Time out at Tonle Bati

A club-wielding guardian on a doorway at Ta Prohm

With my photo-documentary of Tuol Sleng taking up so many posts, I've neglected to complete my postings on my recent visit to Tonle Bati, some 30kms south of Phnom Penh - an attractive weekend retreat for many Khmers. I will remedy this before the weekend. Tonle Bati is the collective name for two well-maintained Angkorean temples and a lakeside resort of wooden huts that the Khmers love so much. The photo above is one of two unusual guardians wielding clubs either side of the doorway that greets you as you enter the main sanctuary of Ta Prohm, the largest of the two prasats. In the background, you can see an Apsara and half-shuttered windows, alongwith a colourful plant, a feature at the temple of Ta Prohm over the years, which is tended to with care and affection by nuns and lay people.