Friends in Hanoi.
Just arrived. Welcome to Cambodia!
I can’t say that I know much more about Cambodia than
I’ve learned from the movies.
The first I ever even
heard about the place was from the Killing Fields, a 1984 drama about the
Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, going to see it with some friends at a shopping mall
Dallas in 1984.
I thought we were going
to see something like The Breakfast Club.
But it turned out to be
a horrific story about a modern genocide, one that took place when I was a child
in the USA.
We didn’t make final
plans to come until a few weeks ago.
To get ready for this
trip we watched a few other films about the place, some documentaries, parts of
Swimming to Cambodia, Spalding
Gray’s story about working on the Killing Fields.
And
Angkor Awakens, a 2017 documentary that traced stories
of people reflecting on the genocide created by the Rhmer Rouge.
Without truth or reconciliation and
members of the regime still in power, healing is anything but simple.
The US bombed this place, destabilizing,
and creating the conditions for their ascent.
Yet the world seems to have forgotten.
We walked around Hanoi
for one final stroll, saying goodbye to our friends in the restaurants and some
of the shops and hotel, snapping a few more shots, before we departed.
Rare to find a city so
alive with its own character, so full of characters.
A surprise we had no
idea was coming, Hanoi opened something for us.
A sense of calm and
care and connection with the world and history and beauty.
Yet, Angkor beckoned.
I’d heard about it
since I was a kid.
My parents visited
before the whole Khmer fiasco.
We made our way to the
airport early,
Getting through
security in a flash,
With photos for visas
and US cash ready for when we arrived.
The whole visa process
feels like a bit of a scam.
So be it.
Part of travel is the
actual moving from one place to another, hotel to airport to hotel or wherever.
Breaks in the middle.
Have a beer with Tony,
Who is always with us
when we travel.
He always advises a pint
instead of stress at an airport.
Hurry up and wait,
flight delay.
Cheesy shops of stuff
you could have gotten for half the price outside.
The bored looks of the
workers.
And a quick
flight to Siem Reap, Cambodia.
The little one was bubbly with laughter on the flight.
Caroline slept.
We wrote.
We giggled.
And made our way.
Arriving, the sky was
expansive, seemingly greeting us.
A Buddha in the
airport was a first.
Visa no problem.
Didn’t even need the photos.
But the line through
security, two men handling the 22 people in our queue, a Spanish family ahead of us, an Aussie
behind us.
Nothing happens for a
half hour.
But the line to our left
is moving.
The one women there is cranking people through.
The one women there is cranking people through.
We turn around.
The Aussie has moved
to the other line.
We follow chatting him
up for the next half hour.
And we’re through.
Ahead of the Spanish family.
In a cab on our way to
Siem Reap,
a small town in northwestern Cambodia,
a step away from the
ruins of Angkor, the seat of the Khmer
kingdom a thousand years ago.
It looks like Costa Rica outside, buildings
with metal rooves.
Scooters,
And Buddhas everywhere.
History beckons.
The horrors of the past are still here.
But so is the beauty.
What will this place become?
What has it become?
We’ll see.
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