Kratie Hop

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When planning your trip you always want to unearth places others haven’t been yet, or are at least less frequented en masse by tourists. So when we discovered Kratie (pronounced kra-chey) in the North East of Cambodia, we thought this is definitely the type of place we want to explore. With it being on the way to the Elephant Valley Project (http://www.elephantvalleyproject.org), which we are visiting after our trip to Kratie, everything slotted into place nicely. Although its only a small town, its most redeeming feature is the french colonial promenade that overlooks the island of Koh Trong, and has a look and feel about it that would sit well in most sea fronted european cities. Nevertheless its still run down like most Cambodian cities and is most noticeable with the amount of litter that is strewn along the river banks. As a way of controlling the litter problem the WWF have invested a lot of money throughout this whole area. They have placed recycled rubbish bins made out of lorry tyres along the front for backpackers and locals alike to put their rubbish. The main reason for all of all this is to try and conserve the fresh water dolphins that swim in the Mekong (more on that in another post).

WIth the town explored in a couple of hours we prepare ourselves for the trip the next day to the island of Koh Trong where we will be partaking in something called a homestay. For anyone who doesn’t know what a homestay is (I certainly hadn’t heard of one) you stay with a local family in their home and for a small fee you sleep and eat with them and other travellers. Homestays have an amazing feel good factor about them, especially on an small island like Koh Trong. You are basically paying money directly to the community who run the businesses, and there seems to be a lot of this type of eco tourism happening in Cambodia (well, apart from in Sihanoukville where beaches are being leased out to the highest bidder and local businesses that once existed on those beaches are being told to disappear but thats another story altogether).

In order to reach the island we had to get the ferry which departs every half hour or so from the promenade near our guesthouse. It’s actually not a ferry but a beautiful long wooden boat that is stacked to the brim with local people and all of the produce that is needed for the island to run, and costs 1000 Riel (25 cents/16p). We jump on and the ride takes less than 10 minutes to cross the calm blue waters of the Mekong. Once at the other side we get chatting to a Polish girl called Anya who is also looking for the homestay and we all decide to sit on the back of some local Moto’s (the Cambodian name for motorbike taxies) and travel to the homestay, gripping on for our lives (don’t worry Mums, its not that dangerous, honest). Homestays are not normally pre-booked so we get off our Motos, pay our $1 to Evil Kenevil’s stunt double and head up to the massive wooden stilted house.

We are greeted by massive smiles as usual and are told that it would be $4 per person per night, $3 for evening meal and $2 for breakfast the next morning. Sleeping arrangements consist of a thin mattress laid out in the communal living space where anyone who is staying that night sleeps, and a mosquito net hung over you. With backpacks dumped we go in search of some bikes to rent for the day with Anya the Polish girl. It wasn’t to long into the walk that we realised that the bikes are rented from the Jetty where the boat drops you off, but its a beautiful island and we take a very long walk back to where we started. During the walk and roughly every 5 minutes or so you hear a “helllllllloooooo” come form the bushes and its the local kids again running out from their stilted houses to come and practice their english on you. We find out later that from a young age the kids are taught the importance of tourism for the economy of Cambodia and that being friendly is one of the things that tourists love most, and they’re right too as the kids are absolutely adorable. The cost of renting a bike is $1 without gears, and $2 with. It’s flat so we go for the cheap option. A circuit around the island is about 9km and takes about 45 minutes, a bit longer if you stop and take in some of the amazing views. Just off the south west coast of the island is a floating village where a whole community exists on floating barges, and the villagers fish for their livelihoods. Its all very idyllic but its extremely hot so we head back for some refreshments. Stopping at one of the local shops, which is just someones front living room we get chatting to a local lady who invites us to sit with her family whilst we drink our warm water. The grandmother obviously thinks Suu-Min speaks Cambodian and starts chatting away to her. Even though it’s clear enough that Suu-Min doesn’t understand much of what is being said, the grandmother still keeps talking away undeterred. It feels good to actually sit with local people and take in a bit of their lives for 20 minutes, and we chat with the little girl who the grandparents are looking after as she helps grandma with the shop.

Turns out everyone on the island is really friendly, and up for hanging out even if there is a language barrier. We were joined by a couple of young kids, an 11 year old girl with a little boy just 1 year 2 months old. Suu-Min takes the opportunity to try use a little bit of Khmer so we find out their ages, and that they’re not brother and sister but they are friends. The little boy has the amazing ability to balance on the bike, with his feet on the middle support and his hands on the handlebar – pretty impressive at an age when a lot of kids are just learning to walk.
Just before dinner is served outside the homestay we get chatting to an extremely talented young man named Haki, who is with a British mother and daughter as their local tour guide through the Kratie area. After the initial hello’s he quickly gets on to the subject of corruption that exists throughout Cambodia. When you hear the word corruption it conjures up in your imagination high level government officials squandering public money on useless projects that help no one. But to our surprise corruption exists at much lower levels than government in this country. He talked about how the police set up toll roads to siphon money from agricultural vehicles like ox carts who use the roads for their businesses, but what’s even more shocking is that the police don’t do this to extort people, they do it because their salaries aren’t enough to send their kids to school. Which brings him onto his second point, teachers. I couldn’t believe my ears as he told how in the days of blackboard and chalk, the teachers would write down everything from the text books on the board and the kids would copy the content into their books. The teachers no longer do this, but charge for photocopies of the content needed in order to learn the subject they are studying, and that’s if they can be bothered to turn up to teach. Teachers not turning up for class isn’t unusual, as they don’t feel their salaries are enough to warrant teaching full time so in order to make up for the content the kids miss, a lot of them attend private tuition classes that they have to pay for. So on top of the cost of school equipment, he has to pay for tuition he should be getting in class anyway. And to fund all of this? He gets some money from his family, but most of it he funds himself by working 3 jobs. He’s an entrepreneurial young man, he has set himself up as a tour guide and gets bookings though an agency (http://www.cambodianpridetours.com), he works in a local restaurant and also works on a fishing boat when he has time in the 70 hour week he works. I’m truly humbled by what he’s telling me and I feel a little bit guilty that I don’t have to work for a year, whilst this guy works his backside off to get the education he quite rightly deserves.
We are all called for dinner which is lovely fish soup, egg plant curry and fried morning glory its all absolutely delicious of course and we sink it all down with an ice cold beer.
As we settle down for the night and its surprisingly comfortable considering we’re sleeping on the floor. I can’t speak highly enough of this type of tourism, please if you are visiting an area check and see if homestays are available and you won’t regret it I promise. A day off chilling tomorrow and then a bike ride to see the famous river dolphins of the Mekong.

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