On the Road with Kem

Life changes quickly in a developing country and I have been called elsewhere. As I reflect on my time in Phnom Penh, the one constant aside from my volunteer work with Daughters NGO was my tuk-tuk driver Kem. He collected me daily from work in the slums near Wat Steung Mean Chey, rain or shine--mostly rain though, among the dark late afternoon clouds.


On my last day in town, Kem drove me to the airport. Before he dropped me off, we stopped briefly, so I could interview him about the tuk-tuk, which was a source of fascination during my stay. Tuk-tuks are the major mode of tourist transport in Phnom Penh. In this hectic, lawless town, a trustworthy, savvy tuk-tuk driver is an asset. Kem was always there for me, only a text message away. He was a safe, dependable driver and a good friend. I will miss him and our daily drives.


Talking in a Tuk-tuk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HwuYZMfmXlI

This short video, only five minutes of the fifteen we talked, is breathtakingly amateurish: The sound is poor, due to passing moto traffic; I'm sweating bullets like a rookie thanks to the heat; and at one point, there is the disconcerting sound of someone sharpening a knife. But more important than the video quality, or lack thereof, is the interviewee: The kind, hard-working man who made a challenging experience manageable for me, by ensuring I arrived, whenever, wherever, safe and sound.

Tuol Sleng

I arrived to Phnom Penh exactly three months ago by bus from Siem Reap. It is a five hour bus ride and they show movies along the way. I usually enjoy films but on this particular bus ride, they showed Zombie movies, a Khmer favourite. I had never seen a zombie movie before, did not in fact know it was a distinct genre, and I am now quite certain I never want to see another. Only marginally better were the karaoke videos played during intermission, at full volume.

When I got to town, I caught a tuk-tuk to the Boddhi Tree Hotel Umma. It is a lovely hotel, with a spacious garden restaurant and large airy rooms. But it is best known for its location. It sits directly across the street from S-21, the former Khmer Rouge prison known now as Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, where thousands of Cambodians were detained and tortured in the mid to late seventies.

The site is a former high school, comprised of four three-story buildings and a large central courtyard. Today, visitors can walk through the buildings and see the small cells where people lived for months at a time. The fourth building, Building D, is filled with graphic photos of the dead. It is not for the faint of heart.

It took me three months to find the courage to visit this place, as I had heard stories about how awful and disturbing it was. But what struck me most about Tuol Sleng was not the barbed wire, the cage-like rooms, or the photos. It was the silence: It is the most peaceful place in town.

And now for something completely different...

I was told I was going to experience beggar fatigue out here. There are beggars everywhere, young, old, limbs, no limbs, every shape, colour, and size. They are the backdrop to decades of poverty and conflict. But no, in fact I don't have beggar fatigue at all. Granted, I don't give them money when they ask, since warlord gangsters control the beggars and collect their proceeds at the end of the day. But I don't avoid them either. The beggars are simply doing their job, like the rest of us.

However, I do have a fatigue of sorts. I have "Old Western man with young Asian girl" fatigue. Every restaurant, every cafe, every street corner here, there is a Western Grandpa getting it on with a Cambodian girl forty or fifty years his junior. I said I would not judge, but I take it back. I judge now. Oh, I can talk about flip-flops and rain storms until the emaciated cows come home to the rice paddy, but the most pervasive image here is the sex tourists. It gets a little draining and after a while, you just don't want to see it anymore. If I am being ageist, by not complaining about the entire age spectrum of people exploiting the women here, well then tough, get over it. Somehow, the cute 23-year old on his gap year trip having a little romp doesn’t seem half as bad as the 70-year old man who should have gotten it out of his system long ago. So in the spirit of Juvenal and Jonathan Swift, I have made a meagre effort to express my further thoughts on this issue in song, to be sung to the tune of "Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer".



Grandpa Got Run Over by a Tuk-Tuk


Grandpa got run over by a Tuk-Tuk
Walking home from whorehouse Sunday eve
You can say there’s no such thing as justice
But as for me and Bong Srey* we believe

He’d forgotten his Viagra
And he’d found a Miss Right Now
So he left to find his blue pills
To ensure Cambodian Boom Boom Pow

But Gramps had been super forgetful
In the throes of new romance
He forgot his hearing aid and glasses
So against a speeding tuk-tuk, he stood no chance.


The tuk-tuk driver hadn’t see him
Or so he claimed to the police
Who arrived to fine the white man
Who was lying dazed but aroused in the street


And now Grandpa’s back with Grandma
And he’s got a lot to ‘splain
How he wasn’t at a conference
But was seeking Asia nooky down the lane

[Chorus! All together now! ]

Grandpa got run over by a Tuk-Tuk
Walking home from whorehouse Sunday eve
You can say there’s no such thing as justice
But as for me and Bong Srey* we believe!





*Bong Srey: "Sister" in Khmer, common form of address among Cambodian women