Forever a Foreigner

I saw my first lion dance when I was maybe six years old.

I heard the drumbeat and the gongs first and ran out to the street. It was hot and sunny, and the coconut trees threw deep frond-shaped shadows on the red dirt. I could see the man with the gong and the drummers wearing yellow shirts with yellow bands tied around their foreheads. One wore a yellow, grinning mask.

There was the lion in the midst of the crowd—yellow and furred, with garish green and red designs ringing its eyes and twirling above its mouth like a mustache. It weaved its long neck and bobbed its head to the drums. Its eyes opened and closed, and its tufted ears twitched in time to the beat. Down it went, crouching, and then rose up, standing on its hind legs. It was fascinating. You almost forgot that there were young men underneath, working the costume.

The lion was going to my friend Kit-Lang’s house. I played with her and my other friends almost everyday.

A crowd had gathered to watch it come, and a parade of other people were coming with it. Kit-Lang, her black hair in pigtails, ran up to me and grabbed my white hand in her brown one.

“Come on!”

I ran with her down the street into her yard before the procession. The drumbeat throbbed in the air. It made me want to dance, to prance like the lion. I looked back to watch the lion turn toward the gate. Every crash of the cymbals and thud of the drum drove its body into twitches and leaps, like a puppet on strings of music.

Kit-Lang spurred me up the stairs into her house. I followed, plunging into the dark of the upper room. It was filled with smoke, and the sweet smell of incense filled my lungs. There were monks with shaved heads and orange robes chanting in the corners.

Grinning and thrumming with excitement, I turned in the doorway to watch the lion as it approached the house. They would dance up the stairs in a moment. I wanted to see how they made it climb.

“Savannah!”

My father’s rumbling, stern voice, broad with American vowels, rose above the noise and the confusion.

There they were, my parents, looking up at me out of the crowd, their pale faces strange as the language in their mouths. “Get down!”

Suddenly, I knew I was not supposed to be there. I did not know why, but I knew it was wrong—the smoke, the chanting, the drums. I darted down the stairs.

Even so, me and my friends memorized the rhythm of the mong-sai drumbeat, and in the weeks that followed we often banged it out for fun on tables or buckets.

Later I learned that the lion dances are done as part of a ceremony to drive out evil spirits and bring good luck.

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Now that I am in Cambodia full-time, my coworker handed me this book to read. Spirit Worlds: Cambodia, The Buddha, and The Naga.

I did not know what to expect at first, but as I read I discovered a masterful exploration of Cambodian beliefs. Philip Coggan weaves together the doctrines, mythology, symbolism, and traditions of Cambodia, looking at how they shape Cambodian thought, history, politics, and daily life. He interviews people from different walks of life: Buddhist monks, the “teachers” who serve spirits, factory workers, murderers, pious women, city folks, and villagers. Chapter by chapter, he unfolds what Cambodians really believe, and it reveals just how complex and pervasive this worldview is, how deep the roots go and how far they spread.

Even though I grew up in Cambodia, as a child I did not understand everything that went on around me in the straightforward way adults grasp and organize information, like on the day I saw my first lion dance. Spirit Worlds helped me make those connections, shining a light on things I knew vaguely, but did not fully understand.

In a country like Cambodia, religion is not in a nice little box. It informs how people see themselves, their country, and the world. People who live in secularized countries often seem to be ignorant of what living in a religious society is like, so I recommend this book not only for understanding Cambodia’s religious culture, but also as a good way to open your eyes to the darkness and need that exists in much of the world.

I will add here that as I read this book, as excellent as it was, I found myself unable to read too many chapters at a time. Deepening one’s understanding of just how lost people are is heartbreaking. But it is the reality.

Thus says God, the LORD,
    who created the heavens and stretched them out,
    who spread out the earth and what comes from it,
who gives breath to the people on it
    and spirit to those who walk in it:
“I am the LORD; I have called you in righteousness;
    I will take you by the hand and keep you;
I will give you as a covenant for the people,
    a light for the nations,
    to open the eyes that are blind,
to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon,
    from the prison those who sit in darkness.
I am the LORD; that is my name;
    my glory I give to no other,
    nor my praise to carved idols.
Behold, the former things have come to pass,
    and new things I now declare;
before they spring forth
    I tell you of them.”
– Isaiah 42:5-9