September 3-4

On the 3rd I got up, got ready, and went to Haha Cafe. Da (my tuk tuk driver) waited for me then I headed to the Russian Market. I bought a lot of TV series for Alice, Tracie, and myself. Now my only worry is getting them through customs. I've heard mixed stories, ranging from they don't care at all to people getting fined. I'm hoping for the former rather than the latter- if they try to fine me they're not going to get anything because I have no money, so not sure how that works exactly... I think I'll be OK as long as I don't look suspicious :-) I have under a hundred DVDs and they are all different so it doesn't look like I"m going to sell them (which I'm not, clearly). Always an adventure!

After the market I headed back to Mason's to pack. He has friends coming in so I'm moving to my last location of the summer (YAY), a guest house near Olympic Stadium. Why Phnom Penh has something called Olympic Stadium I do not know. As far as I know the Olympics have never been here and the city definitely does not currently have the economic capacity or infrastructure to host any Olympic events. Hold on, I'm curious- going to Google it and find out the history...

Ah, interesting: According to Wikipedia, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phnom_Penh_National_Olympic_Stadium) the stadium was built in 1964. It was supposed to be the place of a couple of regional sports tournaments, but due to political strife in the country that didn't happen. It ddid, however, host a controversial FIFA match in 1966. North Korea played Australia and no other country would let North Korea play there due to their lack of diplomacy with, well, pretty much every country. King Sihanouk of Cambodia said they could hold it in Phnom Penh. North Korea won, and because South Korea and a bunch of African teams had quit in protest of North Korea being involved they qualified for the finals tournament, and made it to the quarter finals. It's fascinating how politics even gets involved in sports tournaments.
During the Khmer Rouge era, the stadium was used for public executions, and after the Khmer Rouge it was left to fall apart. Now, it is popular again with Cambodians, who use it for exercise classes and whatnot. There you have it- the history of the Olympic Stadium. Maybe one day Cambodia will have it together enough to host something again. Wouldn't that be nice...

So on the 4th I moved to my guesthouse in the early afternoon. Then I went to Bodhi Tree for lunch, then to a used bookstore- I ran out of books so I had to buy some new ones for the trip home. I was supposed to go out at night but I have a TV in my guesthouse and I got comfortable lying on my bed watching TV so I decided to skip all the getting ready and going out hubbub. I'll probably go out tomorrow night though, since it's my last weekend night in the city.

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