Siem Reap ’14 pt 9: Ta Som, Neak Pean, & Preah Khan

We come to the last leg of our Temple Run, covering three temples. You would think by now we’d be fed up with seeing rocks, ruins, stones, and towers. Well, in a way, we were. But that did not mean we appreciated it any less. There’s still so many things to discover at every turn, I doubt anyone could fully explore all of them. For this post, we’ll zero in on Ta Som, Neak Pean, and Preah Khan.

TA SOM

Reminiscent of Prasat Bayon, Ta Som is a small monastic temple complex with face towers on its outer enclosure. The amount of ruins within, however, reminds people a bit of Ta Prohm or Banteay Kdei. Anyway, the real charm of Ta Som is its quiet and stillness. Entry and exit points are on the East side.

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Outer walls of the inner enclosure are filled with devatas.

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Ta Som is noted by some for its devatas, which have stretched earlobes. Can you see it in the photo below? They look like dangling/long earrings, but apparently, it’s the earlobes going long.

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Inside the enclosure are also ruins, pediments and more decorative carvings. And blind windows.

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On the other end is the western gopura, which also has a face tower. What’s unique about this? The strangler fig right at the back of the face tower.

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NEAK PEAN

Neak Pean (pronounced as Neak Peon) means “entwined serpents” or “coiled serpents”. You’ll see why in a moment.

Neak Pean is unique, primarily because it is an “island temple”, not a mountain temple as most of the others are. But the temple itself is not the only highlight for this place. The path is a joy to walk on.

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Some people have an obsession with sunrises. Others live to catch sunsets. Many are creative in spotting cloud formations. I, on the other hand, have a fascination for reflections on water. I don’t know how it came about, and I can’t fully explain why I’ve grown to have that quirk, but don’t you just think they’re gorgeous? I know I do.

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You’ll finally arrive at the temple itself just by following the path.

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Unfortunately, the temple was closed to actual “exploration” since conservation construction was going on. We could, however, look at it from afar.

The main pond has four smaller ponds on four sides, in a cruciform shape. At the center of the main pond is the circular island where the sanctuary is located.

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Take a close look at the photo below.

On the left of the pic, the East side, is a statue of Balaha, a flying horse that rises out of the water.

You will also spot the two entwined serpents on the east and west side of the sanctuary. That is where Neak Pean got its name.

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And because I cannot help myself, I just had to take these photos on the way back.

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PREAH KHAN

And so we arrive at our final temple stop, Preah Khan.

Preah Khan is said to have been both a Buddhist university and a city. It has similarities with Angkor Thom, starting from its entrance causeway lined with boundary stones and nagas held by gods and asuras. 

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It also has face towers. And strangler figs and silk-cotton trees.

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Interestingly, on one of the entrances is a statue of a monster with a human torso, the legs of a garuda, and a lion-like face. 

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Entering this structure brings you inside what feels like a maze. With fallen masonry and ruins.

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If you stop for a while in the middle of it all, soak it in, you’d most likely be robbed of breath at the scale of it all. And this is just a small temple compared to the others.

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When Awesome-Tuktuk-Driver Sarat dropped us off at the East, he told us to go straight and head towards the West to exit, and there he will be waiting for us.

So we went straight.

Apparently, we have poor sense of direction. All five of us.

We just noticed how there were no longer signs leading the way. Or that we can no longer hear any other sound except for the birds chirping. No sign of another soul anywhere, too.

After a while of walking, we heard sounds of vehicles. Yes! We’re close to a road. We walked on, got to the side of a road…. a deserted road, mind you.

We walked further until we saw tuktuks parked. Awesome-Tuktuk-Driver Sarat spotted us from afar and went to pick us up.

And he gleefully told us we came out on the South side instead of the West.

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Leaving entailed having to exit through the South Gate of Angkor Thom, where our extensive temple run started. That means I got to get a final glimpse of my temple. I mean, Bayon.

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Along the way we met these elephants. We wanted to try a tour of Bayon on top of these beauties. But it costs USD15-20 per person, for 30 minutes. And we don’t have any time left (and, let’s be honest, USD), and the bean counters in us roared their pretty heads, so…. yeah.

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All in all, the temple run was exhausting. Not because of all the walking and some hiking involved – we were totally down with that. No, what made it so draining was the heat, which reached around 35 degrees Celsius and up. That’s already a fever by our standards, coming from a place where it gets hottest at 25 degrees and we are barely tolerating it. Imagine having to go through an entire day (even the evenings!) of this heat! I was just standing there, and I can feel rivulets of sweat streaming down my face. I practically had a mini-waterfall at my back. It. Was. That. Hot.

But I guess that was part of the entire package. And the whole adventure. So SOAK IT IN. SOAK IT ALL IN.

Wrapping this whole trip up in my next post. See ya then!

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