Through the Screen Door to the Unknown: Cambodia and Vietnam

All it will take is just one moment and
you can say goodbye to how we had it planned
Fear like a habit run like a rabbit out and away
through the screen door to the unknown…

Live and Die, Avett Brothers

It’s been a while.

After May, where I was so sure that I was back to photographing again, somehow I just lost the thread while getting ready to set off on vacation in Cambodia and Vietnam. And then I went and came back with better than 3000 images and stuff to think about.

And I still haven’t entirely processed it. Both countries seemed to seep in and overwhelm all my senses. I suppose that’s what a journey is supposed to do. And you come back a different person than the one that left. And that’s what an adventure is supposed to do to you. But there’s no easy answer to the question of, “How was the trip?” There’s not a clean set of adjectives or phrases that fit that hole.

Because the heat and the taste can’t be shared, the euphoria at the top of the mountain, feel of the elephant’s skin, a monk’s blessing with cold water, butterfly swarms, the incense at the heart of the temple, the cigarettes and beer and conversation shared with strangers, the wind tangling your hair as you motorcycle through blurred sights of jagged mountains and rice paddies, fresh pineapple dripping on salty tanned skin, fumbling with language, and the pull of the undertow as you realize how fortunate you are to be in this place and time. Fear and joy and enlightenment and confusion, exhaustion and clarity. Newness of everything. The strangeness of everything.

But there has to be an answer to the question, right? So how to organize a disorganized mind and an exciting, but untidy trip. The literal trip took me from Phenom Phen, Sen Monorom, and Angkor Wat in Cambodia, then down the Mekong into Vietnam, up to Hoi An, Dong Hoi, and Phong Nha, then down to Saigon. It was a strangely emotional trip, but if it had an overarching theme, it was simply wonder. There was really a stew going on, but the wonder never really left me no matter what else might have been included in the mix.

Let’s go on an adventure…

Mondulkiri Project, Cambodia

Observing the crookedness as it mingled with the good people we meet
Good friends we had
Good friends we’ve lost along the way
In this great future you can’t forget your past, so dry your tears

No Woman No Cry, Bob Marley – on the radio in the Mondulkiri Project dining hall

Without a doubt, my time spent at the Mondulkiri Project outside the little town of Sen Monorom was a once in a lifetime experience. The organization shelters and rescues former work elephants and protects Cambodian forests at risk from foreign logging companies as well as working to provide better conditions for the indigenous tribes that rely on this land. Visitors have the opportunity to trek the jungle, spend some quality time bathing, feeding, and caring for the resident elephants. What else can I say, but I got to get up and personal with some of the most amazing creatures in an amazing setting to match.

Angkor Wat Archaeological Complex/Siem Reap, Cambodia

I don’t have to sell my soul
He’s already in me…

I Wanna Be Adored, Stone Roses – on the jukebox, Siem Reap

All roads lead to Angkor Wat and Siem Reap, the town that serves as a base camp for the temples. If you come to this post looking for impressive postcard images of stunning medieval Asian architecture, you’re going to be disappointed. There are plenty of beautiful images available in print and video. I really wanted to take the pictures that I couldn’t easily just google. Built over centuries from around 800-1500 A.D., the temples are truly incredible in scale, scope, setting, and detail. You could photograph for a year and not document all there is. But in the middle of the insanity of the tourist throngs, there are quiet places where you can remember that these are holy sites and human sites where ordinary people tend the cattle, go to work, play, create, worship, and lead their lives.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Phenom Phen, Cambodia

You say you want a revolution,
Well you know
We all want to change the world…

Revolution, The Beatles – background noise, Phenom Phen

Phenom Phen is so many things, noise and heat and food smells, hustlers, thieves, monks and housewives and doctors and politicians, night markets and schools and palaces and slums and wats. And then more wats around every turn. Laced with monkeys and girded round with farmland threaded through with rivers, it’s a big unruly city like any other and entirely unlike any other. It’s hard for outsiders to remember that Cambodia was very recently under the thumb of one of the most bloody and oppressive regimes visited of modern history. It’s important to understand the history, but I prefer to hold in mind the kindness, courtesy, resilience of the people who live with the everyday condition of rebuilding out of so much death and warfare.

 

Can Tho, Vietnam

I’m in love with your body
Every day discovering something brand new
I’m in love with the shape of you

Shape of You, Ed Sheeran – heard everywhere at any and all times of day or night

And suddenly I was on a boat floating down the Mekong and came into Vietnam. I zigzagged through the country from the Mekong Delta up to as far north as Dong Hoi seeking food, adventure, understanding, and redemption, found in unequal parts. While I had specific destinations going into Cambodia, I had no great plan for Vietnam. I drifted…

 

 

 

Hoi An, Vietnam

 

 

 

My Son Ruins – Vietnam

 

 

Dong Hoi – Phong Nha, Vietnam

 

 

 

 

 

Saigon, Vietnam

 

 

And you come back a different person than the one that left. And that’s what an adventure is supposed to do to you.

Forever I will move like the world that turns beneath me
And when I lose my direction I’ll look up to the sky
And when the black cloak drags upon the ground
I’ll be ready to surrender, and remember
Well we’re all in this together
If I live the life I’m given, I wont be scared to die

The Once and Future Carpenter, Avett Brothers