In 2010, the International Buddhist College moved their main campus to Korat in NE Thailand, and many times I was invited by friends to go and photograph the nearby Khmer Phimai Complex, which is one of the best Angkorian sites in Thailand. Unfortunately it never worked out, and now IBC is once again back in Sadao, which is where the University originally started, so I may not make it there any time soon.
I am very grateful therefore to Ven. Priya Rakkhit (Bangladesh), one of the old students at IBC, now studying at Harvard, who, on a visit to see his friends and relatives in Korat, took time out to photograph the Phimai site, and offered the photos for publication on the Photo Dharma website.
The site appears to have been an important centre at the end of a long road from Angkor itself, and was built as a Buddhist religious complex, even though the rulers at Angkor at the time were Hindu. The remains are of a number of stone buildings, with some fine carvings on them.
There are also a few statues at the complex, including a very fine one of Jayavarman VII, the Buddhist king who was responsible for the Bayon and around 1/2 of the remaining sites in Angkor Thom, and I use this as the feature photo for the site.
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