And, I'm back...

Yep, I've arrived in NYC and am back in my East Village apartment. The next few weeks look like they will be filled with more joy, excitement, and reflection. But first- I'd like to fill in the details of the rest of my journey... Rewind your mind to the second week of July.

So, back in Kratie- one of the main things that made me uncomfortable was the sight of a man beating a puppy to death on the sidewalk. I know this isn't a usual occurrence, but the shock of it was tremendous. I was walking home from the internet cafe when i heard this yelping. At first I thought it was a child whining, but as I identified the location of the sound, I saw in the darkness, a man banging something limp against the pavement. From where I was it looked like a rag doll. As I put the sound and shape together I realized it was a puppy. From that moment I wanted to get out of Kratie. I rushed to where I was meeting a fellow traveler for dinner and told her about it. It was at that point that I decided to change my plans to go trekking in Laos instead of Cambodia.

The next day Laura and myself (she's a Finnish woman that works for Unesco and has been traveling for about 8 months) got on the back of some motorbikes and took a tour of the sites around Kratie. We went to Phnom Sombok, a small hill with an active Wat. The views from the top were pretty great. A number of elderly nuns still live there and seem to look after the cackle of cats, dogs and monkeys that hand out around their temple. It was really a sight to see the monkeys chasing after the dogs and pulling their legs! I have some good pictures. The wat in Phnom Sombok was the first i had scene that incorporated a Christian kind of pictorial narration of the life of Buddha. Brightly painted panels adorned the walls and ceiling of the temple in a serial manner. Kind of like Giotto's Arena Chapel in Padua. I wonder when it became the norm for monks and nuns to decorate their Wats like this. I wonder if it was learned from an interaction with Christian missionaries. Of course Wats were decorated before this. Wats from the 19th century portray painted walls in the manner of Chinese and Indian wall paintings. a continuous scene that shows repeating characters and does not demarcate space according to rules of western perspective. It does make sense that the artistic traditions would follow from the dominant Chinese and Indian type to the more Christian western type. This region of the world was called Indochina and did evolve into a predominantly Buddhist region through the influences of India and China. Once Western powers invaded the area they brought with them the idioms of western culture and representation.

Anyway- after climbing the hill we went a bit more north to Kampi to try to see some Irrawaddy river dolphins. We were successful!!! Really! Although there are only 70 left out of the 1000 that once made the area of the Tonle Sap lake in the Mekong River their home- we saw a good amount of them! They have long round noses rather than the typical pointy snout you think of when remembering the dolphin show at Sea World. They are a dark blue/gray color and have large flippers and small dorsal fins. I got a few good pictures of their fins and a nice splashing tail shot!! Mostly- I chose to watch the dolphins with my eyes, rather than through the lens of my camera. That was how I operated through most of my trip...
After that we went Sambo and saw the largest Wat in Cambodia with 108 columns. Again, the interior was brightly painted with scenes from Buddha's life. This wat is also famous for the story of the Crocodile and the Princess. I couldn't tell you what that story is now- But I did see a painting of it in an adjacent pavilion. Within the main Wat there were a number of old men who spoke French. They handed me a book that was published by a Cambodian student who investigated the paintings of the crocodile and princess story. Very interesting- well, what i remember of it anyway.

I think that was it for my stay in Kratie. We drove by the requisite rice paddies and farmers. Wooden houses built up on stakes, poor children and families selling sugarcane on the side of the road- and I booked a ticket for Phnom Penh.