Word: wat
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...peacekeepers are the occupiers. The electoral process they oversee is impressive. Near Angkor Wat, Sajjad A. Gul, a Pakistani, says Cambodians have told him they really do want to vote -- though some of them wish they could vote for UNTAC. As of mid-December, UNTAC officials could take satisfaction from the fact that 4 million of an estimated 4.5 million prospective voters had been registered...
...year-long civil war, which began in the early 1970s. The Khmer Rouge, whose genocidal reign of terror killed an estimated 1 million Cambodians, did little direct damage to the monuments, but the fighting made maintenance impossible. Says B. Narasimhaiah, the head of an Indian archaeology team at Angkor Wat: "Wherever there is a small crack, dust will accumulate and soon a bush will spring up." All but a few of the major temples are covered in weeds, small bushes and even large trees...
...into the sandstone and allows mold and moss to destroy the intricate carvings and eventually the integrity of the structures. The antidote used so far has been to scrub the facades. Since 1986 the Archaeological Survey of India has spent the six-month dry season sprucing up Angkor Wat. A team of 15 Indian specialists supervises more than 300 unskilled Cambodian workers, who scrape the fragile sandstone carvings with brushes and chemicals...
While the bright facade of Angkor Wat is a welcome change from the grim, mold-covered exteriors of the other temples, the procedure is controversial. Says a foreign archaeologist at Angkor: "Initially, the Indians were very careless. Much of the detail in the carving has been lost." But on balance, there is less criticism of the Indian efforts now than a few years ago. Says Pich Keo, director of the National Museum in Phnom Penh: "At least they came here and worked when no one else would come...
...work on other monuments. The most ambitious project would be the restoration by Polish specialists of the Bayon, the last great temple built before the collapse of the Khmer civilization. Most of the temples at Angkor are Hindu, but the Bayon was built as a Buddhist shrine. While Angkor Wat soars, the Bayon suffocates. It is crowded with 54 sandstone towers, each with four carved visages of a complacently smiling future Buddha, or bodhisattva. The faces are probably likenesses of the temple's builder, King Jayavarman VII. The King, whose vigorous rule turned out to be the death rattle...