DOPE DEALER? PIMP? SCHOOL “BUS” DRIVER? HOW ABOUT ALL
Initially, I thought this guy was nuts. I was entirely new to the city – fresh out of the airport – when I took this picture. A day later, I found out that in this place, five kids and a driver on one small Honda scooter is actually rather tame.
How happy is your Pizza?
Phnom-Penh doubles as both the capital of Cambodia and one of the craziest towns on the map. Cannabis topped Pizza is the local specialty and is widely available and advertised. If Marijuana doesn’t make your pizza happy enough, every local scooter taxi will be glad to make you twice as happy with a serving of opium. You don’t even need to ask for it; the guy will offer you hard drugs like one’s offering a chewing gum.
What about regular taxis? You know, the yellow thing with four wheels and a medallion? There’s none. There are no helmets too. This basic wearable is as rare as a nun in brothel – of which there are many, by the way.
And that’s not all the things you get while you grab for your life at the back seat of your friendly scooter cab. For a 2,000 Cambodian Riel transport fee (about 50 cents), the driver will offer the casual tourist a whole supermarket of vices that will make even the most seasoned detective blush.
“No Opium?, You want Heroine? No prob!”. And if you, as yours truly, not into any such substance, the person at the front will make the obvious conclusions and offer you a young female friend, and old female friend, few female friends together, and so on. He personally offered me his “nice” – I kid you not!
As I disembarked the scooter taxi late at night (with no extra chemicals or companionship), the thought of the sheer lunacy of it all, made me laugh. It still does to this very day.
“Would you like me instead?”
Phnom-Penh’s wanton is so prevalent that going into an ordinary club and refusing the maître ‘d’s offer of girls would lead him to think you must be into boys. He offered me himself. I was so surprised it took me at least two more times to understand what he wanted and politely refuse. Ever a run-of-the-mill afternoon food market turns in this city to a scene of the bizarre. Forget shrimps, snails or even live worms. How about fried cockroaches? Preborn chicks (feathers and beak) cooked in deep oil? Maggots? I finally opted for the crispy Tarantula. At the time it seemed to me like the safest choice.
Madness is all in the eyes of the beholder.
The guy with the five schoolchildren would make top news headlines in any developed city, tagged as a lunatic, and wind up in jail. In Cambodia’s capital, he was just another, ordinary bloke making a living.
A few years later I decided to take this photo and imprint it on my credit card. It’s still there every time I make a payment, reminding me of how fortunate all of us are.
What’s your experience of Phnom Penh?
Do you know of any other capital city as unhinged as this one?
when asked my guide if he eats those cockroaches he twisted his face in disgust. that did not stop him from nibbling a bag full of aquatic insects for his afternoon snack. go figure…
Great one!
:-))
> “Do you know of any other capital city as unhinged as this one?”
Certainly, and you don’t have to look very far … Jerusalem!
As always, brilliant!