The fading art of magic
Fewer Cambodians want traditional protective tattoos.
PHNOM SRUOCH, CAMBODIA — In a haze of incense, clients approach Kol Sambo and humbly request his help, sometimes seeking rush jobs for an imminent crisis. He listens and asks why they require added force. If he thinks they’ll abuse the power, he turns them down “in a nice way.”
Kol is a practitioner of magic tattoos, a 2,000-year-old tradition some call the “soul of the nation.” They can make you invisible, divert bullets and boost your net worth, he says, but only if you believe.
The 50-year-old has traveled the Cambodian countryside for the better part of two decades decorating people’s bodies with gods, geometric patterns, supernatural creatures and characters in Sanskrit and Pali, the liturgical language of Theravada Buddhism.
Some images appear to move as the wearer’s muscles ripple; on others, rounded Khmer script, softened by age, appears to melt as the lines grow fuzzier.
Kol says most clients prefer the more efficient made-in-China tattoo machine he bought a few years back, but, if asked, he still will use the traditional method to ink the skin: two or three sewing needles tied together.
Once applied, by whatever method, a tattoo must be blessed to activate its supernatural powers.
There are “fake” magic tattooists out there, Kol says disdainfully. He was born with the talent, he says, and honed it after becoming a monk and retreating into the mountains to meditate, ponder visions and study ancient texts under a spiritual master.
Grateful clients will periodically return, having survived a war or two, and offer thanks.
Chan Ngeuy, 60, a rail worker who was a soldier during the 1970s, took off his shirt to reveal a line of lacy symbols running the width of his chest, down the outside of his arms and the length of his back bracketing his spinal cord.
“I was shot at, but the bullet missed,” he says. “My tattoo made all the difference.”
Peace, however, as welcome as it may be to Cambodians after decades of bloodshed, is not a friend of the magic tattoo business.
“During wartime, everyone wants one,” says Kong Taing Im, 38, a store owner visiting Kol hoping to safeguard her grandchildren’s future. “Without war, mostly gangsters want them.”
Nowadays, a tradition that migrated from India centuries ago and endured through numerous Cambodian wars and rulers is being chipped away by technology and an education system that encourages people to be literal-minded, says Miech Ponn, advisor on mores and customs at Phnom Penh’s Buddhist Institute.
