Category: Daily Life in Cambodia

WHAT is she sitting on??!!

You don’t see them as much as you did a few years ago, but cattle still roam the streets of Phnom Penh which is really a large small-town.  (At least they walk on the sidewalk!)

Most people, thinking of dangers in Cambodia, immediately suggest landmines and other ERW (Explosive Remnants of War).  And the landmines are a threat.  We average a casualty every three to four days–40 years after most of the mines were put down.

Another very big and on-going menace, though, is lightning.  We’re in week 21 of this year and already 51 people have been killed by lightning.  That’s more than two a week.  In addition 40 others were injured, and 53 cows and buffalo were killed.  Much of Cambodian life is lived outdoors.  Rain or no rain, in the warm climate, the farming goes on and the children keep playing, and the lightning keeps striking.

Most Cambodians in the city eat breakfast on the street.  The thousands of little food stalls are most active during the morning commute to work and school.  Here a father and son stop for a baguette and maybe some fruit.

“Uh….you think you could leave me a place to sit?”

No Egg McMuffins but plenty of other goodies for breakfast on the run.  Note the cooking with a wood fire in the middle of the city where gas is available.  The majority of the population uses wood for cooking.  Imagine the toll on the forests when 10± million people use wood to cook meals three times a day.