Location: Siem Reap, Cambodia
Because of the airplane troubles on the first day, we missed a scheduled dinner show at our hotel. But they performers were available for our added day, so we got to have the dinner and show anyway.
Dinner was a wonderful buffet (with far too much food) at one end of the pool, right next to a small stage. When the first dance was explained as the village women using coconuts to deal their men-trouble I expected some serious Tom and Jerry physical comedy. Turns out it was not nearly so violent.
Coconut dance (17 seconds)
Next was a dance teaching fishing technique.
Fishing Dance (20 seconds)
Then the Monkey King had to convince the Mermaid Queen to stop knocking down his bridge (I not making this up). Unfortunately, I forgot to set my camera for fast motion, so I don’t have many good images. The lead dancer had amazing flexibility. She could bend her hands backwards at the wrist and almost touch her own arm.
The costumes of the peacock dance were eye-popping. Yes, those are big peacock torsos on their heads.
Finally, we had a dance of the Apsara, of whom we saw on the walls of so many temples.
Apsara Dance (29 seconds)
Cambodia has a tradition of shadow puppets. The background lights around the stage had white light-scattering material with leather cut-out figures.
Cambodia Thoughts
- I enjoyed this field trip, but I did not get to visit Singapore and Kuala Lumpur because of it. I’m very glad to have seen Angkor Wat and other places, but I do regret missing the other cities.
- Cambodia has a rather beautiful script, but there is also a lot of Latin letters.
- The first night the hotel pool area closed early because the Cambodian National Soccer Federation (the folks that run the Olympic and World Cup soccer teams) had a scheduled event. I had a window overlooking the pool, and it was fun to half-listen to the speeches and stuff. Then from 9:00pm to 10:00pm I got to experience absolutely wonderful drunk karaoke. Blech.
- Cambodia seems 50 years behind the US with respect to litter. Once our bus driver swept out the bus after we left and just tossed the plastic bottles onto the parking lot. You see a lot of trash along the roads. Perhaps that will change as the economy improves, but it’s hard to be a tourist draw and not manage what everyone sees from the bus.
Bonus Japan Video
The Cambodia hotel had an internet link fast enough to upload long video clips, so here is 2:28 of Japanese koto and bamboo flute music. They came onboard the ship in Tokyo. This is different as I recorded the video with my Canon SLR camera rather than my cell phone.