Postcards from Cambodia: Angkor Wat

One of the few things I was willing to wake up at an ungodly hour for was to watch the sun rise over Cambodia's greatest treasure: Angkor Wat, the City of Temples. 
  First a Hindu then a Buddhist temple complex, Angkor Wat was built in the 12th century by King Suryavarman II.  
  It is the largest religious monument in the world and its perfect symmetry is a wonder to behold.
  The main temple of Angkor Wat is composed of three rectangular galleries, each higher than the next.
  Every inch of the walls of each gallery is covered in elaborate bas-relief scenes from Hindu mythology and literature.
  Angkor Wat's Temple Mountain, its central and uppermost sanctuary, is an architectural representation of Mount Meru, the home of the gods in Hindu mythology.
  From the uppermost terrace, one can see across the lower galleries to the bridge which crosses the moat around Angkor Wat, and all the way to the outer wall.
  The image of Buddha in the uppermost sanctuary depicts him seated on the coils of a Naga. Legend says that Buddha was so deep in meditation, he did not notice the storm that began raging around him. So the Naga coiled itself under Buddha to raise him from the muddy waters and bent its seven heads (one of which is broken here) over him to protect him from the rain. Of all the temples in the Angkor district of Siem Reap, only Angkor Wat was never abandoned and it is still an active Buddhist temple today.

Postcards from Cambodia: Angkor Thom

The Buddhist Bayon Temple was built in the late 12th or early 13th century and stands in the middle of Angkor Thom, the capital of the empire of King Jayavarman VII.
  Its most distinctive feature is its multitude of towers, each bearing a serenely smiling face on each of its four sides.
  The gigantic faces bear a striking resemblance to the statues of King Jayavarman VII, which have led some scholars to believe that they are images of the king himself. Others believe that they are representations of the bodhisattva of compassion.
  Older temples in Angkor Thom survive. The three-tiered Baphuon Temple, built in the mid-11th century, was dedicated to the Hindu god Shiva.
  The 10th century Phimeanakas Temple is located within the walls of the royal palace. It is associated with a very interesting legend which involves the king and a Naga, a mythological creature in the form of a snake which, in Cambodia, has seven heads.
  Angkor Thom's kings had a long stone terrace which they used for public ceremonies and audiences. It is now known as the Terrace of the Elephants because of the parade of elephants decorating the surviving portions.

Postcards from Cambodia: Banteay Srei

The 10th century Banteay Srei, dedicated to the Hindu god Shiva, is distinctive among Angkor's many temples because of the miniature scale of its buildings.

It was constructed using a hard red sandstone which can be carved like wood. Despite being more than a thousand years old, the temple retains much of its intricate decorative carvings.

Postcards from Cambodia: Ta Prohm

Back in November 2013, my husband and I spent five days in Siem Reap, Cambodia with a couple of friends. We got home to news of a large typhoon forming over the Pacific whose projected path would take it directly over the Philippines. I used my spare hours tracking it and didn't bother with my blog—only for a few days, I thought. It took me several months after Typhoon Haiyan to start blogging again. So, half a year late, I will be featuring photos of our "Temple Run" for the next few days.
  Ta Prohm is one of the hundreds of temples found in the Angkor area of Siem Reap. It was built as a monastery and university in the late 12th and early 13th centuries and, unlike other Angkor temples, is kept in pretty much the same condition as it was found.
  Except for one particular temple, Angkor was abandoned in the 15th century, and the temples neglected for centuries. The jungle reclaimed the land and, now, Ta Prohm is best known for the trees (mostly kapok and banyan) growing out of the ruins. (It is also known as the temple in the Lara Croft: Tomb Raider movie.) A few carvings in the temple stones survived centuries of exposure to the elements.

Some of the trees growing out of Ta Prohm are huge. The exposed roots of this one need propping up so the ruins don't collapse further.
  A look back as we were leaving revealed the entirety of the highest tree growing out of the temple.

Bamboo

"Study the teachings of the pine tree, the bamboo, and the plum blossom. The pine is evergreen, firmly rooted, and venerable. The bamboo is strong, resilient, unbreakable. The plum blossom is hardy, fragrant, and elegant."

~Morihei Ueshiba (1883–1969), Japanese martial artist and founder of aikido

I saw this bamboo hut on stilts behind Earth Kitchen. I don't know if it's theirs or if it belongs to the plant nursery beside them, but it would be a nice place to have a meal on a cool day or evening. It'll be tough on the waiters, though.

Framed

"Set wide the window. Let me drink the day."

~Edith Wharton, Artemis to Actaeon and Other Verses

Other than the enormous floor lamp in the middle of the room (see yesterday's post), the interior of Earth Kitchen is simple and even quite spartan: raw cement floors and walls, and tables and chairs that are very utilitarian. The big window which looks out onto the street is beautifully screened by the bamboo and palm trees outside, however, making it look like a painting from inside. The real paintings which currently adorn the otherwise bare walls were created by students of Cabuynan Elementary School in Tanauan, Leyte who survived Typhoon Haiyan. They are for sale for PhP500 each and all of the proceeds will be used to rebuild their school.

Art light

"There is one fundamental fact about lighting:
Where there is no light, there is no beauty."

~Ruby Ross Wood (1881–1950), New York interior decorator

The largest piece of decoration inside Earth Kitchen is a natural fiber screen designed with their logo, which can be seen on the sign outside the restaurant. It's a lovely piece of art and also happens to be an enormous floor lamp.

Shape deficient

"Everything's better with bacon and red wine!"

~Dianne Harman, American author

Though not the last about Earth Kitchen, this is the last of my food photos, I promise. This is their Pumpkin and Goat Cheese Paccheri, made with goat cheese, roasted pumpkin, pili nuts and bacon. If you're a vegetarian, you can ask them to skip the bacon. My only complaint about this dish is that paccheri are supposed to be large pasta tubes, but this is ravioli! But in the greater scheme of things—the flavor! the texture!—who cares?

Pasta pockets

"Life is a combination of magic and pasta."

~Federico Fellini (1920–1993), Italian filmmaker

Being the ravioli fan girl that I am, I just had to try Earth Kitchen's Mushroom Ravioli, and I thought it was delicious! In keeping with their precept of using local ingredients, the pasta pockets were filled with kesong puti (literally, white cheese)—a soft, mild cheese usually made of the milk of the carabao, a water buffalo. Aside from mushrooms, the sauce also had some pili nuts, which, apparently, only the Philippines produces and processes commercially. Although similar in shape to almonds, pili nuts are more tender. Creamy but light, flavorful though mild, Earth Kitchen's Mushroom Ravioli gets an A+ in my book. Though it's probably the least pretty of all the dishes I took photos of.

Share the (bad) goodness

"Pork fat rules!"

~Emeril Lagasse, American celebrity chef

I did mention that Earth Kitchen is not a vegetarian restaurant, right? Truth be told, not all of its dishes are completely healthy either. Case in point: its Braised Pork Belly Soft Taco, with cucumber, peanuts, cilantro and lime hoisin sauce. Just for your information, more than 90% of pork belly's calories come from fat—but that's the reason why it's melt-in-your-mouth delicious. Thank goodness the tacos are small, and we only had one each.

Harmony

"If I must choose between healthy and tasty, I go for the second; having only one life to waste,
it might as well be a pleasurable one."

~Yotam Ottolenghi, Israeli-born chef and restaurateur

Mr Ottolenghi will approve of Earth Kitchen's Tempura Salad—it is both tasty and healthy. Fish and prawn tempura on a bed of organic and naturally-grown tomatoes and greens, topped with nori, and served with a roasted sesame seed dressing.

I just learned today that tempura was introduced to Japan by Portuguese Jesuit missionaries in the 16th century! And all this time I thought it was a quintessential Japanese dish.

Refreshing start

"You have to taste a culture to understand it."

~Deborah Cater, British travel writer

At the risk of seeming like a food blog again, I'll be featuring some of Earth Kitchen's delicious food in the next few days.

For starters, we had their Prawn Spring Rolls, for which they use organic and naturally-produced herbs and greens. The dipping sauce is hoisin with lime.

Healthy. Local. Sustainable.

"Why does no one speak of the cultural advantages of the country? For example, is a well groomed, ecologically kept, sustainably fertile farm any less cultural, any less artful, than paintings of fat angels on church ceilings?"

~Gene Logsdon, Living at Nature's Pace: Farming and the American Dream

Less than a year old, Earth Kitchen is a small restaurant operated by Got Heart Foundation, which helps marginalized farmers and indigenous communities all over the Philippines with natural and sustainable farming. Earth Kitchen is a showcase of healthy and delicious dishes which use fresh, all-natural ingredients, but it is not a vegetarian restaurant. "Fresh" and "all-natural" are words not limited to fruits and vegetables, after all.

The air we breathe

"In tough times, some of us see protecting the climate as a luxury, but that's an outdated 20th-century worldview from a time when we thought industrialization was the end goal, waste was growth, and wealth meant a thick haze of air pollution."

~Alex Steffen, American futurist and sustainability advocate

This is the same view of Metro Manila as my post from May 8 but taken early in the morning rather than in the middle of the day. Unless one lives in a building more than one kilometer high, there's no way to escape from that air pollution. The Philippines enacted a clean air law back in 1999 but, like many of our other laws, it isn't fully implemented or enforced.