This is the palace of the royal family in Phnom Penh. I discovered from my Googling that the king here has been a lifelong elected position since 1993. The candidates come from the members of two leading bloodlines. They are not elected in a popular vote. The election is conducted within a council made up of senior religious and political figures.
The former king, Sihanouk appeared to be well liked. It was one of the times when he abdicated that they decided to set up the vote - although the timing of these eve ts isn't clear to me. This lovely memorial for him was built after his death. However, he had a very spotty career, abdicated several times, was exiled, incarcerated etc etc! He also was a composer and made movies. He abdicated in favor of his son in 2004 I guess those voters agreed with him!) and lived until his death in 2012, as the 'King Father'. The new King, Sihamoni, seems to be a bit problematic for the Cambodians as he remains a bachelor at the age of 64. He was raised and schooled in Czechoslovakia and trained as a classical ballet dancer. He has promoted dance and culture here, but I sensed that the people would like to see an heir. Wikipedia reports that his father stated that Sihamoni "loves women as his sisters"!
Many of us went down to a market with a little shopping for tourists, the Russian Market. I had a rice soup at this little lunch cart. There were many stalls, but as has been the norm here, they seemed very repetitive - each category of stall selling pretty much the same products.
There was lots of beads, silver, pearls, gold, statuary, ceramics, silk, household goods. It was fun. I got a small reclining Buddha to celebrate my being born on Tuesday!
In the evening we headed out on a sunset tuk tuk tour to see the Independence Monument, which is also near the Sihanouk statue.
It was a vibrant setting - many people out running and walking, children playing, tourists photographing. There was a strong police presence. We were told this is because the Prime Minister lives right here, too. Much like visiting the White House, I guess. The reflection of the setting sun on the casino on the right was quite lovely.
From here we went on to the Riverside - the confluence of FOUR rivers! The main one you will recognize is the Mekong! It's on the other side of the building you see in the picture here. The one immediately in front is the Tonle Sap River. The area we visited was Sisowath Quay.
Not only is the palace in this area, but also a very traditional museum - I would recommend it only if you love sculpture and have hours to listen to the audio recordings about the many pieces!
Part of the palace includes a lovely structure called the Moonlight Pavilion which is used for viewing parades. It was also a stage for classic Khmer dance in the past.
Here you can see the path from the Moonlight Pavilion to the river. Everything was clean, trimmed and well kept, which sometimes is not the case in Asia.
Following the yellow path from the Moonlight Pavilion leads directly to this pavilion on the Tonle Sap River which is used by the royal family and other dignitaries for watching boat races during the water festival.
The area was being used by families and was active during the day. It was also very active when we visited during the evening.
To finish our evening tuk tuk ride, we went to a Wat Phnom Historical and Cultural Tourism Site. Happily, this was not the destination, so we just peered through the fence. I say happily, because as foreigners we had to pay to get in!
Our real destination was Mrs. Penh's statue. She was the woman after whom the city was named. We were told that one day she found a log floating in the river in the 14th century. (Our guide, Sareth, made clear that we understood how Mrs. Penh was walking when she went by the river by demonstrating how a woman walks! A great memory!) When Mrs. Penh looked inside the log, she found a Buddha statue, so she immediately jumped into action and got help to pull the log out of the river as this seemed to be a very auspicious event. Not content with merely rescuing the statue, Mrs. Penh must have been a resourceful woman, because she also persuaded the powers that be to build a hill to house the statue in a stupa. The land was completely flat, so a hill had to be built. That hill is now the Wat Phnom (the one nearby we would have been required to pay for entry) - because the word Phnom means 'hill'. Thus, Phnom Penh means 'the hill that Mrs. Penh built'!
I was quite disappointed that it was too dark to get a photo of Mrs. Penh's statue, so instead I took a photo of the log being dragged out of the river, which was carved around the base of the statue.
Getting around required the use of tuks tuks, but the drivers seemed to speak enough English to make that possible. On the other hand, rules of the road were quite haphazard. Traffic doesn't wait for there to be a gap in the traffic to turn left - they just ease their nose into the oncoming traffic and cut it off.
I also found myself going the wrong way down the road - even divided roads in my tuk tuk. You can see here we are travelling against the flow. The proper side we should have been on is on the other side of the barrier. Strangely it didn't feel scary - just surprising! I think the speeds are so slow that it leaves the other drivers response time to avoid collision. However it results in very random and seemingly chaotic traffic flow.
We were warned, however, about not walking around alone at night and watching out for our cameras and purses. There was also the concern that they could be snatched from one when on tuk tuks, so some of them had wire cages at the back and sides.
These hazards not withstanding, it was a pleasant experience with the slightly French feel of leafy green avenues and wider streets. The development in new areas also looked clean and relatively attractive.
It was a pleasing way to end my journey here in Cambodia. It was a country whose history touched my heart and whose people were industrious and gentle. The fact that the genocide of the 1970's could happen in a country full of such gentle people still puzzles me and I pray that modern communication will never allow something like that to ever happen again - anywhere in the world. The landscape was less dramatic than Laos and the heat was ever-present, so I am glad to have had this small taste of their food, culture and environment.
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