The Screaming Monkeys of Cambodia
The temple is a tiny thing, made of stone and wood, but as I stand in front of the doors shifting my backpack it seems as if the tiny building is much bigger than it does to the naked eye. My glasses have fogged up– the Cambodian heat and humidity, I think to myself. I wipe them on my shirt and they become even muddier. Somehow I am not annoyed in the slightest.
I hesitate. The doors are open, welcoming, yet I am afraid. I am a foreigner from a country with too many rules and not enough rain or children. Or monkeys. A piercing cry echoes from my right. I turn my head, the sweat dropping from the ends of my hair, to see a pair of monkeys perched on the stone wall of the temple. One is screaming at me. A threat? A broken welcome?
I walk into the temple; the threats of the monkey fall on deaf ears, as if I am drawn to this place by some unknown force. Something about the gate– vines entwined and crawling up a barren stone wall–makes me contort my face in a strange mixture of a frown and a grin. The sight is both sad and exotic, the last few remains of a slowly disappearing culture. I enter. Walking through the calm and dark passage among the hooting of the monkeys, I can see sculptures atop the gateway at the end of a narrow passage, a wooden beam perched on top of two cylindrical pillars. All these mythical figures, a flying horse here, a golden dragon there, shining angels etched into the pillars, mysterious and forgotten and austere.
There is something unusual about this temple. Not in the architecture or materials used to create this architect, but in the aura of the giant golden Buddha that faces me as I pass through the gate.
Contrary to the rugged cracking outer walls of the temple, the main hall is covered with gold and each wall is sculptured with various images, the etchings made by past masters of this temple. Children slumber peacefully on the floor of the temple, looking as content as if they were sleeping in the comfort of their own rooms, except here monkeys snuggle up to the sides of the children with their tails tucked around their small bodies for warmth. A father and his son harvest rice from the field as a woman looks over them, holding one end of a rope tied to the neck of a cow with sad stone eyes. It is with a warm rushing feeling of awe that I realize that these etchings on the wall show the daily life of villagers around the temple. There was a reason why the people of this tiny village did not tear down this dilapidated temple that has been sitting in the middle of the town. For those people, the temple is more than just a temple, but more like the living proof of their history. It is what keeps them from losing who they are while surrounded by a world that is continuously changing.
As I am wandering around the temple, the giant golden statue seems to be watching and smiling at me, following my footsteps with its all-seeing eyes. I notice, while walking along the stone walls, that a few monkeys are slowly following me. “Whoop whoop,” one screams, its eyes bright with intelligence. When I reach out my hand, the monkeys scamper away.
And suddenly I find myself at the feet of Buddha, golden and warmly smiling down at me as I suddenly feel self-conscious and insignificant and small, his half-closed eyes seeming as if they hold the key to the universe. I am freed, liberated, as I fall to my knees, the sweat and mosquitoes forgotten along with the gray city to which I have to return, the gray city and its people who trudge through their daily routines like gerbils spinning their wheels without even knowing where the road leads them. The Buddha is silent, inanimate, yet his is the most humane face I have seen in a long time.
I feel a tap on my shoulder; it is the head priest of this temple. His face is lined with wrinkles and I have a vague idea that each crease in his face contains more knowledge and emotion than I can ever fathom. I have stayed at the temple for more than several hours.
The time has come. I stand up and dust my pants. My backpack feels lighter on my shoulders. The sun is going down, yet my monkeys are still screaming.
About the Author: Ho Jun Jung allegedly has eighteen different pairs of white shirts that look almost the same. When he isn’t traveling to monkey-infested countries, he plays ping pong and eats nachos with cheese.
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