Kelly's Journals

Kelly's HomeSoutheast AsiaKompong Cham & Kratie, Cambodia

Entries:

Southeast Asia

Kompong Cham & Kratie, Cambodia |

Phnom Penh Revisited

We had a conversation with a very well traveled gentlemen who disagreed with my less than favorable opinions of Phnom Penh. He told me that he found the city to be developing nicely. He commented that what ever city you visit first in a developing country you will automatically hate because it is an assault on everything familiar to a Westerner. I suppose my opinion of Phnom Penh is some what tainted by this phenomenon. At the same time, I am not entirely willing to change my thoughts on the city. Indeed a city is made of buildings, houses and roads--but it is also made of people. In my view, there are so many serious social issues plaguing the residents of the city that I feel it is cheating the people of the Phnom Penh to characterize the city as "coming along nicely".

I do feel the need to represent a lighter side to Phnom Penh that can be found when it comes to all things regarding traffic. There are some very special traffic regulations in this city. For example, if you would like to go the wrong way down a street into oncoming traffic, you may do so long as you honk your horn. If you don’t want to stop at a stop sign just honk your horn. If you do stop at a stop sign you are probably the only person ever to have done so--ever, so you had better honk your horn. If you are an extra special person and you know it, get an after-market horn (i.e. fog horn) so when you barrel through an intersection people really know to get out of the way. If the traffic lights go out it means everyone has the right of way as long as you are honking your horn. Lastly, if you are driving your car and you are happy and you know it--honk your horn.

Another great part to the traffic in Phnom Penh is that you don’t necessarily need a license plate and if you have a luxury car you absolutely do not need a license plate. If you have a luxury car and you do have a license plate there is a pretty good chance that the plate is of American origin. If you reside in California and once had a forest green Lexus SUV last registered in 2004, it could possibly be roaming the streets of Phnom Penh. Did you black Land Rover go missing from Tennessee? Try looking in Phnom Penh. I’m no Sherlock Holmes, but I’d assume these license plates did not arrive in Cambodia through the marvels of EBay. Talk about lawlessness...

Kampong Cham

Motorbike Journey

We made a pit stop in Kompong Cham in the Northeast corner of Cambodia. The town is more of a "stop over" place and not a destination on its own. We decided to spend a few days here regardless and are happy that we did. We rented motor bikes and drivers for a half day to travel to a weaving village. I’m not too sure we ever made it to the actual village, but we did see some weaving and the trip on the back of the bike was fantastic.

No one wears helmets. I actually didn’t even notice if helmets were available. The bikes are 100cc and only going 40 km/h most of the time so it didn’t even seem like that great of an issue. But Kelly! How Dangerous! And I reply that when you are on extended trips you become "desensitize" and start to do stupid stuff you would never do at home.

The trip went a little some thing like this:

We started off down a paved highway that I thought we would take the whole way. We stopped at a road side stand where our drivers suggested we bought face masks and we turned headed down a dusty shale road. Instantly, the scenery was a sensory overload partly because it was beautiful, but mostly because you are watching the everyday happenings of a very foreign life.

The road was flanked on either side by trees and raised houses that are approx. 3 meters in the air with live bamboo planted to grow as a fence around the perimeters of property. As fast as they appeared, the trees and houses disappear and on one side is a steep cliff leading to the unbelievably wide and fast flowing Mekong river. The erosion at the top of the cliff shows just how high the water can rise in the wet season. On the opposing side of the river are open fields of mint green rice paddies.

The path turns into a sand trail that winds between trees and I hold my breath and squeeze every inch of my being as tight as possible as the tires of the bike slip back and forth. I’m not sure if I was more frightened of the bike sliding out or that we were not actually on a path (landmines are a huge issue). The narrow path widens and we came out on to a road wide enough for a car with raised homes on either side. Children yell "hello" and old people stare with unreadable expressions. The houses appear to become nicer. Some have shutters and door trim painted sky blues with pink and yellow fabric trim framing the outside windows. The houses look large considering how high in the air they are suspended.
We came to a river crossing where there was a man standing on a small and rickety looking raft. Our drivers tell us to take the raft across the river. I assumed they were going to take the bikes down different path as there was no way the raft would support the weight of the bikes. I was wrong. All aboard! I can’t believe I actually got onto the raft. None-the-less we safely arrived on the other side of the river.

The dirt road turns into asphalt for 100 or so meters leading into a little traffic circle with a statue of a god or another important figure in the center. There is a school just outside of the little town where kids were playing volleyball or soccer.

The roads become very narrow and are raised very high. The houses are set further back, the road is built up very high and there are platforms attached to the side of the road. Some platforms are little stores, others have hammocks with sleeping babies, some have lazy dogs, and some have kids doing homework. This pattern of scenery repeats three or so times over the journey.

Another interesting part to the journey were the things on the road we had to try not to hit. There were little ponies pulling carts of hay, herds of cattle grazing by the road side, goats who think they are boss, little kids on bikes, little kids carrying littler kids, motor cycles with cylindrical baskets full of little piglets or one big ass pig, motorcycles with 40 live chickens hung by their feel all around the bike, dogs laying in the sun, puppies fighting, noisy-ass roosters, hens that cross the road with their chicks following in single file and so on... The sun was shining, the wind was blowing and it was a beautiful day for a ride into the country.

We did see women weaving silk fabric the old fashion way. It is ridiculously labor intensive, but the finished product is beautiful. The $50.00 asking price was a bit out of our budget so we asked if we could see people making scarves instead. We were taken to a house that looked like many we had seen along the way and were motioned inside. We went up 8 or 9 very steep stairs that took us inside the house. It was one large room separated in two by an elaborately carved china cupboard that was full of glassware. I have no idea how they got that piece furniture up inside the house. The walls were covered in family pictures and there was a T.V. and radio hooked up to a car battery. The bamboo floor felt very good on my feet. It was a nice looking home, but still had no electricity or running water. In the home a very old woman gather up her product to show me while a very old gentleman and younger woman sat by. It struck me at that moment that this old couple were some of the first elderly people I had seen while in Cambodia. If I thought it appropriate, I would have loved to known how old they were and how the hell they go up and down the stairs to get into the home. We bought two scarves and headed on our way.


Bamboo Bridge

We also walked to the outskirts of town to find a bamboo bridge that connects a village that is located on an island in the middle of the Mekong. We never found the bridge, but that afternoon was one of the most surreal experiences of my life. The area we walked through had a large hill tribe (you can tell by their head scarves), and Cham Muslim population in. The road we were on was narrow and the small shacks the people lived in spilled out onto the road. It seems everyone in town was sitting out front of their houses tending stores, eating, or talking to friends and as we walked down the narrow road every set of eyes were on us. The heads turned and followed us until we were out of vision. It might have been Brandon’s height, but the blank stares sent our way felt like much more. I have no idea what these people were thinking, but I felt like an alien.

Kratie

We traveled further up the Northeast side of Cambodia into Kratie. The higher up we went, the more the food sucked. In all honesty, everything tasted a little bit like swamp water. Another interesting fad is the pajama clad women. We saw women wearing pajamas (think ‘Twas the night before Christmas) all over Cambodia but it seems every woman here wore pajamas for a large portion of the day. It is a bit of a funny site to see women in high-heels and pajamas.

Khmer men just about always have their hair trimmed short and kept "proper". The local barbers were driven insane by Brandon's unruly mop. One barber was kind enough to inform Brandon that only a woman was allowed to have hair as long as his.

A short motorcycle ride away from Kratie is one of the best spots for watching fresh water dolphins that inhabit the Mekong. We made the journey and were actually able to see the dolphins from the shore. The $2.00 entrance fee and $10.00 boat fee is collected by the police for "conservation purposes". Sure. Not only did we feel we had paid our fair share to Cambodian police, but there is an information pamphlet stating the dolphins are afraid of the boats. We were happy to watch the ugly buggers play so close to the shoreline. A fish would skip across the surface of the water a few times and a dolphin would jump out of the water to catch the fish. Why not play with your food as you eat it?

Locations Visited: Kompong Cham, Kratie

No images uploaded to album.

Add Comment

Comment Policy:

Only signed in members can comment on journal entries. Please sign in now or register if you would like to leave a comment. Comments are sent to the owner of this journal for approval before being made live on the site.