It all began in Cambodia.
Actually, it began many years earlier – I’d had a tome called Wonders of the World as a kid, which I studied meticulously from beginning to end. There were many ‘wonders’ in that book, but the most fascinating of all to my curious young mind was Angkor Wat: the architectural apotheosis of the once-almighty Khmer Empire, subsumed by the surrounding forests following its decline, before eventually being recovered from the ravages of history and (justly) hailed as one of the most magnificent structures on the planet. Many a childhood night was spent dreaming of its splendour.
Things escalated during adolescence, when my burgeoning interests in arthouse cinema and politics endowed Cambodia with even greater import. My favourite film of the 21st century – Wong Kar-Wai’s quietly devastating In the Mood for Love – featured a prominent sequence at Angkor Wat which had me bawling my eyes out. Meanwhile, my sense of social justice was expanding to encompass a more global outlook, and I developed what can only be described as a ‘Western saviour’ complex: a desire to somehow harness my own privilege and give back to empower the ‘poor people’ of the world (don’t worry, I roll my eyes in hindsight too!). All signs were pointing to Cambodia.
the first couple of weeks around Siem Reap
And so it was that I rocked up to a dusty old town named Siem Reap, right on the doorstep of Angkor Wat, at the beginning of 2011. I was armed with nothing but an ESL qualification, a boatload of virtuous-yet-vague intentions, and a desire to make myself anew.
Did I deliver on those good intentions? Not really, though I proved an excellent teacher (the only role I was ever any good at, and I walked away from it!) and swiftly forged links with local NGOs to better understand my new setting and its most urgent needs. Within a mere month of landing, I’d experienced the worst of all my expectations going in:
- natural disasters (an unexpected flood that saw me practically swimming to work in the twilight hours – on my very first day no less!)
- sexual harassment (repeatedly being chased down dark backalleys by female sex workers and ladyboys alike)
- child trafficking (forced labour abound; most disturbingly when I was propositioned by a kid during one of my early visits to the temple complex)
- road accidents (a drunken motorcyclist who crashed and bled his life out right in front of my eyes)
This was miles removed from anything that I’d ever known. There was rampant poverty, endemic corruption, dirt and dust that suffocated. I was living in what I described as a shack – it was more a self-contained room – where I’d regularly wake up to the sound of roosters crowing at dawn or weddings/funerals blasting music at sonic boom volumes from nearby streets. I had to contend with snakes, scorpions, and what I’m convinced was the world’s largest spider after one night out (needless to say, I promptly headed right back into the night). And getting sick or hurt was to be strenuously avoided given the inadequate local healthcare facilities. I’d swung wildly from my comfortable ‘first world’ bubble and all its perks to a new, less comprehensible society, where I had to re-learn how to navigate everyday existence in a context where danger, although distant, was more palpable than it had been in my life prior.
fishermen on the Tonle Sap, Cambodia’s largest lake
me on the Tonle Sap (note how fully covered I was back then – the hatred for clothes would be fashioned while in Cambodia, but I arrived full of body image issues and reluctant to show any skin…)
And so it was that I rocked up to a dusty old town named Siem Reap, right on the doorstep of Angkor Wat, at the beginning of 2011. I was armed with nothing but an ESL qualification, a boatload of virtuous-yet-vague intentions, and a desire to make myself anew.
Did I deliver on those good intentions? Not really, though I proved an excellent teacher (the only role I was ever any good at, and I walked away from it!) and swiftly forged links with local NGOs to better understand my new setting and its most urgent needs. Within a mere month of landing, I’d experienced the worst of all my expectations going in:
- natural disasters (an unexpected flood that saw me practically swimming to work in the twilight hours – on my very first day no less!)
- sexual harassment (repeatedly being chased down dark backalleys by female sex workers and ladyboys alike)
- child trafficking (forced labour abound; most disturbingly when I was propositioned by a kid during one of my early visits to the temple complex)
- road accidents (a drunken motorcyclist who crashed and bled his life out right in front of my eyes)
This was miles removed from anything that I’d ever known. There was rampant poverty, endemic corruption, dirt and dust that suffocated. I was living in what I described as a shack – it was more a self-contained room – where I’d regularly wake up to the sound of roosters crowing at dawn or weddings/funerals blasting music at sonic boom volumes from nearby streets. I had to contend with snakes, scorpions, and what I’m convinced was the world’s largest spider after one night out (needless to say, I promptly headed right back into the night). And getting sick or hurt was to be strenuously avoided given the inadequate local healthcare facilities. I’d swung wildly from my comfortable ‘first world’ bubble and all its perks to a new, less comprehensible society, where I had to re-learn how to navigate everyday existence in a context where danger, although distant, was more palpable than it had been in my life prior.
fishermen on the Tonle Sap, Cambodia’s largest lake
me on the Tonle Sap (note how fully covered I was back then – the hatred for clothes would be fashioned while in Cambodia, but I arrived full of body image issues and reluctant to show any skin…)
And it was utterly magical.
Those early years in Cambodia remain the best of my life. A rash journey into the unknown where the rewards were far, far greater than any of the risks. Not only was it where I found me, but it was also where I found my tribe – where I realised for the first time that there were others wired like me: progressive warriors by day who partied by night and had an unquenchable thirst for travel. And then there was the habitual kindness of my local neighbours and colleagues who readily embraced my madness and, in doing so, helped rebuild my sense of self. The connections that I made during that time, many of which have sadly become dormant since my departure in 2015, remain the ones I cherish most ardently. It was being a Siem Reaper that (temporarily) restored all the confidence and drive that had been lost during adolescence, that made me realise that the way I viewed myself was by no means the way the world viewed me.
There’s an argument that the same alchemy would have taken place anywhere I’d moved to (I’d toyed with the idea of relocating to Ethiopia instead). But that would be a flagrant discredit to a nation that gave me so much. Angkor Wat was every bit as majestic as I’d spent those childhood years fantasising about, but I didn’t realise that there were so many other Khmer Empire relics within the vicinity to feast my eyes upon. And then there were the lush landscapes, the untamed nights, the jawdropping sunsets, the seemingly neverending escapades, my wonderful students whose diligence and openness remain inspirational. And the smiles! Lord. There is no other nationality on earth that is so gifted in the art of the humble smile; Cambodians can find ways to thaw the coldest depths of a frozen heart with their winsome, beaming grins. They certainly did so with mine.
convince me this isn’t the most beautiful country on the planet – you can’t…
Things would sour during the latter half of my Cambo adventure for reasons that were entirely personal (I wasn’t quite as healed as I’d imagined, sadly). I left in 2015, and both Siem Reap and the country itself have undergone considerable facelifts in the years since. There’s infrastructure and modern amenities in place of the dirt roads and grimy backstreets that defined my time there. I last visited in early 2020, hiding out from a pandemic whose gravity no one had yet fully grasped. I often wonder what turns my life would have taken had I stayed put back then. Would I be happier? Would I finally have made something of myself? Returning to China for the Covid years laid waste to so much of my direction and self-belief. To so much of me.
I’m not convinced that things would have turned out better. The flaws and frailties that undo our worlds are often embedded within ourselves rather than our external surrounds, and I’d likely have come undone anywhere at that point in life. Still, it makes it easier for me to romanticise, to recast those years of reckless, sordid abandon as an extended euphoria. They call Cambodia the ‘Kingdom of Wonder’ for marketing purposes, and it’s certainly apt in this regard – it’s not the manifold trials and tribulations that linger in one’s mind, but the joy of renewal and of finally belonging (ironically, in a place where I visibly do not belong). If home is where the heart is, then Cambodia will always be where I’ll call home, rose-tinted specs be damned.
started with clothes firmly on, gradually became more revealing, before ending up wearing nothing but a box (Halloween 2012 vs. 2014 for comparison…) :-/
Like In the Mood for Love, I’ll end with Angkor Wat. (Major spoiler alert for those that haven’t seen the film!) The film’s male protagonist, haunted by his heartaches and failures, travels to this decaying behemoth that’s stubbornly withstood the test of time with a resilience beyond compare. He finds an anonymous crevice within its massive stone blocks, and into it he whispers his life’s secrets, his deepest truths that he can’t bear to vocalise in reality. And then he finds a clump of grass and seals that crevice, encasing his pain and sorrow within this most spectacular of ancient structures forevermore. A decade later, inspired by that sequence, I’d perform exactly the same task. It was a young man’s attempt to cast off the old demons; to banish past memories in order to cleanse the soul and give oneself a shot at creating newer, happier memories that wouldn’t ever need to be sealed off in a bygone old building. I’ll be returning to those memories many, many times as we proceed.
For more Cambodia images from this period click here.
Discover more from Reehan Miah
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.