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Published: September 1st 2009
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After five fascinating though exhausting days in Siem Reap, we took a bus east to Battambang. This bus featured one of the greatest signs I have ever seen. “Please take care of everything by yourself.” Point well taken. The bus departed at eight-thirty and by eleven, had stopped three times. First stop was a pee-break by the side of the road. Second stop was a snack break. Third stop was lunch. All in the span of two and a half hours. See, the driver makes money by stopping at certain places. Like most other businesses in Cambodia, pay-offs and corruption are central to the bus industry. The driver stops at a snack shop, insists everyone must get off the bus for safety’s sake, and he receives a cut of the profits plus free snacks. This snack shop was modern and fully equipped with fabulous Asian versions of Western snacks (crab-flavored chips, fish-flavored crackers). The lunch stop was a large but decrepit wooden shack with a terrible food selection. A plate of rice, steamed cabbage and a tiny fish was the sole dish up for offer. The driver gets fed and receives a cut of the profits. So understandably, whether it be
eleven AM or three PM, the driver is going to stop at all possible lunch and snack shops offering payoffs. Wouldn’t you do the same?
Lucky for us passengers, the quoted trip duration had included all these stops, and we made the next two hours without any further stops. Battambang is a more authentic Cambodian city, chock full of big, old apartment buildings in various stages of decay and devoid of all the tourist amenities found in Siem Reap. We checked out about four hotels and found them all to be equally decrepit. Many were grand and fabulous at one point, but seem to have been left to decay the last twenty years. We settled on a hotel with a gigantic room, fabulous but massive wooden carved furniture, and a staircase slowly but surely crookedly sinking in to the ground. After ten PM, the streets were dark and deserted, a big change from Siem Reap where the downtown area is well let and open for tourists to party all night long. At any time of day in Battambang, only one or two places could be found to eat in the downtown area. It’s a depressing feel, and I remember
Typical Decrepit Apartment Building
Looks like it should be condemned but I met a sweet grandmother who lives there with her daughter and baby granddaughter thinking that I would not recommend this place to anyone. In retrospect though, some of the most interesting experiences I had in Cambodia were in Battambang.
It was here that I first saw women on the street selling large dishes of fried beetles and bugs dressed with chili and scallion. Women balancing plates of salted miniature clams, papaya salad, dumplings and sugar cane upon their head.
It was also here that a little girl walked by me on the street, holding her mother’s hand. She stopped, said hello , then stuck out her hand for me to shake. I shook her hand and then she said goodbye and went on with her mother.
Eating breakfast at the sole tourist restaurant one morning, we watched a little boy run by, pantless and underrates, with a thousand riel note in his hand. He exchanged it for a piece of candy at the drugstore. Running back the way he had come, tearing open his candy, he saw us staring and stopped to say hello! How polite! Boy, did we feel rude!
Soon after, he walked by again, this time with his mom and brother. We watched as his mom
begged some locals for money, then exchanged it for candy for his baby brother at the same drugstore. Fascinating; bottoms are not a requirement for little kids, even in the cities.
At this same restaurant, an eight-year old boy took our order, as serious as can be, acting like a grown man. He didn't ask us to repeat a thing, nodding solemnly after each item we listed. Then he took our menus, went inside, and started playfully wrestling with his little sister. In a little while, serious-faced again, he brought us our drinks. After about half an hour, we went inside to check on our food. The little boy told us his mom would be back soon. Hysterical. Soon after, his mom returned and came out to check what we had ordered. The little boy had no idea what we had ordered but was so polite he just nodded and went inside to wait for his mother! Too cute.
This morning we watched the iceman come, by motorbike and sidecar, to deliver blocks of ice to the locals. Many people here have only iceboxes.
Walking around town, we saw a truck piled humorously high with what looked
like large sandbags. The drivers were continuing to pile bags on, atop an already twenty foot high stack. They seemed perplexed that we were taking photographs. We also came across an incredible sculpture of a dragon, composed completely of fused metal weapons that had been surrendered following the years of violence. It is a symbol that peace is now hopefully here to last.
We visited a temple and spoke with some novice monks, as well as a temple boy, Rong Roeng, who I am still in touch with via email. A temple boy is a young man who is allowed to live and eat at the temple in exchange for his work there. I am still not quite clear why he doesn’t become a novice monk, as this would bring merit, and be more of a respectable position. Rong has since chosen to attend a cooking school in Siem Reap, established by Europeans to help train young Cambodians to succeed in the workforce. Unfortunately when he graduated, the economic recession had taken hold worldwide, causing a great decrease in the number of tourists visiting Cambodia. The one hundred percent job placement rate after graduation, promised on the company’s website,
did not include times of recession. Now Rong is back at the temple, dreaming of further education, but lacking the funds. I continually encourage him to keep looking for cooking work, now possessing a degree, but not knowing the situation on the ground, I can’t say if that’s an impossible search now.
Though Buddhism has existed in Cambodia for a long time, the Buddha sculptures found around the country are mostly new and primarily dreadful. The Khmer Rouge banned religion and destroyed many ancient temples and sculptures. I can only guess that the new creations are poor quality because of a lack of access to good quality education, including in the arts, or that perhaps arts commissions are given on the basis of connections and not talent.
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