Phnom Penh - Wednesday. We are flying out of this fascinating city in a few hours' time, bound for Siem Reap. Para, whom I am sponsoring for English lessons, came down by bus, a dusty five-hour ride, but we are flying him back with us - his first time on an airplane. He's had a great time and is loaded with grammar books and readers, all so unbelievably cheap. A huge Khmer-English dictionary, hard-cover, about 4" thick and put out by Oxford, is $21. Books we use for teaching English that I have bought in Brisbane for $47, are $7 here. Not photocopied but original. Dozens of high quality books on grammar for $2! Power-saving fluorescent globes are 80 cents, a new desklight was $3. Why? Surely taxes and freight to Australia cannot be that much.
Janet is going to write about the orphanage when she can put down her reading material. She has just devoured book after book on this journey but has also seen the sights. Strangely, I've not done all the "sights" that the guidebooks dictate MUST be seen. I like wandering, shopping at the markets, getting lost, meeting the locals. I always feel as if I am going to return in the near future and maybe see the sights then.
Last night at The Sugar Plum, an up-market, authentic Khmer restaurant, 200 m from this outstandingly beautiful guest house, inbetween the Khmer grilled fish with soy beans and the shredded beef in ginger, the city was plunged into darkness. Maybe it was the gin and tonics or just that we are becoming so laid back, but we toasted yet another facit of Phnom Penh. Same thing this morning in the middle of retrieving emails.
Janet has some wonderful tales of her discoveries and seeing Geraldine Cox out at the orphanage and for dinner on Monday night. Geraldine hates the hair-raising drive from the orphanage into the city, a distance of 15 kms, and says she has to have sufficient gin and tonics to give her courage to drive back home. Her jokes and stories were strong enough for Para and his 24-year old uncle, Mao, not to be understood but to leave Janet spluttering with embarrassment.
Siem Reap in a few hours and we'll be there for Christmas Day, which the Khmer think is our New Year festivity. Luckily we'll be in Vietnam by then so we don't have to explain why we celebrate it all again a week later.
