Out in the Provinces

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I was at a public concert in the middle of nowhere. The lot was flooded with teenage Khmers on motorscooters. On the stage, a half-dozen Khmer beauty queens danced in front of AIDS awareness banners while a young singer crooned over a classical music band. Mobs of teen boys and their little brothers followed me wherever I went. I got closer to the front and saw that the tiara-sporting beauties where really a pack of well-done-up lady boys. A balloon bounced off my head. No, it was one of the free condoms the AIDS activists were giving out--blown up and tied to make a ghetto beach-ball. I saw a fellow foreigner and I asked him if there were any good bars in town with western food and decent conversation. He laughed. "Sorry, friend, you're out in the provinces now."

The observant reader may have noticed a handful of blank spots in my records of Cambodia. Generally speaking, those were the times I spent "out in the provinces".


Kampong Chhnang

My first serious foray into tourist-free Cambodia involved a trip to the sleepy town of Kampong Chhnang. My Cambodia plan had included this small provincial city-on-the-lake ever since I saw my first map of Cambodia. It was on no one's agenda, so I knew I had to stretch my trip north from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap and at least give this place a day. I was told all kinds of things to keep me from going there. Everything I was told was wrong.

They said I couldn't get a bus there.

I found a ticket in Phnom Penh for less than $2.00. The bus ride was smooth. Being the only non-Khmer on the bus, I was left alone and got plenty of sleep. I got into town, found a great hotel that was big and cheap and empty, and settled in.

They said there was nothing to see there, and nothing to do.

I spent the afternoon napping, then wandered out to find what I could find. The old part of town has some beautiful little parks, and I found some great food. The food stand was customerless when I arrived, but by the time I'd finished eating, there were several dozen people there. They'd all come to watch me and to gossip. When I finished eating, a group of boys started practicing their English on me. I humored them. They invited me to come see a concert. We went and watched the lady boys dance and blew up condoms into beach-balls and had a blast. Then me and the older guys went into town and shared some beer and baguettes. I ended up staying awake half the night watching a really bad James Bond movie with the hotel's night staff.

They said it was impossible to get a boat to Siem Reap.

I chartered a driver in the early A.M. and we went down to the waterfront. I saw bustling morning markets and crowds of tiny fishing boats preparing for the day. I got some grub and found a ferry that would take me out into the reeds to meet the speedboat from Phnom Penh.

That gave me a couple of hours to wait for the boat. I spent them conversing with the waterfront police and entertaining kids. Then it was onto the Tonle Sap.


The Tonle Sap

The Tonle Sap is a giant lake, comparable to the Great Lakes in the Midwest-U.S.A. The Tonle Sap is also a river that connects this massive lake to the Mekong river. It's the only river in the world that actually flows both directions. Most of the year, it drains the lake into the Mekong, but during the rainy season, it drains the Mekong into the lake. This means incredibly fertile soil and tons of freshwater fish.

My little ferry took me out to the reeds and we tied to a pole. After a short wait, the speedboat from Phnom Penh came along. They let me on the boat and I was headed to Siem Reap, to the consternation of all the grouchy, sun-burnt tourists who had believed this partial journey to be impossible.

The boat itself was unexceptional. A Cambodian speed-ferry, packed with rich, ugly Europeans and Northeast Asians. There were no seats, so I ended up on the roof with dozens of others, packed like cattle. Our captain drove the boat like it was a Phnom Penh tuk-tuk, speeding and tilting and blaring his horn at every obstacle or fishing boat he saw.

And that was one interesting part of the Tonle Sap journey: the obstacles. Being such a fertile fresh-water fish source, there were dozens and dozens of small fishing villages along the way. All of these places are above land in the dry-season, so permanent stilt houses sprouted up from the river and the lake, along with groves of trees and even churches and stores. In between the villages of stilt houses were clusters of fishing boats stretching out their nets. Some of them were large and looked like Conestoga wagons on the water, with whole families cooking and sleeping on the boats while they waited to pull the nets in. There were even small villages of floating houses, re-located several times throughout the year to stay along the ever-shifting shoreline.

The other interesting part was the lake itself. After we got past the mouth of the river, the banks began to recede from view. The trees and reeds poking out of the water got shorter, and soon all we saw where the occassional branch reaching out. The boats and villages thinned out. In a matter of minutes, we were in the middle of a vast expanse of water. At the center it could have been the ocean, with no discernable land features on any side.

And then we saw a hill, and more greenery, and a huge fishing settlement. We were approaching Chong Khneas, and after that: Siem Reap.


Poipet

I did my days in Siem Reap, living with the monks, playing with kids, and taking way too many pictures of ancient temples. In fact, I'd taken so many pictures that there was no room left on my memory card for pictures of the many exciting sites of the next few days. Detailed descriptions will have to do.

My pre-arranged date to return to Thailand was the 7th. Chelly would be awaiting me with dinner. My mom would be hoping for a call for her birthday. I would be itching to get back to my interim home and it was gonna take me a full day's travel to get there from the border.

So, I decided to leave Siem Reap a day ahead, get to the border and spend the night. I'd be crossing first thing in the morning, and I'd be home in time for dinner and kisses.

But that meant I'd be spending a night in Poipet, which was highly unadvised.

My guidebook describes Poipet as a cesspool. My ex-pat and Khmer friends in Cambodia had all described it as a place to stay away from, or a place to get robbed. The guidebook was understating it and the friends were all off-base. It was the most disgusting place I've ever been or could ever imagine, but the people were great.

The bus to Poipet was full of interesting backpacker-types. It was also one of the worst vehicles I'd ever ridden in, and on some of the worst roads in the country. That meant we were all awake and having great conversations all the way to the border.

However, when we got into Poipet, I found myself saying goodbye to all my new friends and was soon left completely alone.

No help from the locals, because they were not at all used to having a foreigner stay the night (unless it was at one of the monster casinos right on the border). I had a bag of snacks and I wandered.

The town was like a garbage dump, with bunch of buildings sprung up out of the waste and looking eager to return to it. None of the structures was over three stories, and many of the garbage piles rivaled them for height.

The roads were worse than dirt. They were like dry streambeds of hard mud, formed in ruts. The sides were steeply banked and piled with garbage.

The empty lots were home to more trash--and larger pieces--with more than a few people and dogs and chickens living amongst it.

I sat in front of a closed-down store to rest and put my books in my bag. I munched on some snacks.

Soon, a group of children had surrounded me. I gave them a bag of coconut-crepe-crisps that had begun to overcome me. The boys snatched them and began to feast, only sharing with the girls at my insistence. Soon enough, their parents arrived. The folks gave me directions to a guesthouse and I was on my way.

The Chinese owner didn't speak English and neither did her staff. I don't think they even spoke Khmer. There was no running water, lots of bugs, but the cable worked and I saw no other options. I had a nap.

At dinnertime, I went for another wander. I saw games rooms crowded with ping-pong masters and snooker sharks. I saw internet cafes wth no internet service or working phonelines. I saw a lot being cleared and set up for a kickboxing match later in the night. A group of Khmer casino-workers saw me and invited me to join them for dinner.

These guys were cool and they spoke pretty good English. We sat by the side of the garbage-filled trench of a road and ate soup made with chunks of cow's brains and they told me how much Poipet sucked. They were all from other parts of the country, but had migrated for the well-payed casino jobs. We exchanged emails and they picked up the tab. I thought Poipet was pretty cool so far.

Walking back towards the hotel, I stopped in to a hairdresser to get my beard shaved. It was getting pretty long and unkempt, and I knew Chelly would like me better with a fresh face.

This was my first ever straight-razor shave. Lit by one dangling flouro bulb in the corner of the room, a giggling, chubby Khmer hairstylist gal scraped the longest beard I've ever grown off of my face without the aid of creams or lotions. It might have been her first time doing this, as the Khmer don't typically grow facial hair. I should have been scared. But, I'd just eaten a cow's brain by the side of a garbage stream, and I wasn't feeling too rational.

After this experience, the kickboxing match that I'd seen preparations for earlier looked pretty attractive. The ticket cost me a dollar, and it came with a ringside seat. Being a fair-faced young foreigner, I was soon mobbed by dozens of little girls, all jumping up and down shouting "Hello!" They followed me to one of the carnival-style game booths and I bought them a basket full of throwing darts. They threw darts and popped balloons and won me a prize of a bottle of imported Thai methamphetamine-based energy drink.

I gave the bottle away to a wiry Khmer guy. He told me he was cornerman for one of the night's fighters. I was glad to contribute to his evening's insanity.

Pretty soon, a group of boys had joined my screaming mob of girls. I decided to buy the kids some snacks. I guess they were scared to take my food, 'cause it scared most of them away pretty well. Except for one chubby toddler who grabbed up a whole bag of mango and went to sit on the side of the ring for the match.

I settled in to watch the match as well, and it was great.

There were something like six fights between well-matched Khmer boxers, all from local provincial capitols. Then there were the two "Kampuchea-Thai" show-downs.

You see, the kind of kickboxing that most of the world knows as "Muay Thai" and associates with the flashy kickboxers of Thailand, actually originated hundreds--or thousands--of years ago in Cambodia.

It's less well-known, but Khmer Kickboxing is the original. I found it to be far less flamboyant or showy, completely non-commercial, with a better grasp of the fundamentals of the sport.

The first Kampuchea-Thai bout was the best-possible comparison of the two styles. The Thai started out with an elaborate, arm-shaking, bowing, dancing, praying, pre-game show. The Khmer merely bowed to each corner and did a few stretches while he awaited his opponent. Throughout the fight, the Thai tired himself out with ridiculous flying attacks and handstand kicks and such. They were great crowd-pleasers and Jackie Chan would have been proud, but they were totally impractical. The Khmer just settled on his back foot, watched and waited, threw in the occassional well-timed and solid punch. It did get pretty hairy there a couple of times, but the stalwart, no-nonsense Khmer boxer had the match from the beginning and won it in the third round with a TKO.

The second Kampuchea-Thai fight was dissapointing. It was heavyweights, but that would have been hilarious to an American audience, since neither fighter was taller than me. This match suffered from what we see a lot in the heavyweight contests of hometown wrestling matches: competitors of grossly mismatched size. The Khmer was like his predecessor, a superior fighter with great emotional control, timing, and form. The Thai was flamboyant and wasteful, but he was just a lot larger than his opponent and won the match on points due to a longer reach and heavier blows.

Anyway, the matches ended at midnight and I found myself surrounded by hundreds of drunken Khmer, some quite pissed-off about the last match, and a couple carrying AK-47s. I couldn't see the pistols.

I decided to go home, watched some CNN and BBC, enjoyed a recap of the day's Asian Games, and eventually passed out.

I was up early the next day and back into civilized Thailand. But, I'd definitely seen a thing or two worth seeing "out in the provinces".

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Comments

[Aaron Brown]

yum- cow brain. It's actually loaded with good stuff(as long as raised healthily/on grass). I haven't tried any yet but will at some point (I could actually buy some here from a farmer in Texas but I dont think my mom wants cow head in our house, basically). I've gotta say Nik, I'm really liking following along with the off-the-beaten-path experiences.