"I was changing jobs back in September '98 and had to go to Cambodia to get a new visa. There had been an election in July and Prince Norodom Ranariddh was trounced. Hun Sen had complete control, but everyone knew it was rigged. Cambodians took to the streets, monks and students protesting in the parks and temples. Run of the mill until bodies started piling up outside Phnom Penh, dead monks in ditches, 100s of dead monks with holes in their heads. Soldiers were running amok at night, pulling monks out of temples, and marching through the streets in the day, quashing whatever small protests rose up. I flew into this proverbial shitstorm on a Monday, a combined visa run/vacation. Two guys that had worked at the restaurant next to my school were killed in a car accident the night before I left. I remember ironing my pants, shaking, thinking, "Things come in 3s. 3s. You're gonna die there, you're gonna die in Cambodia."
I grabbed a taxi outside Pochentong Airport. Not even out of the parking lot the driver's teasing me, "You want lady? You want ganja?" opening his glove compartment to 20 perfectly rolled joints. I kept looking out the window for some sign of the terror I knew was going on. Nothing. Just motorcycles, buffaloes and rice fields. Then the capital, Phnom Penh. "Is it safe? I mean what's going on? What the fuck is your take on all this shit?" "No worry. I drive you. You go out in morning, home early, don't go out at night, you ok. You want ganja?" I got a hotel and kept this guy. For 10$ a day he certainly seemed to have a handle on things.
There were protests everywhere. We drove all day, through them, in them, by them. Cruising along the Mekong we came to a glut of people, shouting, fists pumping, chanting. We stopped, couldn't move an inch. The crowd thinned in front of us and about 100 yards away were the goons with guns. "I think we need to leave." "You no worry. OK." The guns get closer. "I think we need to leave." "Can't. Car there not move. He stop." Guns very close. "We need to get the fuck out of here." "Yes, I think so." And over the fucking curb and onto the sidewalk we went, cutting right across the corner. "You ok. We go to Russian market, get ganja, you go hotel." I filled the tub with ice and beer and watched Cambodia on CNN.
I did 3 days in Siem Reap, touring Angkor Wat. Rented another taxi, 15$ a day. Angkor Wat is one temple, but it's actually a whole temple city that you go to see. I never... I can't describe...words don't say enough...I'd go to these 1000 year old temples, stones and weeds with buffalo wandering about. I was the only guy there, Cambodia was a dangerous place then. I had a map and would make the driver take me to EVERY obscure temple there was. He'd shake his head, say "Long time" and drive. Rice paddies and rice paddies and old Khmer Rouge cannons in the fields, then rising in the distance would be a monument to the gods. Only the Bayon is Buddhist, the rest is Hindu. I sat at an ancient pond, now dried up, staring at a fountain with an elephant head, a tiger head, 95 degrees of screaming heat, and four animal heads for each point on the compass. I walked up close and touched them, dragon flies on my ears. I saved the actual Angkor temple for my last afternoon. I did 4 hours there, no regrets, could have spent 4 days on that one temple, it's huge. I left as the sun was setting, an old man playing his saw(That's how the word sounds in English. It's not a saw, it's an instrument.), wailing some lament, said to myself, "Look long and hard. You won't ever be back. Breathe. You won't ever be back.""
