Category: Daily Life in Cambodia

I was a little disconcerted to see this photograph in the newspaper of a bed at the Kantha Bopha Children’s Hospital in Phnom Penh.  Dr. Beat Richner, a Swiss doctor, set up the first Kantha Bopha hospital in 1992 to give free medical care to children.  There are now four or five Kantha Bopha Children’s Hospitals in the country and they are the first choice for all parents with sick children.  I have encouraged many families to take their sick children there.  The hospital rules are strict; they won’t allow foreigners into the hospital, and I don’t know why but I figured if they were doing a good job, they can make up rules like that.  But then I saw this photo with three children in one bed and it gave me pause.  Kantha Bopha may be the best hospitals in the country for children but we’ve still got a long way to go!

You should have seen the motorcycle wobble as several hundred pounds of liquid sloshed around from side to side when he was making turns.

Today I ran into this motor scooter with a new twist in ran protection.  I’ve never seen anything like it before–and I doubt whether it gives much protection from the raindrops–but at least it’s a creative and different approach to riding in the rain.

The sun is down, it’s starting to get dark, there’s a light rain falling–and it’s time to start grilling meat at a street stall near Tuol Sleng, the Khmer Rouge torture center.

“We’re still under the wires.  Throw a few more on top!”

In other countries, one would think the guy in the chair is just playing around while his buddy finishes loading the wagon.  In Cambodia, he’s probably telling the buddy “OK, I’m ready.  Let’s go!”

Can you pick out any violations or accidents waiting to happen in this picture?

• None of the motorcyclists are wearing a helmet.
• The little boy is standing in front of his mother on the second motorcycle.
• Two workers are standing on the rail of the motorcycle wagon or on top of the load.
• The far motorcyclist is using the phone while driving.  (But it’s only his left hand, the brake hand, so it doesn’t matter.)

This is 6:00 AM in the morning and everyone knows traffic rules don’t apply early in the morning.  Also the police don’t work on weekends so why worry?

One of the minor anomalies for me in Phnom Penh is the location of a bunch of small shops selling mussels and clams.  They are located on the northern edge of the city, about as far away from the river as you can get, and I’m curious how they established that location for that product.  These mussels pictured are rather big compared to the thumbnail-size ones that are sold from carts pushed around the streets.  The small ones are a favorite snack of the locals.  I’m not tempted by the mussels and clams, partly because they are generally eaten raw and partly because they come from the Mekong River and I don’t want to even put my foot in that much less eat something that lives in it.  Phnom Penh is a city of more than a million people and has almost no sewage treatment.  Guess where the raw sewage goes?

This is a really encouraging happening, a group of young people down on the Phnom Penh riverfront picking up trash.  The littering landscape here is like it was in Kentucky in the 1940s and 50s.  People then threw paper, bottles, cigarettes, etc., out the car window or just dropped trash on the street as they walked along.  Then came the Don’t Be a Litterbug campaign.  Change didn’t happen overnight but anyone throwing trash on a street in the US today knows it’s wrong.  Most people don’t know that here so it’s heartening to see this group setting a good public example by picking up after others.