New Journeys in Old Asia

From 1922 — the visit that inspired Angkor The Magnificent (1924) — to the winter 1926 comeback, the author has changed. She has been through the hardship of China’s civil war, and her beloved son Harold, ​“Harry”, who was with her in 1922, has died in 1925. The American upbeat optimism seems to be worn-down, but there is also the plain fact that the world itself, and especially French Indochina, has changed, too, and not for the best.

As an American progressist and suffragette, Helen Churchill Candee is still thrilled to see Angkor again, and the ​“pure beauty” of Balinese women later, but the magic of her first encounter has waned. A ​“Mrs Narraccot”, ​“speaking like a soapbox orator”, sometimes irrupts in this travelogue, harshly commenting on the colonialist worldview, be it French or Dutch. In Vietnam, this lady — whom we suspect to be the author’s doppleganger, expressing views that herself could hardly speak out -, is irked by the way the French colonials look down on the nhà quê, peasant but more specifically ​“plouc” (“redneck”) in the French colonial vision of Vietnamese society. [p 140] And Madame Narraccot is the one who will put in the final, blistering remark:

“Show me the nation that uplifts the race it dominates in Further India. Almost all the races of gentle brown people have been attacked by a European power, and so far as I can see, it is tragedy for the native. The European conquers a race, then sets it to work at starvation wages to exploit the resources of its own land to make him rich. And there are the taxes per capita.

“The result is a people over-thin of body, unmirthful, short-lived, shadowed ever with the fear of death through diseases of malnutrition. You never hear them called intelligent, always it is explained, they are stupid, capable of only limited development, the excuse for not elevating them. I do not find them stupid. Mainly they are kept down by Europeans who want all the salaried positions. This gives the impression that the natives are only fit for servants and manual labour.

“Sometime comes the Red Agent from Moscow. He has good ground for his seed. The Under-Dog in Asia is the Asiatic. But he may soon be the White Dominant.” [p 283 – 4]

The author’s return to French Indochina is an occasion for her to pen meaningful, often sarcastic notations on the colonial society of that time, such as:

Disappointing EFEO museum in Hanoi

Lovers of oriental art and of the Guimet Museum in Paris run quickly to the École Française d’Extrême Orient. If one can read Chinese, Kawi, Sanskrit, its marvellous library holds all one could possibly want for light reading. Otherwise one bows politely after a brief inspection of the backs of impossible books, and flees the learned atmosphere of research. The Ecole has a small museum which is open all the days you are not there. It is a disappointment, and not worth breaking museum laws to see, especially if the guide speaks only Tonkinese. We thought to find Angkor here in marvellous objets d’art. But no. [p16]

Later on, in Nha Trang, admiring a ​“fine ruin of the Chams”, she notes: ​“And here you become grateful of the École Française d’Extrême Orient, for these enthusiasts have picked up and replaced scattered stones and have preserved the rare ruins [.…] of the Tower of the Jade Princess.” [p 102]

The Eurasian lady of Tonkin

Evening at Hanoi is full of correct urban diversions for the conventional. There are diners intimes and dinners formal, and there is always dancing at the big hotel, while de temps en temps, there is an opera troupe at the grand house of boxes and stalls. And these last are far above the traveling troupes of British Colonies. All the audience dresses in its extreme elegance and things come direct from Paris to these Colonists whom France is trying to keep content. It is here that a strange flower displays its exotic beauty — the Eurasian lady of Tonkin. She occupies a loge, she is surrounded with coquettish French women of nervous gaiety. She sits calmly, like a lotus-flower, her brow serene below her parted hair, her slender figure draped in gauzy things of latest Paris mode, and her atmosphere a sweet aloofness, an intelligent charm. Young women flatter her. Young men court her, she is elusive, cool, entrancing, and of a beauty! She makes one wonder if the little woman of the people could be like that if she, too, were sent to Paris, and were dressed and beauty-parloured. [p 21]

“All masters”

Saigon is ever en fête because it is the one relief-station of Indo-China, the cure for ​‘le cafard’ [..].The big palaces of the Government were too obviously an expression of political power in other days, so out of proportion were they to the poverty of other buildings. But now all Saigon has caught up with them, and the city is a marvel of elegance, of beauty, of luxury. And yet something is wrong. Faces are significantly pale, and dissipation replaces content.

What then is the charm of Indo-China’s capital to the French? The fact that here they are all masters. The man who was an employé in France, is an employer here. The woman who slaved at her house. hold tasks at home directs her servants here. He who was a clerk, is here proprietor. And all these people are elevated to a social grade impossible to attain at home. When the big palace of the Governor General is open for a ball, they are among the guests; when opera comes to the splendid Théatre Municipale, they have a loge where Madame displays fine feathers. [p 109 – 10]

Loss of the lily-like Annamite girl

In 1922, the author had been fascinated with the young Annamite girls of Saigon, independent and devil-may-care, and these do not seem to exist anymore:

A loss I notice. It is the presence of the exquisite Annamite girl who swayed like a lily through the streets. She is celebrated now, is called la Saigonnaise, and her portrait — wan and elusive is fo sale in the windows of the book-shops. But in the rushing crowds of the noisy new Saigon she is lost. It is a pity. 

Every novelist who writes of Cochin-China put her in his books, and calls her by the native name of congai, but always describes her as the temporal wife of a naval officer, a commercant, a foreig agent. Is that where she has gone then, to the shade little nest of the European on a side-street?

Americans are heard in the Rue Catinat, directing the liveried chauffeurs of their fine automobiles in a French of their own invention. American companies have learned how to pierce the shell of French commercial resistance, and the agents of these great companies have unconsciously come under the spel of being important-masters in fact. And among all these masters of Europe slide the clever Chinese, bland, unobtrusive, unassertive, but accumulative. They, the real merchants of the Orient, are the unrecognised conquerors, the peaceful invaders. [p 110 – 1]

“Angkor” and ​“Leaving Angkor (Chap IX, X)

After mocking the new motor-road from Saigon to Phnom Penh, visiting the Phnom Penh with George Groslier who ​“is giving back to the Cambodians their ancient arts”, experiencing a strange lunch at the French residence in Kompong Thom, the intrepid traveler and her companion make their car stop in front of the Bungalow d’Angkor (see below), where De Bysser, the hotel director, ​“Fomberteaux from Paris, Victor Goloubeff from EFEO and M. Parmentier in the background” greet the ladies: ​“Fancy a home-coming at Angkor!” But before that, on the way, the author had some more acerbic remarks about the colonial worldview: 

The French in lndo-China are my friends, they give me warm welcome and real help, yet when I search for the history of Tonkin or Annam or Cambodia I am irritated at the full-length portraits given by the books of French conquerors and rulers, and the scant sketches of the native races. Here is such wonderful romance, and such digging out that invigorates the heart of scientists who glory in delving and discovery.

It would make a table-boy look divine to know that his ancestors wandered from Lhasa on a summer’s day and slew the natives of Laos until they showed him welcome. It woud be enchanting to find that the chauffeur’s forebears were strong clever men of China, a satisfaction to think all coolies were from the savage tribes of the Mois. The Khmers — ah, now we are running ahead of the story of Angkor and the Hindu influence — and there is an outrcropping of Hindu influence in the mountains of Laos as well. And with races and religions all mixed together, as inseparably and as butter and sugar in cake — who is there that cannot see excitement in pursuing the truth about the natives of Indo-China. There lies history most picturesque and romance enough for a hundred novelists. [p 115 – 6]

She honestly analyzes her changed reaction to the Khmer temples, compared to her first enchanted visit: 

A first vsiit to Angkor begets the boldness of a discoverer. Many there are in whom it arouses vanity, self-admiration, because those who go there are comparatively few. But a second visit brings a shyness, a hesitation to approach such grandeur and mystery. Being initiated, you are humble and have no longer the brashness of the tourist.” [p 125 – 6]

And that’s the thing: there are now many tourists in Angkor, much more than four years earlier, and ​“you see them attack the great Wat with a party of people and a tangle-tongued guide so they may speedily mark that off the list as a triumphant fait accompli.” Yet, she remarks that some of them ​“prowl back all alone in odd hours, now timid and humble”, to ​“rest on a portico and commune with the past.” On the main causeway of Angkor, she even meets a ​“royal prince, just after sunset, [who] had come alone, otherwise his soul would not have expanded.” [p 126]

She is not too impressed by the restoration of the Angkor terraces, finds that too many trees have been felled around the Bayon, ironically calls Neak-Pean ​“the pet of the archaeologues, the fascinating puzzle-picture to put together, and amusedly listens Goloubew claiming, about the fragments of horse statue recently retrieved — and identified as Balaha -, that he ​“was sure there must be a horse to complete the picture”, adding tongue-in-cheek: ​“Which shows that a scientist may have the vision of the clairvoyant.” [ p 129]

The traveler does not name the guidebook she and her companion are using, but we understand it is in French, and pretty bad. ​“The useless guide still describes Banteay Kdei as le palais de la Reine-Mère”, she laments, but her personal knowledge of the Khmer history (and historiography) is sufficient. About the smiling face-towers at Bayon, she notes that ​“an influence has been at work to change their name:

Learned men once called them Brahm. That was probably not at all like what they were christened by the Khmers. Brahm as the Highest Name in Hindu religion seemed probable, and the stone heads accepted it. But when history was dug out of carved tablets it was decided that the temple was built under the influence of the cult of Civa (they spell him thus in Indo-China), so the great benign faces were named after this creator-destroyer. It always seemed to me the calmness and benignity were assumed, a deceitful mask, if cruel Civa were the god immortalised. It is a pleasant thing to know that now all that odium is taken from the grand group of heads, and they are given another alias, that of Lokecvara. [p 130] 

The poignant farewell to Angkor by an older woman now feeling her age — and knowing this is her last visit — is crisply, soberly recalled: 

If sighs of regret at leaving were heaved at dawn it is not by me. Dawn is a still stark hour, a slow return to life that resents an early rising. The night before the heart is sad at leaving the riches of Angkor. At five A. M. there is emotion only for luggage, buckles, and hot coffee. And yet, and yet, as the motor starts there is an anguished farewell look at the towers of Angkor Wat stamped black against the brightening sky, and one realises all too late the folly of leaving a love. Angkor is a great objective, the visit to the faraway city has been held in anticipation until it became a part of life. Now that it is over, and the long road lies through wet bogs and jungle without interest, life and travel seem without a purpose- sans but. Why hurry like this? Into the returning consciousness comes a word of magic — Siam. That is the next light ahead which had been put out by the glory of Angkor. [p 135]

A warning againt mass tourism ahead

The last scene in Angkor is a Khmer classical dance performance, and the magic of 1922 is gone, spoiled by what the author finds another irking trait of tourist mindset: making comparisons.

There is a dance one evening. This is an age of dancing and one race likes to see how another does it. With sadness I hear the audience at Angkor express disappointment after the dance. They have seen the marvellous Balinese, the Javanese, and the Siamese, and they make comparisons. That is a pity.

But Angkor has its own school of dance, and the old standards will be revived. Girls are taken to live at the school and trained as are the dancers of the king at Pnom Penh. They wear costumes of the old tradition that cost two hundred and fifty piastres. There is much expense which is barely met by the fee received from visitors at the Bungalow.

Nowhere in the world has a dance-troupe such a setting as the causeway, such a background as the Temple. Lit only with flambeaux perfumed with aromatic smoke, the dancers look like figures seen in dreams. The flambeau boys sit in a circle on the stones in lieu of footlights. One of them has brought his baby brother, quite nude. The baby totters to its feet, snatches a cigarette and lights it in the then sits down to a quiet smoke with the contest an old man in the easiest chair. Someone offers h another cigarette. He stows it behind his ear fo future use. The audience laughs, the dancers disappear, the file goes lingering in the moonlight. [p 133 – 4]

Later on on this journey, she will visit Bali, too, and find herself in awe with the beauty of the island and its people. But once again the threat of overtourism is acutely felt:

It is down in its southern parts that Bali’s greatest interest is found. It is here the ancient princes lived and ruled until quite recently. It is here the most perfect human forms, both male and female, fill the village roads. Light bronze, without blemish, undressed from the waist upward, they present with majesty and grace a sight for sculptor and artist- and there are a million of these lovely figures on this island of unbelievable luxuriant verdure.

Three days, a week, will suffice to show what thrilling beauty lies here, just as an index shows the contents of a book, but in three weeks all the thrills would not be exhausted. There are a few who have elected to stay there permanently, and forget the rush of the great world and among them are Americans.

Bali is one place in the invaded East where a people has lived and developed and become strikingly individual, without suffering from outside interference. It has ripened like a perfect flower or a perfect fruit. All who see it love it, the island and the island race, and would if possible put a line of signs around its borders intended for other races ‑particularly Europeans — ​“Keep Off.” [p 282 – 3]

The Bungalow of Angkor

In her previous work (Chap. XV), the author had described in detail the Bungalow d’Angkor: 

To those who have not yet been to Angkor — all the world will go there soon — the magnificent ruins represent the whole interest. To those who are already there, the greatest building of the group is the Bungalow. No archeologist, no artist, even, is superior to its charms. After a few days’ stay therein you give it a wholehearted affection, though at first one may be unappreciative and take it for granted. It is low and affectionate in aspect. It sits on a pleasant green by the roadside and is shaded by mammoth trees which yet leave it open to moonlight and the stunning southern stars. A tiled veranda serves as corridor, each bedroom opens on a court like a tennis lawn, and each room has its own big bathroom with floods of water. Night’s rest becomes a joy. Nine o’clock is the welcomed time for beginning it. Yes, nine o’clock, for the tropic sun must be eluded by rising at six-thirty, breakfasting at seven and starting off before eight for the morning’s supernal delights among the ruins. [Angkor The Magnificent]

The first night in Angkor on her second visit, she stayed awake the all full-moon night, just watching the silhouette of Angkor Wat — she had been given a room with windows opening to the moat and the temple. In her imagination, the Bungalow is ​“still the adventure, the kind of which one cannot find in America anymore”. She does not mind overhearing the heated discussions among scientists in the dining room, ​“coffee and petits verres, and the heart expands with the feeding — humiliating fact.” But now Siam is building a railway, and 

will the road just opened make of Angkor a ​“resort”? They are even now drawing plans for a big palace-like hotel to replace that charming retreat, the Bungalow. ​“Frac et smoking”, said de Bysser with tears, ​“et guère l’amitié. I shall go, I have been here many years, but I shall not stay if a grand palais is built. We both, he and I, gazed through streaming tears at the lonely magnitude of the Wat and pictured it dominated with a colossal French hotel of white stucco rising in many stories. It is not to be endured! [p 138]

It is a historic fact, fortunately, that Angkor has been spared such a disgrace. 

See Lucille Sinclair Douglass’ illustrations of the book.