Don't rest on your laurels!

There used to be a time in our childhood when we used to look forward to religious festivities. Besides being a holiday, it was also a time of free food and free pocket money. That was the time when waited with anticipation for our neighbours to call us to their homes for merriment. All that just memories of a distant era.

Now, a long holiday with the lure of cheap flights is the time we all look forward to planning our next holiday destination.

With the same mindset, my cousin and I zeroed in on Siem Reap, the town closest to ruins of an ancient Hindu which existed about a thousand years ago. It was lost in the annals of time also to be discovered by a Frenchman by accident during his expedition through the Mekong River to catch butterflies! So goes the legend!

Nature at its best for a picture perfect postcard

They still live under the euphoria that they were the rulers of the world; that their ancestors were the most civilised in the region and that their neighbouring countries, Thailand, Vietnam and Laos, never existed once upon a time. Their great grandfathers were master builders who were descendants of the Gods. The wisdom of the Khmer kingdom spread from what is now known as Myanmar all the way through the uncivilised land of Thailand to Vietnam. The only semblance of resistance was in the form of the Champa Kingdom, a renegade offshoot of the Han Dynasty.

Their God-king, Jayavarman II, who established the Angkor Kingdom was himself a prodigal Indian prince who went wandering from his motherland to be held hostage by the Javanese. Later working for his captors, he conquered this land and became a turncoat to his employer.

A weekend visit helped to relive the history of the Angkor Kingdom that was made ten centuries ago. Successions over successions of demigod kings saw the region prosper of feats of engineering still awed by the 21st-century men. Transporting blocks of stones over the hill and a distance close to 100km with the primitive machinery of elephant power and river transportation is still unimaginable at this age.

Every leader who reigned here wanted to leave a piece of their legacy behind.The last of this line of Emperors is Suryavarnam II who managed to convince a million of his subjects to live their lives in Angkor Thom and contribute their heart and soul in the realisation of Angkor Wat, his heirloom.

The Republic of Cambodia is a minefield (pun not intended) for visitors who want to appreciate the beauty of Mother Nature in its most pristine state. Lush greenery lined by palettes of natural colours of the elements of Earth is indeed a sight for sore eyes. South East Asia's largest freshwater lake, Tonlé Sap is situated in the northern part of the country. This lake boasts to be a sanctuary to a plethora of freshwater fish species and a photo perfect sunset that humbles all adventure seekers.

One of the tributaries to Tonlé Sap Lake. This river has a reversal of water flow once a year as the annual monsoon floods the Mekong River and due to the difference of height in placement, it flows the other way when the lake is filled as the monsoons subside (the splendour of Nature)! Fertile precipitations induce padi planting and marine life.

Sunset at Tonlé Sap Lake. The path to this spectacle is lined by the sight of the poor fishermen's family who finds solace in knowing that their plight is acknowledged by NGOs and religious bodies who are out there to score brownie points and catch their fishes themselves.

Still living in the analogue world where play means getting the hands dirty and exploring elements of nature. A child is seen in the vicinity of the fisherman's village of Kampom Phluk.

No proper housing facilities and no satisfactory plan to fulfil schooling needs but wait... Do I see an advertisement for a data plan to digitalise their lives? Here comes WeChat, Facebook and Google. There goes outdoors and traditional childhood as we know it! Our chatty tour guide from the city lamented that he was going through what any Generation-X parent goes through in the 21st century - that his teenage is detached from reality and is not fulfilling her traditional duties expected of her. Like any other parent, he feels trapped in a lost generation, bending down backwards to satisfy his parents and going on all-fours to fulfil his parental duties. He feels used and abused.

Where life is simple. It is indeed a miracle. Mother Nature has it all for us, beauty, warts, cure and all. Sounds straightforward and truthful enough but do not be fooled. Pol Pot and his band of soldiers felt the same. They tried to erase Cambodian history and start Year Zero from 1975. He dragged lawyers, engineers and doctors to toil the land, ending with the unforgettable Killing Fields. 

Are they living in the glory of their colourful past? At least it helps them to propel the economy and bring in foreign exchange. To think that all these were long forgotten, in the annals of time after Kings after Kings with more bloated egos than the other conquered that their belief is superior, is unbelievable. And it had to take a foreigner, another colonial master from the West to accidentally bump into the ancient ruins reflects much of our societies' appreciation (or rather lack of) of our past.

Dubbed as the 'Stairway to Heaven' the steep knee-busting journey gives a panoramic view of Angkor Thom and its vicinity. 

A country in ruins? Just when they thought the worse was after the grandiose but disastrous Khmer Rouge plan to reboot the country, they are still plagued with insincere leaders with corrupt liaisons with vulture-eyed foreigners. 

I wonder what lurks within. Is that the serenity of pleased divine powers I hear or is that the graveyard of duped slaves and elephants who broke their backs and souls to appease the God-kings? Is that the testimony of the heights of human endeavour or product of inflated human egos?

The duel between Nature and Man-made structures. In the end, it is always Mother Nature has the upper hand! The famous gargantuan tree root which is a regular feature in Hollywood adventure movies, including 'Lara Croft and Tomb Raiders' as well as 'Raiders of the Lost Ark'.

Are they showcasing their culture to the world to appreciate or are they playing dance monkey to the tunes of the visitors of the more affluent countries? They are hoping to re-live their past glory but things are hard. Standing at the fringe of the nightlife hubs frequented by the party revellers, the locals hope for a dollar or two by ferrying them around on their 'Tuk Tuk' or humbling themselves to massage their feet of the visitors so that they can do more shopping and dancing!

Wat Preah Prom Rath Buddhist Monastery. A Wat is a generic place for worship in most Buddhist countries. In Cambodia, however, due to the sheer numbers of visitors to these places, the sanctity and serenity of Wats seemed compromised. Hence, prayers and meditations are usually done in monasteries, not wats!

The weather throughout our holiday was scorchingly hot, hovering around 30 degrees C. Even though it was late June and it was supposed to be the start of the rainy, we were lucky as we escaped the torrential pour as was the norm in this country. Rain would have ruined our travels as the roads were nothing to shout about! We would have had to mud wrestle with our shoes and the paths to visit the tourists' spots.

The four days stay in Siem Reap were more than enough to unwind. After the first two days of battling through the hot sun and the treacherous journey around Cambodia, the remaining two to chill down in chilling ambience and cooling beverages at the iconic Pub Street whilst the ladies indulged in some therapeutic shopping and traditional body massage.

The take home from this expedition is that we should not rest on our laurels. A good life does not promise comfort for eternity. In many facets of our life, we have to evolve with the changing needs of our surrounding and be perpetually ready for the uneven patch that may lie in front of us in the future. We should use the experience of others to safeguard ourselves!


https://mma.org.my/publications/e-berita/226-berita-mma-august-2017/file

Mother Nature has it all for us?

Rice People (អ្នកស្រែ, Neak Are, Cambodian; 1994)

Story based on: Ranjau Sepanjang Jalan by Shahnon Ahmad

They say ‘Mother Nature has all for us, it is a miracle!’. The hippies say they do not need any education and self-control, all they need is the air that they breathe, love and weed, probably. We are told that we have to show respect to Nature as we owe our existence to it.

After watching this movie, only then do you realise that Nature is neither forgiving nor forthcoming in rendering a smooth passage for our survival. It is indeed a Herculean task extracting produce from its soil. This film, based on a novel by a Malaysian laureate, Shanon Ahmad, Ranjau Sepanjang Jalan (Struggle all the way), just illustrates that. This movie, made by a Cambodian, is altered to suit local sentiments and is the first Cambodia’s entrance to the Academy Awards.

Pouev is a farmer in a post-Khmer Rouge Cambodia with a small plot of land for rice cultivation. Life is hard with seven daughters to feed and unfavourable weather. He inherited a small piece of land after his father had sold part of it to a Chinaman after being hit by poor yields. Now he is stuck with 14 tiny plots and seven daughters (another liability).

His wife Om and his eldest daughter, Sakha are his helping hands.

Tragedy befalls the poor family. Pouev steps on a thorn gets a nasty infection and succumbs to the injury. Om has to shoulder the responsibility of the family now.

If ploughing the land is not laborious enough, under the gruelling elements of heat and humidity of the sun, one has to ensure that seeding has to be done when it rains. Too much rain will drain the shoots, so the land cannot be too clogged. If that is not enough, crabs may invade the water filled padi fields. They have to be caught. Everything has to be done on a tight schedule. Too late and they would miss the harvest at the end. If dry season is what they are waiting for, they have another pest to keep at bay, the birds that would feed on the grains. Out came the scarecrows!

Even half through the planting of padi, Om crumbles under pressure. The pace of work proved too much. She missed her husband’s company. Slowly, she deteriorates. She gets drunk, started acting strangely and finally becomes uncontrollable. She has to be admitted to the mental asylum.

Sakha, the eldest daughter, takes over the rein of the family. She struggles through and manages to get a harvest from her crops. Om, even after her return from the hospital, remains a recluse and is living in her own world, devoid of all the strains and stresses of the real world.

One would never look at a bowl of rice the same way again after watching this movie. The amount of effort, dedication, love, joy, tears, sweat and life given to provide us our daily meal is heart wrenching. Nature is not making it a walk in the park. At every corner, there lurks danger - predators, pests, skin-putrefying organisms, too much of rain, too little of rain and the list goes on.

A peak into Year Zero

Missing Picture (Documentary, 2013)

Another award winning documentary showcasing the evil that men do to each other in the name trying to save his country from the clutches of the enemy. Or is it a wrong choice of strategy (ideology) that blew right on the face? In order to right the wrong, the 'liberators' dug themselves deeper and deeper into their own grave.
At a time when the world was paranoid with the threat of a new ideology sweeping over the newly independent nations of South East Asia, Big Brother, as the self appointed saviour of mankind, tried against old odds to maintain their capitalistic brand of freedom in Indo China. The retreating communist rebels who fled into Cambodia were heavily bombarded by American bombs. The collateral damage on the side of the innocent peasants were too much, prompting them to fall prey to the promises of Pol Pot. After being enslaved for generations from the reign of the Chola kingdom all through to the French colonial masters, the people had enough. When the stomach growls and famine was an imminent threat, it was easy for them to be suckered into the promise of a new dawn where they would be masters of their own land. Equality was promised and classes were to be abolished.
Unfortunately, new Phnom Penh Government was defeated by Khmer Rouge on 17th April 1975 and Year Zero started, people realised that they had been taken for a ride. They had entered a dark era in the history of their civilisation.
This film is an interesting presentation by a survivor of 'The Killing Fields' who decide to tell his side of the story with the help of old propaganda films and clay dolls to reenact a time before 1975 when life in Phnom Penh was a bustling happy town. He fills up the 'missing pictures' in the era by remodelling dolls to create the happy times before his family members perished.
The Cambodians, like their predecessors in China during the Cultural Revolution, were hoodwinked into believing that they were self sufficient. Modern medicine and modern technology was bad. They had all it took to be a progressive nation. All of them had to toil day and night in the fields, exposed to elements of nature with little to go around. Paranoia and torture was the flavour of the times.

Some still believed in the promise but others re-live the living hell even to date. The believers seem to be hopeful of finding the eternal equality and truth for all mankind. They do not mind the human and social experiments all in the name of national pride. They just fail to accept that their doctrine had failed.
Quite many a time, the narrator reminisce the happier times when people were happy, people were singing, music was heard in Phnom Penh. Laughter seem to be something from the distant past. The moral guardians of the Revolution had not only abandoned education for masses, they had also outlawed musical instruments. Food rationing was taken to the limit that people found with 'luxury' items like mangoes and fresh fish were reprimanded severely. As the revolution believed that the land has the ability to feed man, everyone was forcibly worked in the fields, irrespective of their qualifications.
A sad presentation that reminds us of the mistakes that we had done to each other all in the name of national pride and defence of a piece of cloth and ideology!