Keeping the Angkor experience and spirit
A shout out to the modern heroes of Angkor: the 500 person crew that maintains, operates and restore this world cultural heritage on behalf of us all.
That includes famous sites like Angkor Thom, Bayon, Ta Phrom, Angkor Wat and Pre Rup, where I met this jolly group. With the Angkor Archeological Park being over 400 square kilometers big and containing well over 1000 small and larger temples, shrines and buildings, it is a monumental task.
Pun intended.
Preparing for millions
The Apsara (Authority for the Protection of the Site and Management of the Region of Angkor) is the organisation established to run this task. You meet them first at the Angkor ticket office, but that is only one of the 15 departments.
First time I visited, the ticket office was a schack in the middle of nowhere. Now the main ticket office is a stately building with all the facilities needed to cater to thousands of tourists a day. And the old main office serve a secondary function with a large parking lot ready for busloads of visitors ready for ticket control. Beside a wide, modern main road into the moats surrounding Angkor Wat.
During the last few years during the pandemic and aftermath, the tourism of course has been down to nearly none. But the Apsara Crew has been keeping up the work of maintenance and restoration, preparing for more visitors to the Kingdom of Wonder.
