As an adventurer at heart, exploring the ancient ruins of Angkor Wat was such a moving and powerful experience, and I couldn’t help but sketch and write in my journal as I sat among the stunning ruins and nature. My heart was so full when we were walking and exploring these many temples out in the jungle and I will treasure those memories forever. With the crumbling ruins all around me, I wrote down all kinds of thoughts and reflections, questions and potential answers, pondering the ruins themselves and all those who came before. I wrote this story as I sat in the ruins of Ta Som, scribbling away in my journal as fast as I could, my hand not fast enough to keep up with the passionate pace of my words…
The sun is bright and the heat is scorching, as the tuk tuk bumps up and down along the dirt road, making me close my eyes and doze off into my imagination, as we roll along passing by little villages and children on bikes. Then there it is, shining in its own mysterious ancient way. The proud yet crumbling gate stands at the end of the long stone bridge, looking over the moat which sits flat and motionless in the midday heat. “Welcome to Angkor Wat!” says Jim, our tuk tuk driver for the day.
We were about to enter into another world beyond time, where the ancient mysteries of the past still lived alive today hiding in the thick jungle, where only those brave enough would enter. Closer and closer we cross the bridge with statues on both sides greeting us, their eyes casting a deep gaze into our souls, as if to welcome us or warn us of where we were about to go.
Under the gate we pass, the darkness engulfs us for a moment, as the warm sun rays wait for us on the other side. What to expect I do not know, but I know that somehow I will find something new and exciting. Past more and more trees we glide along the dirt path through the jungle, looking out into the trees that seem to never end.
Then there, out in the distance I see it, the time has finally come. Looking back at us is the first temple in all its magnificence. The moment seems too surreal to be true as if it were about to fade away at any second with a snap back into reality.
I gaze up at the temple staring back at me, the dark old stones wet from the humidity, the surfaces engulfed by vines and weeds, nature swallowing human civilization back into the dust. Above my head are webs of leaves and branches intertwining, a maze of life and prosperity, the reminder of how powerful nature is compared to the small work of man.
Step by step I find myself under a high archway of stone, the walls around me all slowly crumbling, with the possibility of falling at any moment, yet sill resistant to the forces of time . Out in the distance lay more and more temples, a magnificent portrayal of how civilization can endure through time, a permanent mark on the world.
Above each arch are faces of unknown expressions, their feelings frozen in the stone moments, staring down at the present wanderer. The walls are intertwined with leaves, branches, and many spider’s webs, the insects hiding in between the darkness of the cracks of the crumbling stone. A maze opens up of archways and hallways, hidden rooms lurch in the shadows and secrets crouch deep in the silence of the walls.
Birds and cicadas chirp up above and their sounds echo through the temple, the natural world slowly engulfing this place back into what it used to be, dirt and stone. Faces of those who came before are carved into the stones, their features slowly fading away with the brush of wind and storms, being carved into another form once again – the form of the past.
I gaze down each passageway with a curios look, my eyes scouting each room and window, catching small glimpses of statues and pictures, my heart racing with excitement. How many have come here before with the same sense of curiosity? How many didn’t make it out alive? The darkness and eeriness of a crumbling temple above my head brings out the adrenaline even more, the Indiana Jones spirit pours out in my heart.
I turn the corner and stare straight into the eyes of a statue coming out of the wall, half stuck in stone, half in our world, almost free from its eternal prison of stone. Her expression is frozen in time, a moment of truth captured forever in this ancient place, for the rest of the future to witness. She is a beautiful woman, adorned with jewelery and gold, her head dressed with a beautiful crown and rings.
I look at her and ask, Who are you? What is your story? What is your legacy? I guess I’ll never know, I say to myself. She is forever stuck here, in a crumbling temple in the midst of leaves and bugs. Yet somehow she is also leaving her mark on the world, after all, I live 700 years after her and still I know of her potential existence.
The sounds are now growing much louder, as if a greater power turned up the volume, the giant leaves hanging up above sway back and forth with the greatly roaring wind. The heat is engulfing every part of my body and I feel like I am in a sauna of history and mystery. There are a hundred different ways to walk, hundreds of nooks to explore, as each stone is covered with different words and stories galore.
Above my head, the ceiling is dark and cold, all the stones are placed perfectly to create an arch of complete accuracy, each carefully crafted and carefully made, each one could be someone’s masterpiece of a lifetime.
I keep walking and walking, climbing higher and higher up a staircase that seems to lead to the heavens, a sense of longing, searching, exploring overwhelms me as I frantically quicken my pace until there, all at once, I see it. The light shines in my eyes and the twinkling rays light up my existence. The trees expand in every direction, an eternal jungle holding treasure and secrets, temples unseen. The temples peak out from just above the tree line, as if to greet one another after hundreds of years alone.
I see all at once the glory of a mysterious civilization that once thrived in these very lands. I see ghosts of people and children, mothers and fathers, dreamers, artists, visionaries, warriors. A culture and past now has been swallowed by the jungle, with only these temples as clues to who they could have been.
For this is the mystery of history itself, it will never reveal all its secrets unless you are brave enough to pursue the clues it leaves behind. I dream of what these lands were like hundreds of years ago and all the people who stood here before me. Here on the edge of the world looking out at the potential of tomorrow. Here where humanity meets nature and dances to create a beautiful maze of mystery and perfection. Here, on the dawn of a new day and an open future that is left for us to create.
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