OUDONG
The city of past kings
About 40km, northwest of Phnom Penh
along National road 5,Along Route 5, signs point the way to silversmithing
villages, a legacy of the past when kings and nobility used to come to the
Tonle Sap to bathe and the people would offer them delicate gifts fashioned
from the precious metal. Turn left at the large billboard, and at the very base
of the mountain is a flurry of picnic huts. On weekends, hoards of people
descend on the area from Phnom Penh to eat roast chicken, fish and palm fruit
in the cool of the thick forest.
Children
sell circles of palm sugar wrapped in woven palm leaves, and fans and hats for
tourists making the long trek to the top, a mountain topped with the spires of
stupas rears from the plain like a fairytale castle.
The
mountain itself runs from southeast to northeast, with a low saddle in the
middle. Khmers say it has the shape of a Naga-the magical multi-headed serpents
that guard the Buddha.
At
the base of the mountain near the path, a memorial containing bones of some of
the hundreds of bodies exhumed from a large Khmer Rouge killing field here has
been built testament to the area's bloody past.
Stairs
to the left lead to a huge, shattered statue of Buddha, the feet almost the
only part still intact. On the path up the mountain to the right, the stairs
climb steeply and a large structure rises on the left.
Inside,
huge pillars stand underneath sky, and in between their bullet-strafed
skeletons, a statue of Buddha sits, only his right arm and shoulder still
intact from the ravages of aerial bombings and shelling that shook Oudong from
1970 on works.
The
Khmer Rouge finished the job in 1977, setting explosives inside the
temple.
This
is Arthross Temple(Temple of Eight points renovated in concrete by king
Monivong in 1911), and legend has it that the Buddha here, facing north instead
of the traditional direction of east, is a testimony to the strength and power
of the ancient Cambodian kingdom.
In
the 18th century, locals say, a Chinese king sent his people out across Asia to
identify potential threats. When they came to Oudong, they saw the mountain
shaped like a Naga, a cavern on the top of the Arthross end, and observed the
wealth and power of Khmer society.
They
went home and told their king that the Khmers were already a powerful race, and
should a Naga appear through the cavern of Arthross, they would be strong
enough to rule the world.
The
Chinese king did not want this, nor did he want a war.
Instead,
he asked the Khmer king if he could build a temple above the cavern, with
Buddha's face towards China in order to protect his kingdom.
This
was named Arthaross temple (Arthaross means 18 corners) because there are 18
points, or corners, built into the structure of the temple. This temple also
once stood 18 hats high- a Khmer measurement of an arm from elbow to fingertips.
One HAT is about half a meter.
Behind
Arthross is Chker Amao stupa. Chker Amao was the dog
of the head monk of Preah Sokhun Mean Bon. He was reportedly so remarkably
clever that the monk could send him shopping with a list tied to his collar and
the faithful dog would walk from the market stall to market stall, collect the
shopping, then bring it home.
When he died he was reincarnated as the son of Chinese
king. The young prince began to get terrible headaches, and the court
astrologer diagnosed the problem as the roots of the bamboo growing across the
dog Amao's head in his Oudong grave. The king sent his people to Cambodia to
cut the roots of the bamboo and build the temple that became Chker Amao temple
to consecrate the spot.
As the ridge meanders northeast, three small Viharas-
Vihear Preah Ko (Sacred Cow), Vihear Preah Keo (Sacred Precious Stone) and
Vihear Prak Neak( The Buddha Protected by a Naga)-have been restored and
feature a statue of the sacred cow, glittering golden Buddha and vibrant
murals.
The invading Thais took the original Preah Ko and Preah Keo
when Longvek fell in 1594. These statues were said to have held golden books
full of all the knowledge in the world in their bellies, and legend says that
when they were lost to the Khmers marks when the kingdom of Cambodia fell
behind her neighbors.
As the head of the Naga comes into sight, three large
stupas mark the resting places of kings.
The first stupa, Chetdei Mouk Prohm, is where the remains
of king Monivong lie. He died in 1941.
The middle stupa, is Trai Traing,
built by king Norodom for his father, king Ang Doung, in 1891.
The last is called Damrei Sam Poan and was built in the
17th century for king Suryopor.
At the very point of the mountain is a huge Stupa which was built in 2002 to house the Buddha relics taken from the Stupa in front of the train station in Phnom Penh.
Across on the smaller ridge, Ta Sann Mosque is a testament
to king Ang Doung's broadminded intellectualism.
Grandfather Sann was born in Champa, the former Islamic empire that
once shared Indochina with the Khmers, and was an Iman at Phnom Chumreay.
He and the king became firm friends during long discussions
about the Dharma of both religions, and the king offered him a 50 square meter
area on any mountain he chose to build a mosque, which he happily
accepted.
But Oudong has not always witnessed such magnanimous tolerance.
The alternative stairway that tumbles down the mountainside near the stupas of
past kings passes murals depicting the atrocities of the Khmer Rouge. No one
here has forgotten that, and the bullet-riddled temples are an everyday
testament to what this fairytale city of the dead has suffered in the recent
past.
