The scent of departure

riverside view

Morning traffic-quiet

Candles and ice

Nia

I have found relief somewhere between dreams, angry spells in the dark hour before dawn and the oblivion of sleep. When I wake up it’s already 930, late morning by Cambodia’s standards. A text from Koosh greets me good morning.  He offers me some down time and a nice lunch at the new Golden Temple hotel. 

The sun is painfully bright for my sore eyes. But I have released my demons again. They have departed with the night. I notice significant differences in the daily landscape that has greeted me every morning for the past fortnight. Whilst the human traffic on the roads has really picked up, there are no cars and tuk tuks as the riverside roads are blocked off. The Festival has officially started. There are the occasional bicycles and mopeds sneaking in but overall this is a pedestrian’s paradise.

There is no way that you can tell the Khmer what to do.  How do you reprimand or guide a mild mannered and seemingly obedient child? There is no easy or apparent way. There is police everywhere but mopeds sneak in behind the officers. At roundabouts where traffic is still allowed the usual thing happens: cars, mopeds, bicycles turn right instead of following the ‘correct’ flow of traffic on the left and circling the roundabout. The mopeds, which can be the only family vehicle, sometimes carry up to four. I see a moped family:  the father driving, a little boy standing holding on to his shoulders, his little sister held onto the moped securely by the mother, who nearly hangs of it at the end.

This is a walking day for me.  I am not risking getting on a bicycle in the sleepless state I am in. It would not be practical anyway.  It is the day before the big Water Festival celebration and the streets are heaving. It’s time to blend in.   There are food and artisan product stalls everywhere. The closer I get to Golden temple hotel and to the centre the busier it gets. It is just 10 am in the morning. The races are starting at 3 in the afternoon.  There are various riverside VIP platforms set up for the governors, politicians, businessmen and celebrity visitors in Siem Reap for the celebrations. There are other smaller platforms but most of the crowd is taking its place at the riverside.

I enjoy the hustle and bustle but am grateful when I arrive at the quieter hotel location.  At the hotel I sit by the poolside, first I snooze in a hammock waiting for a massage I booked. Koosh joins me for a tea. It is nice to feel his sincere compassion. I have not spent much time with Koosh but (I hope he does not mind me saying) I can see he is a sensitive and reflective person but also a survivor. I appreciate his company today.

The next hour is an experience: during my energising jasmine oil massage different parts of my head tingle as the skilled masseuse squeezes the hidden tension out from the different nooks and crannies of my body. When I walk out I feel that the hours of sleep I lacked have been handed back to me. Koosh and I enjoy lunch at the hotel restaurant balcony. I am crazy about the ginger and fish Khmer dish. Ginger is one of my favourite ingredients to cook with and this dish recipe is coming with me to nourish many friends and family.

More wandering in the streets of Siem Reap is in place as the flocks of people become denser. There is loud music of all kinds at the VIP platforms, the roadside and small side streets. There are Khmer BBQs everywhere.  The human and moped traffic has gone beyond the definition of busy. This is what congestions means. People are hanging off the bridges cheering at the oncoming racing boats.  As we catch a couple of boat races , I witness the childlike enthusiasm of the Khmer when in celebration.

I spend some time roaming on my own getting a couple of presents and books. I literally breathe in the colourful celebrations and festive noise like precious air. I can attempt to describe images , and sounds of this place , I could perhaps add a couple of  my really bad photos to accompany words but I still have not figured how to effectively describe scents and aromas. Stop and think how a scent makes a place or a person unique to you.  When in Sardinia I looked around to face landscapes that seemed so familiar to me but when I closed my eyes the disctinct aromas of the place were so uniquely Sardinian that a new memory and special place for this land was created in my heart. The same is happening today. Like an obsessed recorder of the scents of lands and places I store the ingredients of the Siem Reap concoction in a special place.

When I meet the boys (Phalla and Koosh) it is getting dark and the city has transformed into a massive fairground. The traffic and human congestion is alarming at parts. At times we don’t move for 10 minutes or more. This gives me more time to look around and spy on the place that I am about to depart from.

At one of the beautiful bridges of Pokambor avenue we pause as if in anticipation. There I meet Nia whose intelligence sparkles in her eyes. Nia chats in exceptionally good English. She is there with her mother for her festival and has just returned from a break in Vietnam. The boys are circling us excitedly as Nia is an exceptionally beautiful girl. It is quite funny to see this very human side of my two friends. As we talk, an explosion of fireworks begins from a boat in the middle of the river . It is six thirty in the afternoon, and one thirty in Greece. My grandmother’s funeral has just begun and by this strange coincidence I take the liberty to make the celebration of her life part of this year’s Water Festival in Cambodia.

Half an hour later the scent of fireworks is added to my night of departure.