Cambodia's smallest of treasures

via CAAI News Media

By Lucy Chabot Reed

March 27, 2010

We just spent three days in Cambodia, visiting ancient temples, relaxing by the pool, laughing and smiling with tourists and locals alike. It's been the best three days of our travels thus far.

It's the end of the dry season, so the fields are brown here, too. It's coolest in November/December (makes sense); hottest in April just before the rains begin. So much for spring.

Still, our days in Cambodia were wonderful. The people, especially, were kind and always smiling. I never felt we were being taken advantage of, never felt that a place was created just for us tourists.

We visited four temples in a day and a half, including Angkor Wat, believed to be the largest religious building in the world. Each temple was different than the one before. Prerup was tall and small; Angkor Wat was huge yet intimate; Bayon was eery but still cozy; and Ta Prohm was just wild, literally. (That's the temple that had a cameo in the Tomb Raider movie, with roots of enormous trees reclaiming the temple built in the middle of the jungle.)

At each place, we met locals who just hang out there, offering incense for sale to make a blessing at the Buddhas, but also just offering information about the temples they love. Invariably, we tipped them at the end for the impromptu tour, but it never felt forced or demanded. We'd just sit and talk with them. They all spoke wonderful English (as well as other languages as different from Khmer as you can imagine, including Japanese or Russian).

Exiting each temple for our awaiting tuk-tuk, we were approached by children. Charming, tidy children selling things. I had read that it wasn't good to buy goods from children outside tourist areas because many of these children were orphans or homeless, working for unseen adults. Paying for their wares only encouraged the grown ups to take advantage of them.

The children we saw at the first few temples were clean and educated. They spoke English and could rattle off information about my country that half of my countrymen don't even know, including the capital of my state, the largest state in my union, the newest state and our total population. If I had said I was from California or New York instead of Florida, they would have known details from that place. If I was from Australia instead of America, they would have had those facts, too.

I was impressed. The scam, if that's what it was, worked. When one little girl pulled out the flute she was peddling and played it beautifully, I was charmed. Could these kids really be orphans? I asked several how they knew so much. School, they told me. I believed them because I wanted to believe them. I wanted to snatch them up and hug them, make sure they are appreciated for the darling little souls they are. Instead, I gave them $1 for each of the things they were selling. I didn't negotiate with them, didn't bargain with them. If my dollar can help them – God, I hope it doesn't hurt them – they can have it, and many more.

I packed my cheap treasures as carefully as if they were made of gold. I'll hang some on my Christmas tree, give some as gifts with my memory of the little girls who sold them to me, and I'll hold my daughter a little closer at night, praying these little angels in Cambodia have some of the same love spilling over them.