A Birthday Abroad - June 28, 2013

I can't remember the last time I celebrated a birthday at home. Mine happens to fall in the middle of summer vacation, so each June 28th I normally find myself in some foreign locale. This time I'm in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia.

Today, I recognized my 48th with a breakfast of my favorite, noodle soup, and I treated myself to a nice dinner.

I tried Cambodian pancakes, which is not at all how it sounds. The "pancake" is a type of thin, rice puff pastry filled with pork, bean sprouts, and cucumbers. The entry also consists of a plate of large lettuce leaves, basil, and more cucumbers.

I had no idea how to eat it, so I asked the waiter for help. The idea is to break off a section of the meat-filled pancake, put it on top of the lettuce leaf, and add basil and cucumbers to one's liking. Then the diner dunks the packed leaf into a solution of soy sauce mixed with peanuts and other seasonings. It was fabulous. Mom, don't worry. I'm stuffed every day and getting my vegetables.

Phnom Penh seems to encapsulate the ever changing, painful, political and economic reality of the country over the last 60 years.

It's been a rough ride for Cambodia, to say the least. From 1884 until gaining its independence in 1953, Cambodia was a French colony. By all accounts, the French did little to develop the region.

In 1969, the United States began secretly carpet bombing Cambodia during the Vietnam War in an attempt to slow the flow of North Vietnamese supplies into South Vietnam. When the bombing finally stopped four years later, more than half a million people lay dead.

By the way, Cambodia wasn't the only neighboring country to suffer widespread bombing. In 1964, the U.S. also began secretly bombing Laos to try to break the supply lines of the Viet Cong through Laos to South Vietnam via the Ho Chi Minh Trail. That bombing earned Laos the notorious distinction of being the most bombed country per capita in the world.

Personally, I still can't understand why the United States got involved militarily in the region. The domino effect never made sense to me, but this blog isn't meant to debate the merits of the war. Still, I wanted to give some historical perspective because Southeast Asia can't be understood without it.

Under these past circumstances, I might, as an American, expect to receive a less than warm welcome in both Laos and Cambodia, but it has been just the opposite. Fortunately, in my travels, I've found that people do a remarkable job of separating visitors from the actions of their governments.

Things got even worse for Cambodia in 1975 when the Khmer Rouge, under the leadership of Pol Pot, seized power and set upon a course of genocide. After the 44-month reign of terror ended, an estimated one million people were executed. Some put the number much higher. This death toll is even more shocking considering that the population at the time was 7 million.

If these events weren't bad enough, Vietnam invaded the country in 1978. Next, the country endured a civil war throughout the 1980s and in 1998, there was a coup.

Phnom Pehn especially felt the brunt of many of these events. The capital has always been an important commercial center. The population swelled during the first Indochina War and then surged again during the 1970s as Cambodians fled the countryside because of the U.S. bombings and guerrilla warfare.

By 1975, the population of the capital stood at two million people, but then Phnom Pehn became a virtual ghost town when Pol Pot emptied the city, forcing most of the population into the countryside. Recently, I read that the population is just now back to about one million.

Against such a backdrop, it's easy to understand why it has been so difficult for Cambodia to develop economically and develop an infrastructure.

The gulf between the rich and poor was obvious in Kratie. It is even more apparent here in Phnom Penh. There are skyscrapers, but there are also homeless people begging on the streets and shanties leading into town. Tonight, for the first time during my trip, the owner of the hotel where I am staying said if I wanted to get out after dark and walk very far away from the hotel, "There will be a problem." Unfortunately, that seems to be the case in many capitals.

A couple of days ago, I wrote that I felt that Kratie and Cambodia in general has a frontier-town mentality. Last night, I was speaking to a Spanish man who runs a restaurant, who agreed with my observation.

He described himself as someone of modest means who decided to give it a shot in Cambodia. Since the country is trying to develop economically and there isn't an overabundance of regulation, he said it's fairly easy for someone to chart his or her course without interference from the government or police.

However, as it is across the planet, life is still very difficult for those on the lower end of the economic ladder, struggling to merely get by. For them, Cambodia isn't necessarily a land of opportunity.

At the same time, little regulation results in problems like sewage in the streets, a lack of medical care and other basic services, and widespread corruption.

O.K., enough of the the background. I just don't want to give the impression that Southeast Asia is Disney Land. There are many problems here, just as there are around the world, including my own country. Really, I am just a teacher trying to see a little bit of the world and share my experiences and observations.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time in Kratie. My hotel was next to the central market, which was buzzing with activity from dawn till dusk.

I had an amusing encounter with one of the merchants. I wanted to exchange my remaining Laotian money, but no one would take it. Finally, I found a guy willing to do it. We communicated by punching numbers into a calculator. Really, he was doing me a favor changing it in the first place, but the rate was terrible.

I enjoy horse trading, so we went back and forth in a good spirited manner, although we couldn't understand a word between us. Finally, I got across the point that the rate was much better in Laos. He smiled, made a motion like he was riding a motorcycle, and pointed north.

Immediately, I understood and burst out laughing. I think he was saying if the exchange rate was so good in Laos then I should jump on my motorcycle and go back there.

With that, he also began laughing, gave me a slightly better rate, and we concluded the deal, mainly on his terms.  As I've told people before, I remember encounters long after I've forgotten sites.

Speaking of sites, tomorrow, I plan to head west to Angkor to see the remains of one of the world's greatest ancient civilizations. Tonight, I'm just relaxing before the bus trip.

I appreciate all of you reading my blog. Thanks for your e-mails and your words of encouragement. As always, I'll be in touch.