Tale Number One:
you can buy a "seat" in something called a 'share taxi' to get from one city to another. i have not done this, so im quoting a friend named Izzy who has deemed this her favorite (and cheapest) way to get from the province in which she works, back and forth to Phnom Penh as needed. keep in mind that Izzy is a very fit, patient and thin individual. for various personality and body type reasons, the share taxi would not be as appealing to most of the rest of us.
most of the cars used as taxis here are just plain old mid-1990s Camrys or Corollas, some of which are far more street-legal than others.
then you have the share taxi....
put on your imagination hats, kids, as i walk you through a very crowded tour, from trunk to nose, of this creative ride share experience.
the trunk is stuffed to the brim with the passengers' various belongings, and then the gaping trunk lid is tethered to the bumper with something that must have been lying on the ground near the car when it was time to tie up: wire, old cloth, plastic twine.... in the trunk: animal cages, rice, suitcases, presents, seeds, etc.
if there was a rearview mirror, and if the driver were somehow still about to see out back in that mirror, the view would then be made obsolete by the rest of the belongings shoved into the space behind the seats and in front of the rear window. accompanied, of course, by the omnipresent felt dog decoration with the bouncing bobble head.
in the back seat there are 4-6 people. adults and the requisite screaming infant, usually breastfed throughout the trip (thank god).
when you buy a ticket on the share taxi, you are buying one of about 8 seats in the Camry and a bit of trunk space. 4-6 bodies in the back, 2 in the front passenger seat, and then one person to the left of the driver, who is also on the left. sometimes, apparently, that person shares driving duties with the official driver (who is not counted among the 8 "available" seats) and operates either the pedals or the steering wheel. and sometimes - Izzy swears it - theres a tiny little old lady sitting in the lap of the driver, with the little pedal helper lodged in on the far left.
all windows down to accomodate limbs that wouldnt otherwise fit.
so this is how you get where youre going. luckily, you can buy two seats and at least not have someone on your lap.
gotta love when people make do with what they have....
Tale Number Two:
in Cambodia, most people are cremated when they die. Buddhist, right? and some are buried in fancy coffins in fields in something resembling a sarcophagus, but decorated like a Chinese child's 5th birthday party.
i cant tell you HOW i know this (except, hint: got recruited for a top secret CIA mission), but Cambodia only has three coolers in which to store dead bodies. in... the... whole... country.
there is one Khmer medical examiner, who im dying to meet because hes been described as looking like the crazy basement dwelling, totally-into-dead-bodies, creepy laughing long haired weirdo autopsy-ist -- except!! they dont DO autopsies here! you cant get one!
so here we have this situation in which an ex-pat person dies, for example, and there happen to be three other dead bodies in Cambodia at the same time that are at the morgue in Phnom Penh rather than laid out under the grieving family's stilt house in the provinces. now we have a problem, because there are four dead people and only three coolers. what to do?!
someone has to stand there, and rotate the bodies out of the coolers every 30 minutes; #4 goes in while #1 comes out, and #2 and #3 move down the row to the left. 30 minutes later, it shifts all over again.
Tale Number Three: (over 18 only)
im going to say two words and you tell me the first thing that comes to your mind:
Asian massage
ok, stop. you dont have to tell me what came to mind. in fact, im hoping you wont.
the point is that getting a massage in Asia is fairly widely known for men to be very likely to include the offer of a "happy ending." i have male friends who dread getting a massage here, because they want the old-fashioned, Puritan-value kind where you have nice major-muscle-group rubdown with some oil and it feels nice and then you almost fall asleep and then you get up and leave far more relaxed than when you came in. and, its usually $4-8 for one hour, so thats also relaxing.
however, the reality of their experiences here is far more stressful. they KNOW that at some point in the massage, they are going to have to face the issue/question of whether they want the massage to take a sexual detour or not. and - i get this - they dont want to walk straight in to the establishment before the massage stating, 'i DO NOT want a sexual massage. just a normal, non-genital-touching one' - because that seems presumptuous and rude.
this is a common scenario, and i feel bad for those guys having to deflect the unwanted attention (if thats not what theyre into.)
however, the problem has since broadened in scope.
remember when massages for women were relaxing? like, always? like, for as long as we can remember in the history of human kind?
ladies - our day of the troubling massage has arrived. and trust me on this one, because i have done extensive research in the field about where to find the best and most affordable massage. i have been lucky to have zero incidents of inappropriate sexual touching, but three friends have not been as lucky as i.
its rare that a massage place will give you a male masseuse, so you always get a lady. [i should also state here that lesbianism is very taboo and for some, especially for women, is simply not on the radar at all. veritably unknown and certainly shocking.]
Friend #1: reputable massage place, paying $8 - got some unexpected full-on nipple massage 3/4 way into the hour.
Friend #2: same place and price as Friend #1 - got more than that. enough said.
both friends immediately jumped from surprise and the issue was dropped without further comment. no happy endings, and they were fine with that -- but still tres awkward.
Friend #3: weirdest yet....
she went to a less expensive place near her house, but it was still a place she had been 3-4 times already. during second half of massage was lying on her back with her eyes closed, of course, and the masseuse kissed her on the bellybutton with an open mouth.
WHAT?! what in heaven's name?
when she was relaying the story i immediately cupped my hand over my mouth in shock and said - "what did you do?!"
and she said immediately tensed up, but then she just laid there with her eyes closed and hoped it would stop.
it did. that was all. just an incident, apparently, of a little affectionate navel kissing between total strangers.
she and i told the staff at work, just to make sure that we werent missing something simple, like that this was a common way that Khmer women showed friendship feelings between themselves. they were shocked. absolutely shocked. all they could say was -"P'sutt goatt?!" [literally, "Her mushroom?!" - the Khmer word for bellybutton.]
still a mystery, but the general consensus is that friend #3 should not revisit mushroom-smooching, neighborhood massage parlor.
just in case.
Tale Number Four:
my Aussie friend Pete just finished his social work internship in a village in another province. he made great friends with all the village people, and especially with the children.
by his third day there, he had genuinely befriended the village chief (and his supervisor for his project), whose name was Sineng.
They had another meeting scheduled on Pete's 4th day in the village. early that morning, Pete got this text on his phone from another of the attendees: "Hi Pete. I would like to suggest to cancel our meeting as Sineng died tonight around 2:30am."
Suggest? how cute is that?....
Sineng had suffered a heart attack and had died on the way to the hospital. this was especially sad to the community, since he was so beloved in the village and apparently had a great sense of humor and ease with other people.
fast forward to the funeral a few days later. Pete is playing a quiet game of soccer with the kids while the adults nearby hold the service to release Sineng's spirit to the universe, his body lying in a grave near the village. a somber event, and a dark day for his family and friends.
Pete kicks the soccer ball to a smaller child, who puts his foot out to stop the ball. luck would have it that the snazzy soccer move deflected the ball into the air, and then..... you guessed it - directly into the open grave.
Pete said he thinks that it took an average amount of time for the ball to go from the tip of the kid's flipflop to the grave, but it seemed as though it took 15 minutes.
keep in mind that this is a country whose people harbor a LOT of superstition. if you are flying a kite and it dives down and hits the top of someone's house, you have just brought bad luck to their family for generations, as well as bad karma for yourself for this unintentionally evil act. so you can only imagine what Pete was thinking as he stood there, one week into his internship, with no Khmer language skills, having watched the soccer ball disappear on a trajectory toward Sineng's lifeless body, and into the earth.
there were a few moments of stunned silence as everyone realized what had happened. many were on their feet, wondering what to do next. then the whole crew burst into loud laughter, slapping each other on the backs and proclaiming that this was just the way that Sineng would have wanted his funeral to go...
Pete, for one, took it like a champ, and went right down into the grave to retrieve the ball. good on 'im!, as the Aussies say.
at the end of his internship, the villagers threw him a party to celebrate his time there. he took a bus back out to the village last weekend to celebrate with them and to tell them goodbye.
one of the children who had been his playmates lived in the house that was hosting the party. Pete had been chasing him around and around and tickling him, and all the adults were laughing along with the child's infectious laugh. as with most 4 year olds, he just keep begging to play an annoyingly tedious game looooong after the adult (who usually initiated the damn thing in the 1st place) has decided that they are too winded, embarrassed or bored to continue on.
Pete decided to switch it up and toss the kid onto the bed. immediately after launching said child into midair, Pete realized that it was not a bed after all, but a wooden table draped in a sheet and topped with two pillows. the child hit the table with a sickening thump and looked up at Pete like, 'big buddy? for REAL?' - with that 'please let me know if i should start bawling or not' face.
Pete rushed to the table and begin tickling him again, again reassuring his right place in the village as the local somewhat destructive and unpredictable but well-meaning whitey - still accepted by all.
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