I thought
that Angkor Wat was a singular building and did not know that it was just the
major construction amidst a landscape full of temple complexes and individual
temples of the Hindu Buddhist cultural mix that occurred in Cambodia. I was
fortunate to find Wan and his tuktuk (a motorbike rickshaw) outside my hotel in Siem Reap the morning
I decided to begin my tour of Angkor Wat. He proved to be a knowledgeable
driver as we navigated between the many different sites over three days. He
knew the good restaurants for lunch and his driving skills were impeccable.
Angkor Wat
and all the other complexes are stunning works of construction and the
sculptural features are breathtaking in scope and intricacy. Still more proof
of my thought that humans do their best building for their gods. I could not
help but to compare the Angkor temple complexes to the Mayan ruins I photographed
which you can see under that category on this website. A lot of both construction projects occurred on a very flat landscape under a very hot sun at about the same time in history.
