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Published: September 27th 2007
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There are geckos everywhere in this city. Here, some are following the light on the ceiling of the hallway. I am a fluent English speaker yet upon stepping foot in Cambodia I was tested in my own tongue. And it was harder than I thought.
I arrived to the California 2 Hotel late afternoon Sunday. The California, run by two American guys, sits on the riverfront of Phnom Penh’s Tonle Sap. I was immediately welcomed by Steve, the interim manager, who explained everything about the city with a West Coast-style smile.
The menu at the hotel, which is actually more like a restaurant/bar on the first floor with a back staircase leading up to the rooms on the second and third floors, is a really nice place. Plus they have hamburgers. I had to indulge.
And Steve, who claimed it was “time to rock out”, turned on the CD player to “Dream A Little Dream of Me.”
Rock out, Steve.
As I ate, one of the Cambodian women who works there approached me and a group of guys from Madison, Wisconsin. She asked us to help translate what she was reading. It was titled, “The Damage Done: My 12 Years Behind Bars in a Bangkok Prison.”
She specifically wanted to know what the words
Kids
Half of Cambodia's 14 million people are under 21. Here are a few of them. “terrible” and “worst” meant.
Rarely have I ever had to explain English words in English. The last time it happened I was explaining what “truancy” meant to an 11th grader. Following our discussion he continued to be absent, clearly not learning the definition. But, despite my track record, I decided to take a stab at “terrible.”
“Terrible is something really, really, really bad,” I said.
She nodded and smiled. “Really, really, really bad,” she repeated.
Now, I don’t know if she understood or not, but both in Thailand and here the people do a remarkable job of at least trying to understand. And they do it by repeating what you say, which totally throws me for a loop as to whether they actually comprehend.
“And ‘worst’?” she asked. The Madison guys had probably downed eight or nine Angkor beers at this point. Angkor Beer is the “The National Beer” of Cambodia. Or so the can indicates -- "My Country. My Beer" is the motto.
Either way, it’s 50 cents a can and quite good. Just ask the Cheeseheads.
So their explanations were incoherent at best; although their attempts were quite humorous. Not only
The View
The view from my room on the Tonle Sap River. were they mumbling and stuttering, but she repeated everything they said and listened intently. It was truly funny.
I tried my best but I couldn’t explain the definition of “worst” without actually using the word itself. I kept coming back to “Angkor Beer is not the worst. Pabst Blue Ribbon is.” That definition was useless. She had no frame of reference.
But the Wisconsin guys did. They reluctantly agreed.
I tried to put things in context. I wanted to say, “The Khmer Rouge and the genocide in Cambodia is one of the worst things in the world’s history.” I thought that might be offensive coming from a newly-arrived Westerner, so I opted against it.
So I thought I would go with a universal; something that the whole planet knows to be the “worst.”
“Do you remember September 11th when the planes hit the buildings in America?” I asked.
She smiled and shook her head no.
“Do you know New York City?”
“No.”
I guess those aren’t the universal topics I thought they were. But that helped shape my first thoughts on this place. The people are not world travelers. They are,
The View
The view from my room on the Tonle Sap river. in fact, very poor and appear to be very local. But just because they don’t know geography, politics or languages doesn’t mean they aren’t seemingly a fulfilled group.
From my balcony I watched hundreds and hundreds of cheap motorbikes go by along the river. Many of the people were laughing and smiling and seemed content.
Everyone, though, has their own definition of traffic here. Some see the roads as having distinct lanes. Others see it as being one giant lane where dodging head-on cars, bikes and pedestrians is far game.
(On a side note, I tried to cross the street and had to take baby steps the entire way while motorbikes went around me on both sides. That was a first.)
Some families here view a two-seater motorbike the way Americans view a minivan. Mom and Dad up front and the two kids - no more than five years old - in the back. It’s scary to see.
But making the most of what you have and being content, like the families on scooters, seems to be the Cambodian way. Not a bad approach.
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