Thursday, November 16, 2006

Battambang: The Days After the Vietnamese Left



"Vietnamese soldiers had been slowly trickling back home for years but it wasn’t until the 9th of September in 1989 that the final three divisions left Battambang. To mark this auspicious occasion a leaving ceremony was performed around Battambang’s famous Dambang Statue (at that time looking very worse for wear) and the locals schools were duly emptied to provide an appropriately large and impressive audience."

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I always look forward to a new Chhay Vet article, his simple, matter of fact, anecdotes about the darkest period of Khmer history.

Doubly interesting to me because they are based on Battambang, this is where Heng and her family are from.

Follow the link to read the full article.

http://www.khmer440.com/?p=763#more-763

Wednesday, November 15, 2006

Retarded Chimpanzees on Crack™

Retarded Chimpanzees on Crack™

You know that you are having a bad day when before 07:00 in the morning you are chasing a car down on foot with the intention of strangling the driver.

…rewind…

Anyone that has been in Cambodia for longer than thirty seconds is aware of the fact that your average driver here, regardless of age, race, religion or shoe-size, has less motoring skills than a Retarded Chimpanzee on Crack™.

This fact was, quite literally, rammed home yet again this morning.

While sat in my usual Rice-Shack having breakfast a loud *>BANG<* distracted me from the Cambodia (rarely) Daily (almost) looking up I was surprised to see a new Toyota Camry parked in the spot where my bike and two others had previously been parked. This defiance of the Laws of Physics was, of course, achieved by reversing without looking straight into the three bikes parked on the pavement outside the restaurant.

Leaping to my feet, I rushed over just in time to see the teenage girl driving the car accelerate away as fast as she could onto Sisowath Boulevard. I gave up the unequal race after about 50 yards and returned, seething, to the pile of crushed motorbikes.



The two plasticy Suzuki Vivas had suffered quite badly, ping, ping, ping. The Playboy Mean-Machine had not fared a lot better; twisted handlebars, cracked brake-fluid reservoir, dented tank, cracked side-panel, et cetera.

What added to the infuriation was the fact that next door but one to the restaurant, the entire road had been blocked off by a wedding, which of course meant that there were half a dozen police officers milling around parking cars and earning some more ‘tea money’.

However, while all the Camry crash-bang-wallop-flee was going on, they just stood there watching and laughing, like it was an entertaining television program.

Honestly, the police in this country are far worse than the criminals. Hell, if we just put fucking monkeys in blue clothes they could do a better job.



Thursday, November 09, 2006

For You Incoming People...

Hi, for the 20 or so of you who are coming out to visit me later this month, here are some nice photos !

Click on the link to John's website for more.