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Published: August 9th 2007
It finally feels like the trip has begun. We had a ridiculously early flight from Bangkok to Phnom Penh, the capitol of Cambodia. I didn't really know what to expect... I had heard that the place was turning into a backpacker's Mecca but was pretty run down.
Taking a look out the plane's window, the entire country seemed to be brown; it reminded me of an aerial photo of the North Korean country side. While the airport was pretty modern, with a somewhat unorganized customs system that rendered me $20 lighter and took up a page of passport space. We found a taxi and were off. The city was basically a disaster area, with beautiful colonial razer-wire-defended buildings and puddles of questionable liquids in the street. It appears that there's not public sanitation system for the city... the only clean places seem to be behind walled compounds with their own water towers.
Our taxi driver from the airport had been Matt Dillon's driver, and promptly presented us with photographic proof. Alex and I had been discussing if there were any tuk tuks in Thailand, and then all of a sudden a cadre of tuk tuks buzzed by. The cabbie
quickly corrected our language, telling us not to use the term "tuk tuk" because it was Thai and to instead using another term. Unfortunately, I can't recall what he said; I guess it must not have been as catchy as "tuk tuk."
The Thais and Khmer have a complex relationship, with Thais having occupied western Cambodia for several decades. Furthermore, unlike Cambodia, Thailand has a booming economy, over 10 million tourists per year, glistening beaches, a history unmarred by colonization, the Khmer Rouge, or just about any of of the misfortunes the Khmer have endured. However, Thailand (or any of Cambodia's neighbors) doesn't posses anything near the artistic or cultural achievement of Angkor Wat When, in 2003, a Thai actress was reported to claim that Angkor Wat belonged to Thailand, riots ensued.
Needless to say, I found it telling the driver made the comment. We planned to stay at the Boddih Tree Aram Guesthouse, which we weren't able to find. The spot it was supposed to be in was an empty field, full of dodgy look people, including one guy on a motorcycle who spent about five minutes staring me in the eye through the cab window. The
driver offered to take us to another place free of charge, and, after checking it out in Lonely Planet, appeared to be decent. Luckily, it was.
Sitting down in the guest house's mosquito nest/restaurant, we were approached by an aid worker asking us to donate blood for street children suffering from an outbreak of Dengue Hemorrhagic Fever. I was starting to feel pretty under the weather myself, and, with a bit of guilt, I declined. Seeing all the mosquitoes zipping around, I went to put on some long pants and my 100% DEET repellent. I had already been bit once on the ankle, which is where the dengue carrying A. Agypte mosquito likes to bite.
The first day there, we checked out the dear leader's residence. I didn't get any pictures of it, but this site provides some photos of the buildings. His picture, along with those of his mom and dad, appear to be prominently displayed in every building in Cambodia. Some buildings just have the three photos aligned horizontally, others surrounded the pictures with all sorts of decorations. The practice is similar to Thailand's, but, given Sihanouk's support of the Khmer Rouge, the people and the
royal family have a rather complex relationship. Of course, this practice is also shared by North Korea, with photos Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il displayed side by side.
While we were visiting one of the attached museums, a downpour started. We had chosen to visit Southeast Asia in the rainy season, knowing full well that it rain hard for an hour or two a day. What we didn't anticipate, particularly in the case of Cambodia, was the puddles that formed would become mosquito hatcheries.
Luckily, our impeccably friendly (like everyone else we met in Cambodia) tuk tuk driver was able to navigate around the puddles, while obeying Cambodian road rules. From observation, I've surmised a few rules:
* If you want to turn left, don't wait for a gap in traffic. Proceed the wrong way down the street and then merge in. Other drivers will honk and clear a path.
* If you run a red light, honk a few seconds afterward.
* If you drive a motorcycle, you can only swerve into oncoming traffic if you want to pass someone.
* If you're driving on an unlit street at night, headlights
are optional.
The next morning, we talked to a tuk tuk driver and he offered to take us around Phnom Pehn for the day. The first place he brought us to was the Tuol Sleng museum. The museum was high school that the Khmer Rouge had converted into a prison and torture camp. The building was in the essentially the same condition as when it was being used by the Khmer Rouge, down to the blood stains below iron bed fames, the hastily constructed masonry, and the slightly bent bars on the windows of the cells.
Of the tens of thousands held, seven escaped and the rest were murdered or died of starvation. One was an artist whose paintings depicting scenes of torture and execution. There were only seven of his painting displayed, one of which showed water boarding.
As we left the Tuol Sleng, we found our driver waiting for us and asked him to take us the Killing Fields. When guards deemed they couldn't beat any more information out of the prisoners, they took them to the killing fields where they were executed.
It was a considerable drive the Killing Fields, which were in
the city's suburbs. We passed through an endless shantytown until we started to get clear glimpses of the country side, consisting of dirt and grass flats punctuated by a palm tree or cow. Even near central Phnom Penh, rice fields were a common site.
Like the Tuol Sleng, the Killing Fields were left as close to their original condition as possible. The bodies had been exhumed, and some of their skulls were placed on glass enclosed shelves inside a memorial. On a lower shelf, there was a pile of victim's clothing. The grounds consisted of a series of holes that were emptied shallow graves. Bits of clothing could be seen in the dirt between them.
After the Killing Fields, stopped in the Russian Market, where we picked up a few trinkets. The market is just what you'd expect from a third world covered market, full of pirated books and DVDs, including a $3 edition of Vista Ultimate. The final stop on our tour was an orphanage. First, the driver took us to a rice dealer, from whom we purchased a 50kg bag of rice. Luckily, one of the guys who worked there was able to load the thing
on to our tuk tuk.
After a few kilometers, the driver pulled up to a brown puddle and got off. I couldn't believe that was the orphanage. The driver grabbed the rice sack, and starting walking towards a building in the current shanty town. It required passing about 20 meters of mud to get through. At the other end, there was a wooden building with a scrap-metal roof.
The kids seemed happy. They had a Thai Kickboxing league, the big ones looked after the little ones, and they all were eager to practice their English, which they were learning as part of the program. However, there the place was swarming with mosquitoes, when it rained, the roof (part scrap-metal, part scrap-lumber) was ineffective. The Dengue Hemorrhagic Fever epidemic had hit there hard, and, they didn't have enough to feed everyone that day, even with the rice we brought.
We spent our last night in Phnom Phen out on the town, going to the somewhat legendary Foreign Correspondents Club. It overlooked the Mekong, in what actually qualified as a pleasant location. It's become a mecca for journalists, tourists, and the many NGO workers.
I spoke to an
NGO worker on the flight from Japan who was actually working in Phnom Phen. She said that much of the foreign aid that comes to Cambodia is distributed to NGOs, who use it to send specialists to the countries. The specialists stay in enormous houses, have drivers and security details, and require western salaries. This quickly eats up aid dollars leaving little to actually go to the people in need.
Ultimately, Phnom Phen is one of the few places I've seen where tourism is a strong, unambiguous, net plus for the host location. Aside from braining in money to the local economy and creating jobs, it gives a ready supply of much needed blood donors, aid workers, and small scale philanthropists. Moreover, the agencies the tourists help through aren't the NGOs, but young, independent aid workers who get volunteers through visiting hostels or talking to tuk tuk drivers. Finally, having seen the immense problems first hand, visitors will raise concerns about Cambodia's problems in their home countries.
Addendum:
Having finally looked through all the papers buried in my pack, I was able to find the orphanage's website: www.cambokids.org.
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Alex R
Nice pics
Looking good. Love the bandit getup.