We were all up bright and early today (5:30 am) to catch a glimpse of the majestic sunrise at the west gate of Angkor Wat! The sunrise was gorgeous and my camera doesn’t do it justice. There were several people there with us who were camped out on the grass. At the west gate, we also got to see a statue of Vishnu. This statue had been initially placed in the center of Angkor Wat. However, when Angkor Wat switched from a Hindu temple to a Buddhist temple, the figure was relocated and replaced with many Buddhist statues and carvings.

After the sunset, we walked around a bit more, passing by a replica building workshop, a newly built temple, and a few friends of our guide, Archaeologist Ea Darith, who showed us their excavation site. We found out that many of the statues along the outer bridges of Angkor Wat were actually replicas that were placed there in order to protect the artifacts. 

We then passed through the naga bridge which is believed to connect heaven to earth and began an exploration of the temple and the 8 outer galleries. Each gallery depicted a story and intricate carvings.

One of my favorite galleries depicted an episode of the Mahabharata, an Indian epic. In this tale, two opposing clans, the Kaurava and the Pandava, go to war over a beautiful woman named Draupadi. As the story goes, Draupadi was the wife of the five sons of the Pandava clan. However, due to her beauty, the 100 sons of the Kaurava clan were extremely jealous and challenged the Pandava clan to a game of dice with their property (including Draupadi) as the prize. The Pandava siblings lost the game and were chased out into the forest. Only after years of hiding were they able to return and reclaim their wife and their property. There were several Indian epics such as this depicted on the walls of Angkor Wat. Despite having switched to Buddhism, the king still respected these stories as part of history. 

We ended our exploration of Angkor Wat at around 4 after finally finding Magnus’s favorite gallery: The one depicting the churning of the sea of milk. We all took part in a video recreation of this churning (all participants have access to this video). Overall, today was an enriching experience and I can’t wait to see what tomorrow has in store!