Cambodia (History Class)

 Recently, for my history class, we watched an informative video and learned about Cambodia, more specifically around the time of the Angkor Empire. Cambodia is not one of the main units we are supposed to cover in 7th grade, however my teacher is Cambodian so we got to learn about his culture and lifestyle.

 After watching the short documentary film centered around Peter Lee's discoveries of Cambodia & the Angkor empire, I have gained new understandings and insights about current & past life in Cambodia. The first thing I learned about Cambodia is that the Angkor Empire dominated & controlled Southeast Asia for over 600 years. As the empire lasted so long, I wonder what suddenly caused the ruling to fall. I also learned about how water is "treated" and how sacred water is in Cambodia. When hiking to certain mountains, the Phnom Kulen for example, splashing water on yourself at the top acts as a blessing & sanctifies the person. Cambodia also faces monsoons for a good chunk of the year, from May - November. Monsoons are a mixture of heavy rain and wind, and together can destroy lots of land & kill many people. However, during non-monsoon season months, the weather is extremely hot & dry, there is never a sweet spot of weather. The tons of rain has benefits to the environment, though. The rain from monsoons helps rice grass grow, a thing no other plant is able to do with the amount of rain. The rice really did help the people of the Angkor kingdom, as it secured enough food for the people in times where no other crops were to grow. This is partially true to my household as well, as my family eats rice everyday & count on rice to fill us up. All in all, I have learned a lot about Cambodia's history & daily life from the CNA documentary film.