Cambodia, Laos and Thailand all share an alternative New Year to the West which is normally celebrated in mid-April. Each country has its own traditions but generally speaking it is a family time. They clean their houses and wash the temples to have a fresh start for the new year. In the spirit of cleanliness young people have water fights and plaster one another in talc as an extension of the more religious traditions.
We were excited to be in Cambodia for this national celebration and planned to be in the capital, Phnom Penh, for the three day event. First however, we were going to spend two nights in Battambang before heading further south.
We left Siem Reap to take a delightful boat trip along the Tonle Sap on one of the most scenic pieces of river in the country. It was advertised to take 4-5 hours. It took 9.
Battambang is a small Khmer town that, due to the French colonial buildings lining the riverbank, is quite beautiful. We spent our time wandering around and generally enjoying the peaceful atmosphere.
On one of these wanderings we passed a Wat and I was keen to have a look in the hope that one of the monks could explain to me a little more about the New Year celebrations.
I went in and sure enough a young temple boy took me round. The various statues surrounding the temple were decorated in coloured streamers and ribbon in preparation for the following few days.
The young boy also explained to me about basic Buddhist beliefs and stories. One story was depicted by a few statues and it couldn't help but catch the eye. It was the story of an Indian Prince who had never seen any unhappiness in his life because he had never left his palace. Buddha takes him outside to show him the real world including the old, the ill, the dead and also a monk none of which the Prince has seen before. When he sees the monk he vows to dedicate his life to Buddhism. The story I had no problem with the statues depicting it on the other hand were a little disturbing. More specifically the depiction of the dead man was really odd. They were all new statues, almost cartoon-esque, and painted in bright colours. The dead man was a man lying on the floor with a green face and a hole gouged out of his stomach where a statue of a bird was perched now eating his insides. For such a peaceful religion this seemed a little grotesque.
That evening Lizzie and I ventured to the only club in Battambang that was advertised as playing Khmer love ballads and house music. The intrigue was too great to resist.
Inside the "Sky Disco" we were unsurprised to find ourselves the only Westerners. The evening was evidently a special club night for the New Year. The only reason we knew this was because every now and again between remixes of American and Khmer rap, the DJ shouted "Happy New Year!" Also, there seemed to be some kind of special raffle where someone won an electric fan. We didn't get it but the winner seemed happy.
The following day we carried on to Phnom Penh. When we arrived at our hostel we asked the owner about any special celebrations going on for the holiday, "Not really", he replied, "Most people go out to the country to be with their families". We noticed that evening walking around the town that, for a capital city, it seemed quite quiet. We were hoping for huge water fights in the street when in fact we were lucky that things had stayed open at all.
The next day we saw some lights and heard music coming from a nearby Wat and went to investigate. The Wat served as a kind of roundabout and on this huge green space was a stage with a live band and families gathered to eat and dance.
We grabbed ourselves a drink and stood back from the crowd to watch the band. Soon we attracted the attention of a few young Khmer boys who were inviting us to dance with them. I say boys; Lizzie was asked to dance by a boy about our age who seemed genuinely friendly and meant no harm. I was asked to dance by a man in his late thirties with his front teeth missing. We both politely declined and retreated further back. We were just swaying and bobbing where we were when a small round woman, who was with the afore mentioned group of men, came up to us and indicated we should dance. We smiled and shook our heads. She then grabbed Lizzie's arm and dragged her towards the dance floor. Lizzie grabbed my opposite arm sending me spinning round before being dragged along behind. We found ourselves in the middle of group and could do nothing but dance. While dancing a few youths ran passed patting our faces with talc leaving hand prints across our faces.
All in all it was not what we had expected of the new year but we saw some celebrations and were invited to join in. I thought the dance must be the Khmer equivalent of singing Auld Lang Syne but without the organised handholding or everyone being too drunk to remember the words. Mybe the Khmer have it right.
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