Outside the temple of Ta Prohm, an armed soldier stands guard in the spring of 1999. We were the only tourists at the temple when we took this picture, and the only other people there were another armed guard and two young local boys. One of the boys had a missing arm, presumably from a land mine (Cambodia has the highest per-capita rate of land mine injuries of any country on earth), and with his one remaining arm he fanned me the whole time we were at the temple, using a small paper fan. I tipped him well.

When we returned to this temple a little over three years later, in September of 1999 (the rainy season), there were dozens of tourists here. And the guards had changed from loaded guns to 2-way radios, because — as our guide told us — "guns scare the tourists." The area around the ancient temples of Angkor is changing fast.