"Some days ago we went to visit the Male and Female Mountains ( Phnom Pros and Phnom Srei) a few km west from KG Cham. The shorter of the two mountains is Phnom Pros and the taller is Phnom Srei. To make the story short, according to the legend a mountain-building competition was organised between men and women to determine who of the two should propose marriage."
Phnom Pros
The two mountains are the main attractions, with a 308-stair walkway leading to the top of Phnom Srei. In between the mountains are the famous Kampong Cham killing fields, which are an interesting place to visit.
There are various transport options available for arriving at Phnom Pros and Phnom Srei including taxi, bus, motorbike and boat. From Phnom Penh you can either take a bus or taxi although roads can be of poor quality, particularly during the wet season. Fast boats are available along the Mekong River and take around 3 hours to reach Kampong Cham. Another popular option is to hire a motorbike and self-ride here.
Phnom Pros and Phnom Srei is located at Kro La Commune, Kampong Siem District in 7km from the provincial town of Kampong Cham. The northern part of Phnom Srei and Phnom Pros of Kampong Cham is surrounded by spectacular mountains of Dang Rek, Ba Ley and Chhuk.
At the top of Pros Mountain you can view the beautiful scene of Kampong Cham.
The mountain of Srei has pointed peak and can be climbed up by 308 Stair steps. At the top, there is a ruined temple, with a few nuns and no monks who stay to maintain and collect contribution to rebuild the temple.
Phnom Pros
Phnom Srei and Phnom Pros translate into Man Hill and Women Hill respectively.
Long time ago, there was a Queen called “Srey Ayuthia”, who had reign Khmer Kingdom. There was no one asking her to get marriage, because she was as the King. But many years later, she decided to ask for a man in order to marry her. Then all the women in the Kingdom stated to follow their Queen. They started to ask man to marry them, which was contrast to traditional norm that men were the one who ask women to marry. However, it was unfortunate for the ugly women as they were rejected by all men.
Then for many reigns later, the women and men decided to set up a competition by piling up the hills. One hill was made by men, and another one was made by women. Their work was within only one day, they had to stop their work before sun rise. The condition was, which side could make the higher hill than the other side, they will be the winner. And the loser would be the one to ask the opposite side to get marriage.
The next day, the competition started from day until night, when the Sirius Star rose (It’s about 4am). However, at midnight, the women group had set a trick.
They raised a small lantern into the air near by the men hill. When the men saw the lantern, they thought it was the real Sirius star, with joyful they all stopped working, and went to sleep. Meanwhile, the women group tried to make their hill higher and higher.
Then, a few hours later, the men group woke up while the cock was crowing, and they were surprised with the real Sirius star that just shined. Now look at the women hill, it was higher than their hill, so from that time till now, all Cambodian Men must ask Cambodian women to get marriage.
NEDERLANDS
