Pandemonium in Poipet

It’s pretty easy to spook Cambodians. Of course that’s no wonder after all they’ve been through in the past 3 decades…but it does make for some interesting stories to tell.

My first work trip involved going to the border town of Poipet to gather some stories from schools around the area. After being in Poipet for no more than 24 hours, fighting broke out between Thai and Cambodian troops over a disputed piece of land further north of us. (See the linked stories to get a fuller understanding of the situation).

Even though the fighting was hundreds of kilometres away, Poipet being Poipet (a rather wild and dusty frontier town, full of trafficking and gambling, sex tourism, and constant tension between Cambodia and Thailand because the two countries have been mad at each other for centuries), exploded into full scale pandemonium.

That’s when we decided to evacuate – cause you just never know. There were a lot of rumours – one being that Thailand had canons poised to bomb National Highway 5 and that Cambodia was aiming it’s own artillery at the Thai casinos near the border.

It was all rather dramatic. Every second person was on their cell phone (Cambodians are extremely well connected – there’s no point even reading the news because it’s at least an hour behind what Cambodians have learned from some friend somewhere around the country). And as the rumours started to fly, complete chaos ensued. The dusty town was one swirling dust storm as families started to load onto motorbikes – mom and kids clutching suitcases and holding on for dear life. Long lines at gas stations and complete chaos in the streets as vehicles packed to their roofs weaved their way out of the city on National Highway 5 – yes, the one rumored to get bombed.

It felt comical in some ways – the pandemonium, the chaos, the cars, the people, and the rumors – especially the rumors. Yes, it is easy to spook Cambodians. Chances are, we didn’t need to leave Poipet, and would have been completely safe the whole time – but it’s always better to be safe than sorry.

Amie holding voting instructions in front of the Phnom Penh Canadian Embassy

We might be living in Cambodia for the time, but we’re still Canadian citizens – and as good citizens, we cast our votes in this year’s federal elections from halfway around the world.

It wasn’t an easy process…so for all you Canadians on home soil – GO VOTE, and don’t take for granted the ease of walking down the street, showing ID and marking the ballot. Here’s what we had to do:

1. Find the Canadian embassy in Phnom Penh. Ok, not hard so far. Get registration form.

2. Fax registration form to Canada for special ballot registration. For this we needed photo ID with address on it (ie. Driver’s licence). To make a long story short, we didn’t have this ID up to date. Steve used an old photocopy of a cancelled licence and Amie used a valid one but with an old address. So we ended up getting registered in districts that we haven’t lived in for a while. Who knows if our votes will actually get counted in the end. The fax we found (likely from the 80s) was so slow that it cost us $8US, which is half a month’s rent for a local.

3. Get our special voting kits – we can’t believed it actually worked out that the embassy actually received our special voting kits cause the whole process of faxing everything was just too sketchy. So…another trip to the embassy – this time a ½ hour bike ride away on the other side of the city. The special ballots just had a blank line where we were supposed to write our chosen candidate’s name. They just happened to not have the candidate list available that day. Great! We decided to check the internet but it was apparently down at the embassy for the day. We were sent next door to the Australian embassy. Just our luck, the guest computer was broken and the embassy rep could barely speak english. So we had to spend another ½ hour looking for an internet café.

4. We marked our ballots, and each stuffed it into the inner envelope, then into the outer envelope, then into the mailing envelope. Easy! Ready to send!

Really though, all the envelopes and all, we’re thankful that the country we call home is democratic and that our votes were guaranteed to be anonymous…not something that happens in Cambodia which is one of the most corrupt in the world. Insane experience. But important too. By casting our ballots for the Canadian elections, we felt we were somehow making a small difference in the world – and not taking democracy for granted.

We have moved in. It certainly didn't happen as we expected, that's for sure. But eventually it did happen. We signed an agreement with our landlord on September 22 stating that we would pay the deposit then, but rental payments wouldn't actually start taking place until September 29. All seemed well.

That is until we got back into the city on the 29th, and couldn't get a hold of our landlady for the life of us. True, it was a national holiday - but a deal's a deal right! Apparently not. By the time 6pm rolled around and we still hadn't heard from Dat, our landlady, we finally booked ourselves into a hotel room and felt absolutely and completely sorry for ourselves.

We slept the night near the riverside just thankful that we weren't lugging our backpacks around with us anymore. Then we slept.

When we woke up the next morning, our hundreds of calls the day before paid off. Our landlady was on holidays, but her dad was able to swing by to let us in. Steve pulled our bags into the house the Cambodian way - hoist everything up over the balcony - and try not to hit any powerlines.

The place was a mess, and the landlady still had half of their earthly possessions in our spare bedroom. But...at least we could move in to our room and the rest of the house.

So we went shopping for cleaning supplies and a broom, and got busy. Three hours later, the years of fingerprints, spiderwebs and cooking grease were virtually gone and we were much happier to be in Cambodia. We cheered our efforts by buying bicycles and Gin and Tonics and a mars bar. Alas there are some comforts in Cambodia!

We’d heard about Prasat Preah Vihear long before getting to Cambodia. In July, the 1000 year old temple complex, perched on top of a string of mountains that stradles the Thai-Cambodian border, was awarded UNESCO World Heritage Site status which means that Cambodia will generate more money from it. In Cambodia, temples = tourist cash and that's a very good thing.

The temple site has been disputed for years. Because of its location, both Thailand and Cambodia think its theirs (even though the UN determined it was Cambodia’s way back in 1962). Thailand – not to get the short end of the stick - has bulldozed a huge highway right up to the temple steps making it incredibly easy to saturate the site with Thai tourists. The Cambodian side isn’t so lucky. Dirt roads (as Steve has explained elsewhere) are the only way to get up the mountain and it’s a freaking long journey from anywhere remotely close to civilization!

After the UNESCO announcement, Thailand got a bit jealous and protesters and the military set up shop near the entrance. Cambodia got a little annoyed back and sent in their own troops to guard the national pride. They also closed the gate to Thailand and won’t let anyone in from the Thai side. If that weren’t enough, the army has strung at least ½ a kilometre of barbed wire around the entrance and around the edges to make sure no rogue or sneaky Thai gets in.

Usually, tourists from the Cambodian side (who’ve gone through something resembling a living hell to get to the temple) have to share the experience with tourists from the Thai side who’ve driven up to the steps in air conditioned express busses.

For us, there were no Thai tourists – one of the reasons we went at this time in the first place - but there were hundreds of army men. We got to share our experience with army medics, cooks, and soldiers, and tried to take pictures of the temples without getting a soldier bathing, army tents and other equipment in the shots.

It was early morning in Northern Cambodia. We had just finished a quick breakfast consisting of a malaria pill washed down with sweet ice coffee and it was time to negotiate transportation. A lift was needed because there was no public transport available to Prasat Preah Vihear temple - our destination goal. We insisted to the surrounding circle of moto drivers that we wanted a pickup truck because it was cheaper. They all assured us that there were no pickup trucks and motorcycle was the only means. We finally succumbed to their lies and this left the choice of who to take and how much. After several minutes of standing around, we chose our drivers, agreed to a inflated price and were instantly flung onto the backs of motorcycles and be whisked away down the laterite road.

The 2 and a half hour journey found us travelling down endless bumpy roads with cleared and uncleared landmine fields to the left and right at all times. This area was the final Khmer Rouge standoff and was heavily mined by both sides. Amie was lucky enough to get a motorcycle leg burn. You know the one from the exhaust pipe? It seems inevitable sooner or later. People just look at the bandage location and either laugh or say “ahh.. I hate it when that happens.”

Read elsewhere about the actual visit to Prasat Preah Vihear temple. This is all about back country travel, which is usually as memorable as the destination. For the return journey, we decided to cut costs after hearing from a German traveller that as we thought, the moto drivers were all lying and there were in fact public pick-ups running to and from. So we sat in the small town of Sa Em (near the temple), waiting for such a ride. Unfortunately, after 4 hours of sitting at the town’s only intersection, there was to our luck, no pick-ups. Presently, what did come by was a military truck bound for Siam Reap picking up anyone who dared to ride. Since there were only 30 people squished in the back, we decided that 2 more wouldn’t hurt. But, it did hurt.

For the next tense 4 hours we squatted in the back of this military truck and felt every bump through the metal. There was some comfort in the fact that everyone groaned in unison after the nasty ones. Surprisingly, no one was flung out of the back despite getting up to a foot of air on the more notable bumps. One crazy military guy actually slept for ¾ of the trip. A couple of times I thought he had died when he didn’t react to his head slamming down on the metal after a huge bump. But at the end of the trip he hopped up without concussion and without noticing people had sat on him for most of the trip. We finally made it to Siam Reap via Anlong Veng and after massaging our wounded stiff limbs, we noted that Asians do not show red dirt very well. They were quick to point out how filthy we barangs (foreigners) looked though.

-steve-

We spent a few days in fabulous Bangkok mainly to visit my sister, Chantelle, who is working there for 8 months. Not only was the company incredible, but the food was to die for. We ate so much spicy food that I suffered from several bouts of diarrhea. It was difficult to fill time in before eating again. It was worth it though. Tom Yum soup, Panang curry, Massaman curry - I'd much rather get diarrhea than not eat them.

We took a day trip out to Bangkok’s sliver of coast. It’s not the white sand beaches of the south, but it was still cool none the less. We ordered Tom Yom soup – usually a pretty safe bet in Thailand, and got all sorts of sea creatures in soup. We were brave that day.

-amie

When we stepped off the hydrofoil in Macau after the hour-long ride from Hong Kong, I wasn't sure if we were in a parallel Vegas universe, if we were in Mainland China, or if we'd somehow stepped off somewhere in Portugal.

We were in Portugal because of the architecture and street signs and in Vegas because of the craziest looking casinos including the under construction vegas-style everlasting huge exploding volcano. We were in China because our ordered dinners translated from the chinese menu were "noodles with shrimp's dumping" and "cheese and egg sandwich with managed".

Here, the excess of Vegas meets Asian kitsch. It’s truly a bizarre experience. The ingenuity and capacity of the Chinese seriously astounds me. And most of this incredible development and growth has happened between 2002 and now. I wish the City of Calgary could operate the same way with contstruction of the LRT and the Ring Road.

And it all culminates in The Grand Lisboa. It’s an architectural wonder. I can't believe someone had the vision for it in the first place, and then actually pulled it off. The building looks like a, well a whale spurt, if you can imagine it. Fans of metal and glass reach up towards the heavens. A bulb of flashing lights and mirrors and glass billowing out of the bottom of the hotel is the casino.

As for the two of us? We stayed in the old quarter, surrounded by bakeries, sweets shops, and Portuguese-styled buildings, in a colonial era hostel.

Hong Kong has been at the top of my must see list for years. Finally I've gotten to experience the city of lights and skyscrapers in real life!

What a place.

-amie-