gods in the jungle

the music grew louder with every step. accompanying it was the sucking sound made by wet earth, as i walked beneath massive trees on my way to the temple of ta prohm. as i turned a corner, the source of the music appeared through the mild drizzle. it was a group of ragged locals, sitting under a tent and creating a rhythmic, hypnotic rhythm. some were blind; others held percussive instruments between stubs that were once feet. victims of a 25-year old civil war, they were survivors. and, for a world that had forgotten them, they were creating music.

it was, with hindsight, the perfect setting for my first glimpse of ta prohm, a name derived from a dedication to lord brahma. like a dirge, the music created a backdrop against which the crumbling walls of the temple appeared. it was a view that had stayed the same for decades, the stone held firmly in place by the massive roots of silk cottonwood and strangler fig trees. it was a strange state of limbo for what in the late twelfth century was born rajavihara, the ‘royal temple’, built by the khmer king jayavarman vii.

begun in 1186 ad, this was to be a buddhist monastery and university. family was clearly important to the king, considering the temple’s main image was allegedly modelled on his mother, while smaller temples within the enclosure were dedicated to his elder brother and his teacher. those calm faces staring down for centuries, at visitors from foreign shores, were all that remained of what was once a powerful kingdom.

as i stepped into an enclosure of fallen columns and sunlight-dappled ground, it was hard to imagine what life here was like eight centuries ago. according to the guidebook the monuments of the angkor group, first published in 1944 by maurice glaize, this was once home to over 12,000 people, including 18 high priests and more than 600 dancers. 80,000 people living in villages nearby offered services and supplies. a full temple treasury enabled the complex to expand until the end of the thirteenth century.

and then, in the fifteenth century, the khmer empire collapsed. temples was abandoned everywhere, and the forest slowly closed in. while the world outside struggled with mundane issues like war and the clash of civilisations, ta prohm slept undisturbed. when it was eventually re-discovered early in the twentieth century, an unusual decision was made to leave it as it was. glaize says this was done only to ta prohm because it was the one temple that had ‘best merged with the jungle, but not yet to the point of becoming part of it.’

it was easy to see why ta prohm was among the most popular temples in the massive archaeological park that held angkor wat. it was all thanks to the trees. an ironic situation, considering they now held the temple in a vice-like grip that could no longer be broken. maurice glaize described, almost lovingly, their ‘long spreading skirts trailing the ground and their endless roots coiling more like reptiles than plants.’ the effect was eerie. it’s why hollywood wanted it as a backdrop, and got it for the angelina jolie-starrer tomb raider.

apart from the stunning architecture, what gave the ruins of angkor wat much of its character was its mysterious past. when king suryavarman — the predecessor of jayavarman vii — died, work on angkor stopped abruptly. the temples were sacked by enemies of the khmer people, the chams, and restored by jayavarman vii.

now, as tourists lined up beneath the strangling roots for photographs to send home, i thought about how this calm still seemed illusory. not many countries could boast a history as bloody as cambodia’s. after the nineteenth century came to a close, the twentieth saw the rise of the infamous khmer rouge. there was little damage to temple structures during that bloody reign, but a large number of statues were stolen or destroyed. the passage of time still refused to guarantee peace. riots erupted in cambodia’s capital phnom penh as late as 2003, after a false rumour spread, of a thai soap star claiming angkor belonged to thailand.

i walked through crumbling halls that must undoubtedly have once been grand, thinking about how the vietnam war had left cambodia with over six million landmines. one in every 236 cambodians had lost a limb due to a mine explosion. the music outside, barely discernable, was a reminder no one paid heed to. it was now a souvenir, available on cd for $10.

as i continued on my way out, the devatas on temple walls turned eyes of stone towards me and smiled calm, placid smiles. the world outside had changed irrevocably since they were carved into being. for them, however, our history was just a moment in time. as i stepped into the sunlight, the music played on.