The rocky road to Cambodia

Question: How many people and bags can you cram into one 8 seater minibus?
Answer: 14 plus two at the front.




The queue at the border




Not sure what the mask is about.


Just a few metres away from Thailand and suddenly all the streets are littered with rubble.



January 2005, Phnom Penh, Cambodia

I liked Cambodia from the moment we got to the border. The 300 Bhat luxury bus that was due to pick us up from our hotel in Bangkok turned out to be a mini bus for 8 people. They loaded it with 12 people and 12 sets of luggage and took us all the way to the border.

Once there I was virtually attacked by kids asking for food. I remembered that I had bought some doughnuts for the ride and pulled them out. Big mistake. Within seconds I was surrounded by about fifteen children all dressed in rags and covered in dirt shouting 'yam yam' at me and signalling their hands towards their mouths. It was heart breaking. I didn't have enough for all of them and soon enough a local adult came and shooed them all away. I’d bought the doughnuts knowing that I’d be able to give some away. OK, I caused a bit of a riot, but when else will those kids get sugared doughnuts? Tim really had a go at me. Not in a bad way. You could see his heart was going out to them too, but he feels strongly that we shouldn’t give to kids. I don’t give them money, but a bloody sugared doughnut?

There was a girl sat outside the passport office aged about 15. She was thin as a rake, with short, curly hair and her face was smeared with dirt. She was stunningly beautiful. Her clothes were in tatters. As the kids continued to hassle people for food and money, she just sat there staring ahead of her. My heart stopped beating when I saw her. She was obviously no older than 15, but her face, her expression, was one of a 60 year old. I tried desperately not to let her see my face because I was holding back tears. I didn’t want her to see my pity. I know she saw me though. By this time I’d given all my food away. As we left, Tim waited for the kids to run away and then gave her a bag of crisps that he’d forgotten we had. The local police get really angry with them and are constantly shooing them away because they pick pocket tourists on one side of the border and then run to the other side where they can’t get arrested. It was the first time I had seen misery like this since Peru. I assume she was Cambodian. Just a taster of what was to come.