How much does one know one’s wife after 13 years of marriage? I’ve decided that the ultimate test is to have to guess where she has chosen to hide something as a ‘safe place’ – unfortunately I failed. Against my better judgement, I brought some Amex travellers’ cheques. They are much more hassle than a bank machine and often more expensive. Anyway, I needed my passport to change some, but neither of us `could remember where we might have put it. I went through every cupboard and drawer, every bag, every piece of clothing and every piece of furniture, even through the saucepans – who would guess that it had actually been put in the toe of a running shoe !! `Hopefully any potential thief is as dumb as I am!
As we’ve mentioned, Public Transport in Phnom Penh is still dominated by motorbikes and tuk tuks. In the city, you rarely see more than 6 or 8 people squeezed into a tuk tuk, but in the countryside, the carriage becomes a wagon, and one can see up to 25 people pulled by one Japanese motorbike – this is apparently known as a Japanese heartbreaker!
Surprisingly, we haven’t seen many amputees (from mines) . There are still mined areas, but mainly in the forests and hills nearer the borders of the country, and not so much in populated, cultivated areas. However, I found that the big news yesterday was that a mine had exploded on a heavily travelled farm road near Battambang, where Home 2 is, killing 8 people. Apparently, when these big mines were laid, the Khmer Rouge often buried pivoted poles deep in the road surface, which were triggered by the weight of extra heavy loads – in this case a cart with about 15 people on it. Obviously the risk is not zero, but detonations are now rare, and one just has to be fatalistic about the whole thing, and avoid carts with more than 10 people on them!
The traffic in Phnom Penh is still far more risky, but fascinating. I would definitely recommend that every tourist to Phnom Penh spend at least an hour travelling around the city by tuk tuk. I had the extraordinary experience yesterday of travelling in a tuk tuk, and being stopped by the police! We were travelling the wrong way down a one way street, but there were so many vehicles doing it that I didn`t even realize that it was one way. Since this must be one of the few cities in the world which has a 4 way traffic flow system – both ways, up both sides of the street – accepted as normal and allowed for by all the vehicles – this really seemed like a trivial infringement!
Many of the children taken in by the Homes may have one parent alive, but unable to afford to feed or educate them. However, some have much sadder stories. Two 7 year olds who joined this summer were passed on by the Thai police, as they were being trafficked into Thailand (sold by their parents - $50 a child ), while two more quite young ones were left on the steps of one of the local pagodas.
My NGO here is very much focused on giving the orphans a chance to go through to higher education and University, but the education system in general does not seem to be a government priority. Talking to a Peace Corps volunteer, I discovered that High school teachers do get 2 years training, but that the entry level for the course is often Grade 12 failure, for those who fail to get enough marks to go to University – not an encouraging prospect for the teachers of future Grade 12`s. They are not helped by the size of the classes (50 or 60 children), so it is no wonder that extra coaching is required to pass examinations.
This coming weekend is the Annual Water Festival in Phnom Penh, with a 2 day holiday, the only occasion during our visit when we get 2 days off (+ the weekend), since there is little time off at Xmas (not exactly a big Buddhist Festival). The focus is dragon boat racing, but we were also hoping for decorated and lit bamboo rafts, floating down the river, which we had just missed in Luang Prabang in Laos. Unfortunately here the Festival apparently consists much more of commercially sponsored steamers + the usual dragon boat races, which have less appeal to us, so we decided to take the opportunity to visit Siem Reap and Angkor Wat. This morning, I just learned from a Canadian in Siem Reap that it also has a major Water Festival on, so we have no choice but to enjoy it. Perhaps, Judi will add photos later, to balance some of the more intimidating stone structures at Angkor Wat.
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