Passage

Greetings,

People are more affected by how they feel than by what they understand.

When they met she was anxious. Tall and talking fast. She was in a highly frantic state. She was from Sweden. After a couple of days she calmed down. She had a dream after visiting a temple at Angkor.

She said, "I don't know what I'm running away from. I'm traveling for a month. I just knew I had to leave. Now I don't know what I'm running toward."

"Yes," he said, "one door opens and one door closes but the hallways can be a bitch." She laughed. She felt better releasing her anxiety, her uncertainty by laughing. If only for a moment.

She's been here a week. "A week here," she said, "seems like a month. Now I feel like I can be in the moment. It's hard but I'm working on it. I want to cut all my hair off."

"Nothing like modifying your outward appearance to affect your self-esteem."

Shy Cambodian girls with straight black hair cut off her long blond movie star hair. They treasured her tresses, wrapping it with rubber bands to decorate their hair. 

"I feel better now," she said feeling the searing heat of tropical sun. "I'm going to begin sketching again. I loved to sketch when I was younger. I lost it somewhere. I'm starting again."

Here's one entrance/exit passage.

Here's one entrance/exit passage. There is NO EXIT.

Metta.

Elephant Tears

Greetings,

A girl from Argentina who arrived in Siem Reap after midnight broke down after breakfast. Tears streamed down her face. Her boyfriend stood helpless. He handed her a tissue. He didn't know what else to do. She cried and cried. He suffered in silence.

She blubbered in Spanish. "I miss mama...I miss mama. Where are we? What is this strange place? Everyone is trying to cheat us. The food is terrible. They charge extra for butter. Where's the beef? The bus scam from Thailand was long, bumpy, grumpy, expensive, a drag, a mistake, a terrible tragic drama. I can't understand the people here. O woe is me, us." She discarded a soggy tissue.

Her macho man suffered in silence. 'She's a basket case,' he thought.

They'd argued recently. About their trip, lack of good sex, decent food, hot sticky weather, poor planning, lack of planning, expenses.

'Maybe it all comes down to sex and money,' he thought. Clean and clear understanding. In Spanish or Splanglish or deeper emotional levels of complexity. 

She blew snot into another tissue. She crumpled it into a ball and dropped it on a plate glass table. It shattered under the weight of her sticky mucus. It's not what she thought it would be. Her expectations were shattered by illusionary possibilities. Her life was one big question.

She gradually composed herself. They started to leave the restaurant. They paused at the top of the stairs. It was a long way down. He whispered to her. Calming poetic words. He put his arm around her shoulder. She was frigid. Mr. Romeo had his work cut out for him and there was nothing to fix.

Metta.

Yellow Butterfly Guide

Greetings,

Evidence of intelligent life on Earth is greatly exaggerated. It's a rumor. A myth.

I recently wandered Banteay Kdei and Ta Phrom.

Kdei is great for walking through the dust. A sun yellow butterfly was my guide. It led me around the perimeter for a feeling of perspective. Being outside gives you the feeling of space acknowledging deep green forest. I do this at every temple. It's rare to see others explore the outside. Intelligence on Earth is rare.

Tourist ants are in a highly disciplined hurry. They march in, follow others, follow the stone path. They wander around, make a lot of noise, pose for pictures and march out. Their time is limited. Many look serious and sad, especially the Europeans. They are clearly controlled by forces unknown to them. It may be a silent ticking mechanism on their wrist near a pulse. They are little robots.

I remember a Tibetan saying, "I would rather be a tiger for one day than a sheep for a thousand years."

I explored outside slowly inside gentle winds from the forest. It's a very slow walking meditation. I engaged all my senses. Thick dust underfoot is a welcome relief after stones. I am surrounded by light and shadows dancing through leaves. All nature all the time.

Butterfly leads me to interior passages and shadowed experiences. Butterfly shows me mysterious art. Deep interior space. It takes ages to reach the center. 

Prohm is where "possibly the most famous photographed tree on planet Earth exists." It entwines itself around and through soft stones. It's a zoo. Human hoards line up to take a photo. They push and shove and jostle so they can have their picture taken with this tree.

Italian, French and German tongues wag like mongrels in heat. Life is a bitch. The Japanese, as I mentioned in an earlier post from The Silk Worm Farm are total photo freaks, obsessed with posing in doorways, passages, with carvings, plants, ferns and leaves. They feel the experience with their cameras. They behave like the temples are one gigantic amusement park. 

Here's the tree. No humans. Actually there is a tiny tourist sleeping inside the third root from the center.

Banteay Kdei and Ta Phrom galleries.

Metta.

Beng Mealea

Greetings, 

The mysterious and magical temple at Beng Mealea is wonderful. Dating from the 12th C., it was built to the same floor plan as Angkor Wat. At one time it was connected by 10 bridges through the jungle to Angkor Thom and Preah Khan. Nature owns it.

You climb over huge piles of stones between hanging vines, exploring a well preserved library, impressive carvings, destroyed central tower and deep dark passageways. Perfect for exploring. An elevated wooden walk way allows for a higher perspective. 

Metta.

Beng Mealea images...

At breakfast

Greetings,

I'm sitting in the lodge. People eat breakfast and chat. They remember last night. They plan a new day above ground.

There's a super serious Danish family of four. Sad blond dad and morose mom resigned to her fate. Two young boys about 10. They love to play pool, run around and make noise. A lot of noise. They need a behavior modification lesson for public places.

They're slamming balls around the table using their hands. Suddenly the young one blasts off into a terrified shriek of pain. It wakes up the eaters. His right hand was inside the cushion and brother's ball caught him squarely on the fingers. 

Dad rushes over. He cradles his son, escorting the bellowing child back to bread and eggs. Mom looks bored. She's dreaming of ice crystals in Copenhagen.

Three middle aged Americans and two 28-year old girls arrive and sit on soft cushions. One is the niece of the man. They've just arrived from a horrendous scam-filled long bus ride from Bangkok. 

The man is soft spoken. He's an Asian tour guide. He reminds me of Robert Thurman, the Tibetan scholar. His wife is an attorney in Portland, Oregon. She deals with suits. No one at breakfast is wearing a suit. I know her job because of the way she cross examines the two girls. An older woman with regal bearing is with them, perhaps one's mother. She is patient, kind and asks intelligent questions.

She lives in Eugene, Oregon as does one of the girls. The older woman grew up in Eugene, attended Portland State College and loved languages, especially Italian. She moved to Rome for six years. She came back and got her M.A. in Italian and Foreign Languages at the University of Oregon. She taught Italian until retiring. 

The attorney and the woman talk about growing up. The attorney is from Michigan.

"I was only able to get away for two weeks. My boss said, 'What happens if someone sues someone and you're not here to handle the case?'"

The older woman said, "It was just coincidence I ended up back in Eugene. It was hard growing up there."

"Why," said the attorney.

"It was the late 40's. We didn't have enough to eat. It was only steak and they cooked it to a cinder. It was that and potatoes. One brand of rice. I remember my mother and father loading us in the car and we'd drive to San Francisco to buy food."

"To sell?" asked the attorney.

The older woman looked at her. "No. To eat." I hear her thinking in Italian, "Mama mia! What a crazy question!"

The group talks about the bus, lodgings, cost and border hassles. The girls are dead tired. They compare travel stories. One girl has just completed a month teaching English in Burma. She says she managed to find a job through a foreign woman running a tour company.

"Yes," said the man, "there are people there who know the system. Where did you teach?"

"I didn't teach school. I taught teachers."

The man knows Burma. "I see. The authorities are very suspicious of foreigners. It's difficult to really get to know the people."

"I hoped to spend time with the Burmese in their homes but it was forbidden," said the girl.

I see the girl teaching a class of Burmese "teachers."

Half work for a government agency designed to acquire western educational pedagogical plans. The other half work for the secret police. One is a real teacher. Can you find the real teacher?

Metta.

A teacher.