wife for awhile, which was a tremendous blessing. There, too, after a couple of hours got so slow that we couldn’t work anymore, which is why we headed to the hotel. All in all, a pretty frustrating morning technologically speaking! So, not sure when this will get posted. I did one posted, the final one from Singapore, which tells you how far behind I had fallen. There just hasn’t been connectivity here. Hope it’s better in China.

Getting around Phnom Penh on a motorcycle gives one a fresh perspective on the providence of God. Now, that’s not to alarm you, because you never really get going that fast, it’s just that the confusion of the traffic and the way it moves (or doesn’t) is a wonderful picture of the wisdom of man at work, and as I wind my way through it, openings appearing at just the right time, a car or truck setting a pick for me just when I need it to get across a road, and just generally not getting lost are all vivid evidences to me of the reality of God’s providence even in the small things of life.

 

As you can see from the picture, I am fitted out with the latest in moto fashion and safety gear. With the visor down, I look like a character out of the tragic sci-fi classic “The Fly,” only instead of being merged with a human, the fly flew into an experiment with a Cyclops. Oh well, I’m satisfied knowing that I am providing cheap entertainment for the local populace.

 

After a nice lunch out, Mark and I were preparing to head out for some grocery shopping when the skies opened up again. This time, we were right next to a little indoor mall, and we waited it out in there. Much better than walking or riding through it. Took a couple of hours, though, for it to calm down enough to ride again, long enough to flood some of the streets, but nothing that was a problem. People just take it in stride. The rain, however, meant that our planned excursion to the demon’s mouth temple that has just been completed didn’t happen, so we headed back to Mark’s place to rest up a bit before dinner. The skies stayed a bit cloudy the remainder of the day, which was great, because the temps stayed down to only the upper 80s or low 90s. With a bit of a breeze, it was quite bearable for this time of year. We rode out for dinner and our grocery shopping later, and enjoyed another really nice meal (duck flambé and Mekong lobster) on the banks of the river at the Titanic restaurant again. Great place.

 

It’s been a blessing to treat Mark to some places that he hasn’t been able to go to, and wouldn’t usually go to because he tends to bring new meaning to the word “frugal.” It’s also been a blessing to really take all these opportunities to really get caught up on his life and work here, and live it with him to some degree. It’s not an easy life, but Mark wants me to be sure to let everyone know that he isn’t suffering, either. He’s really learned his way around, and how to get things done. It’s clear that he is at home here, and very content with the sovereign choice of God for his life.

 

It’s Sunday morning as I write. The services at Glory Bible Presbyterian Church aren’t held until the afternoon, so we are enjoying a quiet morning of devotions and fellowship. Glory BPC is pastored by Rev. Stephen Choi, an IBPFM missionary from Korea. Mark helps out there doing some teaching and preaching from time to time. Their services are held on the covered roof-top of a building. When it rains it can be deafening up there, Mark tells me. The way the rains have been coming in every day so far, and the way the skies look today, we may be in for it again. Hope we don’t get caught out in the rain on the bikes in our church clothes, but we’ll get what we get. I get to just sit and soak up the Word today, which will be a blessing. I’ll write more when we get back this afternoon.

 

We made it back well before the rains came, though we could see the clouds on the horizon. They’re right over us now, and I expect a deluge at any time. Glad to be back under cover. The service on the rooftop was pleasant, since the approaching storm generated some breeze. By pleasant I mean that the sweat felt cool when the breeze blew! Anyway, Pastor Choi preaches in Korean, which gets translated into Khmer, which was in turn translated into English for us by a young man from the congregation. We sang a couple of songs that I knew, which was nice, though of course it sounded strange when I sang them in English while everyone else was singing in Khmer. The congregation is nearly all young people, under the age of 20 or 25 I would say, many coming because they also take English classes at the church during the week. All were very friendly, and I had the opportunity to bring greetings to them, which I did.

 

The ride home was uneventful, and Mark is preparing dinner for us tonight – traditional Cambodian fare. He is a very good cook, and it will be nice to just chill out (relatively speaking) here for the evening. I head for China tomorrow afternoon, and will just have time in the morning to get to the hotel and try getting online again. Hope it works this time!

Angkor, and An Adventure

It’s now Friday night, since I haven’t had an opportunity for blogging since Thursday morning. Actually, I haven’t had any chance to get on the Internet, either. The hotel’s connection was down, which was disappointing. So by the time you read this, it will have been some time since I was on, and you’ll be getting a whole bunch of updates at once. Planning on getting to a café tomorrow and doing all my internetting.

The tourist guide for Angkor and Siem Reap recommended a one day tour of the temples in the area if all we wanted to see were the highlights. It was enough, for sure, since many of the temples look much alike. But we were able to choose a few that had some unique features, along with Angkor Wat itself, of course, and we got a good overview of the architecture, the history, and the scope of the ruins.

We were met by our guide, Rith, about 9 am at the hotel. He was a really nice young guy, and a good guide. We kept trying to get things around to spiritual things (working on the comparative religions theme to try to open the door), but he wasn’t biting, I’m sorry to say. This area is now a national “park” of sorts, and the jungle has been allowed to reclaim much of it, so the woods are green and beautiful and dense around the temples. We were able to see the famous faces of the Bayon temple complex, and climb into its interior to explore it from the inside out. There are symmetrical towers throughout the temple, and each one has four faces on it, each facing the points of the compass. From there we stopped at another temple close by the name of which I don’t remember, which had a long causeway leading up to it, symbolizing the journey from earth to heaven. Many of these temples are “mountain” temples, meaning they represent sacred mountains of the ancient Brahman mythology. They take a lot of climbing to get up into them. There was another one nearby that we could have climbed, the so-called “Temple of Heaven,” but we’d had enough climbing by then.  We passed through the ruins of the ancient palace, and wound up on the Elephant Terrace, which bordered a kind of parade ground where the king would be entertained, returning armies would be reviewed, and the general populace addressed. Quite impressive.

Our final stop of the morning was Pa Thom, the temple where the famous strangler fig trees are reclaiming the temple by slowing crushing it to bits. Even though we were extremely hot and tired by then, it was worth the effort. The trees are magnificent. Mark and I commented to one another that we found it particularly satisfying that God’s creation was overcoming man’s perverse creation. Sure, the temples were amazing and must have really been beautiful in their prime, but they are attempts to imitate divine truth according to man’s imagination, which never works.

After lunch, we returned to Angkor Wat itself for a tour. This place is immense! If you want a detailed history of the temple complex, you can check out the internet on it, but the accomplishment here, particularly in carvings, mostly bas relief, is incredible. What really is something to consider is that from the 1100s to the about the time of the beginnings of the Reformation in Europe, major kingdoms vied for supremacy in this area, many of which we had never heard. The population is estimated to have been over 1 million around the temple and palace complexes! Yet Westerners never hear much about anything else in the world outside of Europe going on at that time. Very interesting stuff, mostly about battles, and quite a bit of mythology.

Came home really wiped and rested for a bit – it was a really hot day, and it sapped us. After awhile, though, we got pretty hungry, and set off in search of dinner. This is more dangerous than it sounds, since this part of Cambodia was at one time infested with crocodiles. In ancient times, they actually used to fill the motes around the temples and palaces with them as a pretty reliable line of defense. You really have to be careful as they tend to lurk in the ditches beside roads, and we were walking down to the Old Market. Once in the vicinity we came face to face with a crocodile! Not just a crocodile, but a python, too. We, however, were not afraid. We cooked them over an open flame. They were delicious. So were the chicken, pork, and fish portions that the restaurant gave us. Mark had spotted this place on Wednesday evening, and we just had to try it. After that, a short walk around in the cooling evening air, and then back to the hotel for the night.

Friday it was back to the bus station to catch our bus, and a long 6 hours back to Phnom Penh. Once back in Mark’s place we rested up and then set out to rent me a motorcycle for the remainder of our time here, since it will be quite a bit cheaper than paying taxis or tuk-tuks to take us everywhere. More fun, too. That’s when our adventure started. The moto rental place is at the other end of town, so I climbed on the back of Mark’s 100cc and we took off. Clouds were threatening on the horizon, so we wanted to make sure we picked up my bike and did some errands before they unloaded on us. About halfway there, the back tire blew, a slow leak apparently aggravated by putting two people on it whose total weight is about 3 times the weight of the whole bike! Meanwhile, the rain had moved in more quickly that we anticipated, and the skies opened up. There was nowhere to get out of the rain, so Mark pushed his moto while I walked along the sidewalk, both of us getting drenched. Even now, hours later, my clothes are still wet. Anyway, we finally found a guy who fixes flats on the sidewalk. He uses a unique method for putting a patch on tubes. He takes some petroleum based goop and smears it on the back of a piece of rubber, puts it over the hole, lays a piece of flattened aluminum can over that, and then a puts the whole thing in a clamp with a little steel cylinder in which he pours some fuel and lights on fire! It melts the goop and softens the rubber, which fuses itself to the inner tube permanently. Seventy-five cents and an hour later (he had several to fix before ours), we were on our way again. We rented my bike finally, and then set off to find our restaurant in the dark. Took a while, but it was worth it. It was a place named after William Tell, and featured Swiss and German food. We started off with cheese fondue, and then had some traditional German dishes. Good stuff. A long ride home, and now we’re enjoying unwinding a bit. Talk to you again tomorrow. Thanks for your prayers!

Siem Reap

Mark and I decided to go cheap and we took a luxury bus up to Siem Reap for only $22 each round trip. It really was a nice bus, but after 5 hours of being sardined next to each other we were beginning to wish that we had flown up here! Especially since we get to do it again on Friday morning when we head back to Phnom Penh. Anyway, we used the time to get caught up and talked through Mark’s ministry plans for the years to come.

The countryside between Phnom Penh and Siem Reap doesn’t vary much. It’s mostly a flood plain that stretches away flat as far as you can see in all directions, dotted with palm trees and laid out with a checkerboard of small farms. Occasionally a small hill appears, usually capped with a temple. Sometimes, far off in the distance to the south a line of hills appears. It struck me that it is no wonder that during the time of the genocide here people tried very hard to get south and west into the mountains toward Thailand, where it would be much easier to hide. The country is so flat and open that moving from one point to another without detection would be next to impossible, especially if you had a group of people. It is also a main reason why so many did not escape. If you’ve never watched the movie, “The Killing Fields,” you should.

This time of year is usually very dry and hot, but it has been significantly cooler this year, and quite rainy, so everything is beautifully green instead of the usual brown. Most of the villages that we go through simply line the road on either side. Different villages seem to specialize in different trades, whether farming, or stone carving, or lumber, or concrete (making posts, water pipes, etc.). One village was famous for carving Buddhas out of stone, and they lined the road by the thousands in various stages of completion. I was reminded of the biblical statement of the sad irony that must be true of every idolater: “…every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols, for his images are false, and there is no breath in them. They are worthless, a work of delusion…” (Jeremiah 10:14, 15).

Cambodia started off as a Hindu nation due to Indian incursion into the area during the Angkor period in the 8^th-13^th centuries. The temples we’ll see today are actually Hindu places of worship, and we’ll see more idols there relating to Shiva and the asparas (kind of the Hindu substitute for biblical angels). We’re not going for the religious experience though, of course, but rather to appreciate the cultural significance of the place and the wonder and beauty that is there. Upon arriving, we unloaded at our hotel – an awesome place that we got at half price because we’re here in the off season – and walked down to the “Old Market” where most of the tourist craft shops are. We pretty much explored the area in entirety, had some good Khmer food, and saved our money for another day. After an evening meal on a balcony overlooking Pub Street (a street lined with restaurants and shops), we headed back to crash for the night. We hired a guide and a car for our tour of some of the temples tomorrow, and it should be a great day. More on that later! One more thing that I have to mention. Mark and I now know from experience the significance of the phrase, “The elevator doesn’t go all the way to the top.” For some weird reason, our hotel’s elevator only went to floor 4, and our rooms were on floor 5! No idea why, but we had to take stairs to finish our trip to the top floor. Still, very nice rooms, and a great breakfast every morning.