laying low in phonm penh

This post is for all of you whose email addresses I havent updated...sorry to all those that have already read this post...

03/01/2009
Hey all,

I thought I'd go back to the traditional email style for this one because I am having trouble remembering my extremely security concious and complex blogspot password and this feels a bit more personal like I am actually writing to someone even though it's to quite a few of you,

So, sous s'dai? How are you? I am not feeling ""la-ah" (fine) which is the only khmer response I know to the question.

I have been having a challenging time in Cambodia, which is fitting - because it's a challenging kind of place. Christmas Day I spent out at Pol Pot's killing fields and the torture house (which used to be a high school) it is a place beyond description and is very difficult to wrap your head around the absolute horror that went on here in the space of three short years... the government abolished money, emptied the streets of Phonm Penh and killed one in four Cambodians. They bashed babies heads against a tree which still stands in the killing fields and teeth are visible rising up through the soil that covers shallow mass graves that have not been disturbed. I have been having so much trouble understanding the atrocity that finally I guess that I have come to the conclusion that it simply is unexplainable evil madness. Cambodian people refuse to speak about it and hang their head and look at the ground if it is mentioned. An English guy who lives here described the killing of intellectuals as thus.... "you know how Australia is full of those rough neck bogans, well imagine how Australia would look if everyone else had been killed and they were the only ones left...not too smart, rough and ruled by the fist." (cue horror music) could you imagine a country full of Pauline Hansons...or worse ruled and populated by the idiotic drunken mob responsible for Cronulla a few years ago without any sensible people to keep them in check...

Today there are a lot of NGOs in Cambodia but unfortunately they do not seem to be winning the battle, although I have seen some very very good initiatives and also heard some really amazing personal stories. For instance the cook that gave the Cambodian cooking class grew up at Friends restaurant where they train street kids in hospitality and gave him a future to dream about, he hopes to study overseas and then return to Cambodia to work in development and give back to other street kids like him (and here in PP there are a lot)... Five years ago there was no rich in the country but now there is a rapidly expanding upper class - but no middle class and corruption is absolutely rampant...many here are saying Cambodia is at a turning point but thoise who seem to know the place best feel that the country has already turned the corner the wrong way and is heading for another disastraous and corrupt regime...terrible news because on the face of it they are such a happy and smiling people...

so enough of the politics... Cambodia itself is a very beautiful place and in the countryside still very poor, most people use water buffalo and ox to plow the field and to cart goods. It is a place of contrast, there will be a flashy new house suddenly (and by flashy I mean flashy in a style that it seems only Asia can do) amongst old wooden and straw houses and men about town driving brand new lexus' (again with the bling - blue underlights and lexus in bold writing down the side) next to poor old guys pushing cyclos and touting for 50 cent jobs like their life depended on it. (whoops Im back to politics)

All the people constantly say "hello bye-bye" to you particularly in the country side and when you respond there is usually a fit of giggles. I am starting to wonder if it is the local slang for fareng\ or foreigner.

In Kampot in the south I took a walk with a lovely Londoner called Alistair through a small village and turned down a very small track though the most gorgeous fields with a huge mountain range - the Elephant Mountains as the backdrop. The dogs weren't so used to weird looking fareng wandering down the street and we were greeted by a snarling pack of dogs and each house that started to get worse and worse...then we started to get really afraid, for a while we forgot as we got very enthusiastic responses at each house with kids running out to wave and in hysterics as we showed them the photos we took....one guy even came running out with a tape deck and proceeded to record us speaking english to howls of delight as he replayed us over and over...(he only taped over some of that absolutley AWFUL cambodian pop music that is so hard to get away from I think it will give me nightmares for years)..
but then the dogs... bring on the flippin dogs....when we finally got to one house where it was so bad I picked up a rock to throw at the dog because I really thought I was going to get bitten but it made it worse and we had to flee across some putrid water on a thin ladder laid across... we stopped and looked back from where we had come.. snarling dogs still out on the track in front of every house and ahead probably even more to navigate... ahhhhh... well we survived without being bitten. I have no idea how.

The Cardamom mountains were beautiful but very difficult to trek in because the government is actively blocking tourist access (they haven't finished clearfelling over the ridge and dont want anyone to see). It was also the last hold of the Khmer Rouge and many have been resettled here. The feeling is different and edgier...I don't have time to explain in this email but in short it is not as foreigners friendly...and it is on the border so there is a lot of drug smuggling and girls smuggling too I think. Everywhere here you can see the sex trade it is very sad...mostly old caucasian men about town with girls who look to be sometimes no more than twelve. Its disgraceful.

I did make it into the jungle quite a way and it is absolutely stunning what is left - virgin rainforest stretching to the sea.... but sadly not many birds or monkeys, nothing like the forests of Borneo at all... (even though there are tigers, rhinos and bears still living in the far reaches)... apparently when the khmer rouge were forced into the hills they ate everything... I did see some monkey scat though and a beautiful scarlet honeyeater (very small like a hummingbird) and some nice butterflies although I guess they aren't great eating....although if they did eat them I would NOT be surprised, at the cooking class we ate crickets, (a few different varieties) and tarantula....

alright... the yanks there ate the tarantula, I did not. But I did try some of the tarantula eggs and a little bit of cricket. We also spoke about the local fondness for dog and monkey, about which I felt extremely sorry each time I saw a dog (oh you poor thing you are going to be eaten)...UNTIL the above mentioned incident. now i feel almost happy, but not quite... it's a hard one to adjust to when you treat your own dog like a princess... anyway this is now a very long email and brings me to the present which is back in Phnomh Penh.

I was blessed to meet a French couple living here, one an agronimist and the other a public health worker while Koh Kong on the Thai border...I came back in their flashy car with them which was SO MUCH nicer than the public bus I caught out there (a 12 seater mini van with 20 adults and four babies inside and an additional five people on the roof)...and very lucky and a blessing because it was at this time that I was very sick with a high fever and lots of ahem 'runny bum''....they kept me at their house for the night which was so great because its one of the great horrors of lone travel to get sick on your own but they took great care of me until we were sure that I didn't have dengue... I am still sick and will go to the doctor today but the fever has gone so its just a serious tummy bug (probably fixable with antibiotics) rather than malaria or dengue which I would have been very unlucky to have... meanwhile I am splurging on a nice hotel and relaxing as much as I can, trying to recover so that I can continue my travels... I think from here I will see only Angkor Wat and then skip the rest of Cambodia that I was going to see and get my (very sore and overused) arse to Laos where it is so much more chilled out...

with much love - Janine xoxox