Bobor

Posted on March 17, 2012 by setiawanphoto

After viewing the sunrise at Angkor Wat, we continued our day trip in Angkor Archaeological Park near Siem Reap, Cambodia. Breakfast at the Kool Hotel’s restaurant was included in our stay there, so we could go back there for breakfast and taking some rest before continuing our day again. But since our tour is a private tour (which means we could change the itinerary if we like since we have the tour guide and driver with us already for the whole day), our tour guide Vanna suggested an alternative of getting the breakfast at one of the restaurants near Angkor Wat, and then continued our trip for the day from there. That would save some time by not going back to the hotel first. We thought that was a good idea. It did mean spending extra money for the breakfast, but it also allowed us chance to get a variety in our meals there as we already had one at the hotel’s restaurant the day before.

There were several restaurants located in the area right across from the entrance gate to the Angkor Wat complex. Given their strategic location, they cater mostly to tourists and I’m sure the price was higher than what you would get at restaurants in Siem Reap. We decided to go with one that served more local flavors, traditional Khmer breakfast dishes. Particularly, I was interested in trying out the Khmer’s version of rice porridge called bobor. I read about it in the guidebooks, and it was particularly intriguing because the word bobor sounded very much like the Indonesian word for rice porridge, bubur. Vanna knew of one of the restaurants that had the dish on the menu, so that’s the one we went to.

As we walked into the restaurant, a young Cambodian boy, must be around seven to ten years old, approached us with a bag full of bootlegged guidebooks to offer to us. He said, ‘Guidebooks, sir? I have several.. on Angkor Wat… Lonely Planet…’ I looked at him and politely said ‘No, thanks’ while shaking my head. He then smiled and said, ‘If you change your mind, come and buy from me, ok? Have a good breakfast…’ I said thanks and we continued entering the restaurant.

We ordered our breakfast and then waited for the food to be prepared. There were several other groups of tourists and locals in the restaurant. They seemed to enjoy the food. When I looked outside the restaurant, I saw the bookseller boy outside hanging out with some of his friends waiting for other tourists to come. Coming from Jakarta, that wasn’t a new experience of being offered goods at the parking lot by people on the way to restaurants. But I thought it was interesting that this Cambodian kid at such a young age already learned English quite well to conduct business (and very likely that was not learnt from taking formal language classes), and the gentle and positive mannerism I think well represented the Cambodian culture as ‘the land of smiles’, and it’s a good technique for someone in sales / business. I just hoped that the boy would have a chance to go to school and get educated, and not getting stuck to working from such a young age.

Our food finally arrived. I ordered a bowl of bobor with salted fish, omelet, and pickled vegetables as toppings. Kristi ordered a rice noodle dish with seafood. My bobor came with the toppings served on a separate plate from the bowl of rice porridge. The rice porridge was a bit on the watery side; it was closer to what I had in Indonesia (bubur) than the thicker ones I had in the US (Chinese congee). And the toppings are very much similar to what we would use in homemade bubur in Indonesia, so the taste of this dish was so familiar to me.

Kristi’s rice noodle soup was somewhat similar to the ‘bun’ dish in Vietnamese cuisine. Given its location in between Thailand and Vietnam, I think that’s one of the unsurprising thing we learned about the Khmer cuisine. There are some similarities with the cuisine from the neighboring countries, but there are also some things that make it unique.

The photo below is my bowl of bobor with the toppings already added to it. Our table was very close to the entrance, and we had natural lighting from outside, which made it great to do food photography.

Sunrise at Angkor Wat

Posted on March 16, 2012 by setiawanphoto

After a good night rest following a long day that started with a trip from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap, followed by a visit to Angkor Wat and Phnom Bakheng, and completed with attending an apsara dance performance over dinner, we’re ready for another day full of activity in Siem Reap area. We started very early in the morning, leaving our hotel around 6 am when it’s still dark. The first activity of the day, back to Angkor Wat to watch the last sunrise of year 2010.

This activity was as popular among tourists as going to Phnom Bakheng to watch the sunset. It was still dark when we arrived at the entrance gate to the Angkor Archaeological Park, but we could tell that it would be quite a crowd judging from the line of cars waiting to get the entrance passes checked by the officials.

When we arrived inside the Angkor Wat complex, there were already many people in there, mostly waiting near the pond in between the library and the main temple building. That seemed to be a popular spot to wait for the sunrise as from there you could see the silhouette of the temple with the sun rising behind it, and the temple reflected on the pond.

The area near the pond was already full of people, so I decided to set up my camera and tripod a little bit further to the side so I had room to capture the image with long exposure at low light with the tripod support. It worked pretty well, though there were several takes that had to be redone because I had people walking in front of my camera setup as they didn’t realize I was taking photos there.

After a little while, the sun had been rising for a few minutes and it’s getting brighter. Many people had left the pond area, so Kristi and I decided to get closer there to take photos of the temple reflected on the pond. I was able to still get the effect of sun rising by changing my shutter speed to be very high. That allowed me to take some photos like one below without the aid of tripod — very helpful as there were people around me that made it difficult to do any set up at all that require space. It was a great experience, and I was glad that it was a nice, clear sky and we could see the sunrise nicely as we hoped for.

Apsara Dance

Posted on March 15, 2012 by setiawanphoto

The apsara dance or the royal ballet of Cambodia is a form of performing arts established in the royal courts of Cambodia. Traditionally it was performed only on special occassions and ceremonies. Like many other forms of art in Cambodia, this traditional dance was almost lost during the repression of the Khmer Rouge. Fortunately it became popular again in 1980s and 1990s. Today when you’re visiting Cambodia you can find dance performances at places in Siem Reap and Phnom Penh.

After visiting Angkor Wat and Phnom Bakheng, we closed our day with a dinner show arranged by our tour company. We went to a restaurant with a large dining hall with a stage at one end, serving international-style buffet dinner. After most people got their dinners, a dance troupe performed several dance routines on the stage, a combination of classical and folk dances. Kristi and I were seated at a table not far from the stage, so we were able to enjoy the dance performances from a pretty good distance.

The dance performance was quite good, and at the beginning of each routine, a narrator provided us with a little description of the dance routine we’re about to see. Thought personally I’m usually not that interested in watching dance performances, I thought this was a good experience nevertheless since I had never seen it before, and they did very good job performing it. Later on Vanna said that these dancers went through quite rigorous training and selection process, so those who actually made it to the troupe are usually very good.

The photo below was taken during one of the dance routines. I used my 24-70 mm f/2.8 lens, taking the photo from my seat without the flash firing with the camera set with shutter priority at 1/125. It turned out pretty well and I was quite happy with the result.

Sunset at Phnom Bakheng

Posted on March 14, 2012 by setiawanphoto

Phnom Bakheng is a temple in the Angkor Archaeological Park near Siem Reap, Cambodia. The temple is located on top of a hill, thus from the temple one can get a nice panoramic view of the surroundings, including Angkor Wat not far away from there. This temple is one of the oldest in the area, being built in late 9th to early 10th century. Today it is becoming a popular place to go especially around sunset time. Given its age and the high volume of visitors, it is among the most threatened monuments in Angkor.

We went to visit Phnom Bakheng right after finishing our tour in Angkor Wat. It was a pretty short distance to go from Angkor Wat to the base of the hill where Phnom Bakheng was located. From there, we joined hundreds of other visitors hiking up the hill (about a mile or so) towards the temple. When we get to the base of the temple, our tour guide Vanna told us that he would wait there while Kristi and I climb up to the temple. He’s been there many times, and there were so many people going up there that he said it’s better for him to just wait there while we go up and enjoy the panoramic view.

The steps to climb up to the temple were quite steep; we had to go up very very carefully. Once we got up there, we saw so many people already waiting for the sun to go down. We followed suit and just waited, and took photos around the sunset time just like everyone else. I lost my directional bearing while up there and couldn’t really locate where Angkor Wat was, as I was hoping to be able to see Angkor Wat complex from higher elevation. Only later on after I got back to my hotel and looked at the area map that I realized most people were so focusing on the sunset in the west, that not many people were really looking at Angkor Wat that was located southeast of Phnom Bakheng.

After the sunset was done, we continued with a careful stepping down to the base of the temple. Again, it was quite steep, and with many people trying to go down around the same time (before it gets too dark), it was quite an interesting experience. I understood then why Vanna didn’t want to go up there…

The photo below was taken around sunset time when everyone was enjoying the view of a beautiful sky and the sun setting in the distance. I decided to take the photo to include the people around me taking photos. It was impossible to get just the photo of the temple and the sunset without the crowd; having them as part of the photo actually gave it a ‘sense of place’ that helps tell the story about the experience up there with other folks at sunset time.

Worship at Angkor Wat

Posted on March 13, 2012 by setiawanphoto

When visiting Angkor Wat, most foreign visitors come to see a magnificent monument / structure and the intricate details of the bas reliefs in the galleries of the main temple structure. One thing to note, however, is that Angkor Wat is still actively being used as a place of worship by the Cambodians. As such, I think it is important to have the proper respect and reference when coming to visit the place.

As we walked around the main temple building, we saw tourist groups accompanied by their guides visiting the galleries and looking at the details. When we reach certain parts inside the temple, however, we noticed that there were not as many foreign tourists there, but instead you see local Cambodians coming and setting up mats in front of statues of Buddha, and brought with them offerings to use for worship. In one of the guidebooks I read, it mentioned that during the Lunar New Year time, this was even more pronounced as the locals would come in numbers to worship, and this might be the time for tourists to yield to the locals and instead observe the use of the temple as it is intended to be rather than simply as a historic monument.

I think it’s also important that before coming to visit places like Angkor Wat that has special meanings to the locals to be reverent and pay the due respect to the traditions and culture. Often times you see visitors who come and think that because they’re the guests who paid their way to come and visit, they should be treated like royalty and they can do whatever they want. That’s very insensitive, and it’s what often times give certain group of people bad stereotypes from the locals.

The following photo was taken from a little distance when I saw the locals in the process of doing their worship ceremony. We watched silently from a bit of distance to ensure that our presence did not cause any distraction or interruption to the worship ceremony that was in progress.

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