A full day off: breakfast, reading, writing, admin, yoga, shower, massage, dinner, bed 🙂
Planned my next move: off to the less-travelled northeast for some nature. Jungle territory. And, more to the point, malaria. Cambodia is a high-risk malaria zone, with the exception of Siem Reap, PP and the bit in between. I took a malaria tablet. Nothing happened. I haven’t vomitted, got diarrhoea or died (admittedly this last one would be an unfortunate side-effect of any preventative medication).
I booked another massage – the first one wasn’t great, but I needed one after lots of walking and tuk-tuks (suspension is non-existent). “I give you another one for free,” offered Nang (the front office manager), “because you are nice.” I suspect she says this to everyone, but it was very much appreciated. She’s been great. “You tell me what you want to do and I will arrange,” she’d said.
“I’d like to go to the northeast: Stung Treng and Banlung.” She’d looked blank for a moment, and then, “I will find out and let you know – not many tourists go there.” Bingo! And she was as good as her word, booking me a van and accommodation in both Stung Treng and Banlung.
That evening she lowered her voice and whispered conspiratorially, “Sam, I need you to do something for me.” Oh goodness, I thought, here we go. “Will you write a review of Golden Temple Villa on TripAdvisor?”
Jeez, is that all you’re asking after all you’ve done for me?! “Of course,” I replied and she looked pleased. In fact, she really wanted to come with me, and I’d have welcomed her company, but she couldn’t get the time off (busy season). “If you need someone to translate,” she offered, “call me anytime.” What a gem! You know those people who you just click with? That connection that you can’t pinpoint but know it’s there? Well, it transcends nationality, race and background.
In today’s short pause, I’ll tell you my favourite Hindu story (summarised):
Hiranyakashipu’s (let’s call him Hira) parents were devoted to Brahma (the not-so-popular Hindu god) and Hira was feted to become very powerful. Brahma bestowed on him invunerability to three things: gods, humans and beasts. Brahma decreed that Hira could not be slain indoors or outdoors, during the day or night, on the ground or in the sky nor by any weapon, animate or inanimate.
Unsurprisingly, Hira started to get a bit full of himself – he considered himself a god in the flesh and forbade devotion to any other deity.
He had a son, Prahlada, who (for various reasons) became devoted to Vishnu. Hira wasn’t very happy about this and tried to kill his son (as you do). But he failed every time – his son was protected by Vishnu.
One day he pointed to a pillar and asked if Vishnu was in it. His son replied, “He is, he was and he will be”, thus refusing to recognise his father as the “supreme being”. Enraged, Hira smashed the pillar and out of the dust came Narasimha – the fourth avatar of Vishnu. And Narasimha killed Hira: he reincarnated as half-man, half-lion (neither god, man nor beast), he set upon him at twilight (neither day nor night), on the threshold of a courtyard (neither indoors nor outside), throwing him on his lap (neither on the ground nor in the air) and tore him apart with his claws (neither animate nor inanimate).
Ha – I like it when someone gets outsmarted (as long as it’s not me)!
And, with all the rock, I didn’t get chance to share the wildlife, so here it is. Let’s start with a gecko (or it might be a lizard – can’t tell) and the bat in one of the temple towers:
And then this amazing spider in Banteay Srei:
And, I know this is cheating, but couldn’t resist including this fella:
