Cambodia 28th - 30th May

My 1^st impression of Cambodia was quite surprising for me. The airport was very modern and nicely furnished. I think it's just me not knowing about Cambodia well enough. There was this English-speaking Tuk-tuk driver waiting outside out hotel building who was telling us that Phnom Penh has become a tourist destination, I think mainly because of it's recent troubled past of the Khmer Rouge in 1975-1979. He was also saying about 10 years ago it'd be unsafe to be walking around in the night there but now its fine. Most things have stabled now and most locals have actually took advantage of the tourists coming to earn some money for their survival. You do see people who suffered during those violent times, how they have become handicapped coming out of the incident and also the children who were born handicapped who are trying to make a living out of selling things to tourists on the streets. In Cambodia, whenever crossing the streets, you have to brave. Don't look at oncoming traffic as you can never expect a stop to the flow of traffic over there. You just have to cross and then all the vehicles (bikes especially) will swerve around you as you cross the road. Wat I'll tell people is that if you took a picture of somebody whilst crossing the road, you'll see him surrounded by vehicles to his left, right, front and back.

One thing I realized about the hotel that we were staying at was the fact that it was right beside the Tonle Sap River. After looking at some local maps and history books, I realized that this river was connected to Mekong River, the exact river that we were staying beside in Laos. Apparently these 2 rivers play a very important role in the economy in Thailand, Laos and Cambodia for a long time, for the fishermen especially. And another thing was also the fact that along the bank of the Tonle Sap river was the varying flags of nations of the world. Every flag signifying the existence of that country's embassy in Cambodia. The hotel where we were staying at was call the FCC, Foreign Corespondents' Club. Therefore the presence of a lot of tourists walking all around us.

Good fate brought us to meet this Tuk-Tuk driver who knew how to speak English, Makarra. He brought us to this temple on a hill but on the way a bunch of children by the street caught our eyes. It was a group of children barely even the age of 5 playing amongst themselves by the roadside. Pete decided to let them try coloring with crayons. It seemed like this was the first they've ever used crayons to use to color on a piece of paper. The first girl that used it, was staring at it (crayon) for a short while wondering, before continuing to color. It is evident in their faces that they we were elated to have received the drawings from Pete. When they went back home. They were shouting and jumping for joy all the way in to their houses. I think it was quite meaningful for those children that a total stranger just came up to them, gave them things and also gave them an opportunity to use crayons, something they might not had the opportunity to experience.

Makarra served to be an inspiration to me as he had this analogy of life and his big dreams. He wanted to study hard the next year and finish his degree about culture, history and traditions and eventually become a tour guide in Cambodia. The thing that was so inspiring for him was the fact that he had to work so hard everyday to earn that little money to help support his family of 4 siblings. And then also to save up for his degree. Even though he was working so hard and was so tired everyday, he wasn't feeling down about it. He was very happy to be able to meet and learn from tourists everyday and be able to chase his own dreams. This showed that in no matter what kind of situation you're in, as you're passionate about something and are willing to work hard for it, anything is achievable.

I was being asked the magic question again, 1^st thing the next morning, 'Are you Cambodian?'. A little bit expected that eventually someone will ask me that over in this country. We were ending this leg of this trip soon so our spirits were up even though we were tired from all those working and traveling.

Either Phnom Penh was really small or it just so happens the school were close to our hotel but when we were in Cambodia, we took very little time to reach the places we were going to. The longest, 20 mins. Which was a very big difference, especially compared to Indonesia. Part of the fact could be thanks to the driver because he knew the roads very well and he was very helpful too. Even knew how to set-up our stuff on stage. Despite the fact that he couldn't speak much English, he still pulled through for us.

Overall Cambodia was a relaxed experience for us as lesser time was taken up for traveling. The people there were nice and the children there were very cute. Very responsive to cameras even though they could barely speak English. Very rewarding experience and a good ending country to this leg of our tour.