I have been living and working in Cambodia for the past 18 months. I use the word “living” lightly – but in my nomadic lifestyle, Cambodia has been a home for me. It is where I work. It is where I go out (occasionally). It is where I sleep. It is where I eat. It is where I return to month after month after vacations around South East Asia, Australia and UK.

People keep asking me what Cambodia is like. Especially those who haven’t even left their own country.

I often answer very succinctly – “It’s different”. Obviously it an extremely vague answer, but it does sum up the country well. Every aspect of life is different, especially compared to the more developed countries, and I don’t mean just the western world; it’s quite different from neighbouring Thailand and Vietnam.

A track in the fields, Kampong Thom province, Cambodia

Living activities in Cambodia – one gets a sense it’s one long street outside the main cities of Phnom Penh, Battambang, Siem Reap and Shihanoukville (Kampong Som). Again it’s an unhelpful description of mine. In the western world, people live in a patch of area off the main road (in general), residential areas like cul-de-sacs. Main roads (high streets, first streets, Street 1, etc) tends to be shopping areas. In Cambodia, everyone lives on the throughfares of some description.

A random street in southern Cambodia

There was one place I visited in northern central Cambodia that actually was a cul-de-sac. I was gobsmacked. Of course, it’s not your average estate, but a collection of hut with a *dedicated access track* leading to it.

Living by the roads is a necessity for the vast majority of Cambodians. It seems the country is a nation of shopkeepers, hoping for some trade by passing people. Fuel in Johnny Walker Red Label bottles for your cycle adapted with a lawnmower engine, fruits, foodstuffs, drinks, cigarrettes, cows, baskets, engines, and body shells. Young babies and dogs are amazingly cunning at when to cross the road and avoiding being squashed.

Puncture? Nah, just take it off! Kampot, Cambodia

Corruption is endemic and so ingrained in the Cambodian pysche that when a corrupt transaction occur, absolutely no effort is taken to conceal it. People mutter in disgust behind closed doors and know it is a problem but no one really challenges it for fear of reprisals.

Life may be tough, but it’s a whole lot tougher in a Cambodian jail. Reading an English-language newspaper, the Cambodian Daily, I recollect a story about a westerner behind bars. Apparently he only get a thimble full of rice. Rice that was swept off the floor of a rice mill. He then need to boil it himself, but the only water available, allegedly, is from puddles. Sanitation, what sanitation? It must have been a shock for the westerner, but equally for the Cambodians behind bars – some probably thought it couldn’t have gotten any worse before detention.

The local people who work with us are paid very generously. One of our Cambodian staff paid a lady 500 riels as I didn’t have cash on me and I later repaid him. He said it doesn’t matter, it’s only 500 riels, it’s nothing. I pointed out that before he started working for us more than a year ago, 500 riels was not pocket change to him, almost like 5 quid to a minimum wage worker in the UK. This still can buy a few staple goods or an hour of internet access in my case. 500 riels is about 9 pence/14 US cents.

The Cambodian countryside is a rich variety of vibrant greens from the different stages of the rice agricultural cycle in the wet season. Come dry season, much of it is parched to a dusty brown or dull green colour.

Fields in Takeo province, Cambodia

The dry season can be very hot, 40c in Battambang in April, the hottest month, is not unusual. Closer to the wet season, humidity goes up like towering cumulonimbus clouds. Distant thunders rolls on relentlessly and flashes of lightning are frequent in the night sky.

Summer 2008 saw a notable lack of rain – sure it rained but not much. However, the following summer, it rained, rained, rained and rained. Days became like a UK winter up in the far north of Scotland – you notice a distinct lack of light and it seems like the sun is going to bed at 2pm despite the summer days becoming longer. It rained so much that a dam under construction upstream of Kampot has burst. Luckily the river is pretty wide at Kampot, that the effects was a bit of localised flooding.

Children in Cambodia, at first glance, appear to grow fast. Kids go to school and then come back home to take a cow for a walk, do some work, sell items, begging, look after their even younger siblings or ride a motorbike before they can ride a bicycle. But they really do let their hair down when it is time to play – be it in a river, lake, tree or a set of swings in a park and they are pretty aerobatic and I’m sure they could give the underage Chinese Olympic gymnastics a run for their money judging by their performance on the swings – way too high even for me when I was a kid! If they fall, they just pick themselves up, dust off and get back on again or tend to themselves if they bruised something.

Sadly, the time has come for me to leave Cambodia. I will miss the Honey Bar in Kampot – if you’re ever in the area, do give the bar a try, the two girls there are fantastic, plenty of music and a pool table at good prices and is fairly popular with the local expats.

For really good food, the Ritikiviki (damned if I remembered how to spell it) hotel/restaurant/bar on the riverside is extremely good, but they charge Phnom Penh prices (ie, pricey but relatively cheap to westerners). Nice balcony view of the river too.

Kampot, Cambodia

Goodbye Cambodia, will be back!