Cambodia

My first visit to Cambodia was strange. Having caught a cold in Thailand, we landed at night and were taken to our resort outside of Siem Reap. I woke the next day to discover I was not well enough to go on any tour. We cancelled the guide and made our way downtown to buy some medicine. Later, sitting in the covered terrace of the hotel watching the torrential rain, stoned on cold meds and listening to Brian Eno and Harold Budd ambient soundscapes, I got the feeling there was a lot going on here that you couldn’t really see. My wife gladly signed up for 2 massages that afternoon (best day of her life, she says) and I continued contemplating the unique combination of colonialism, genocide, war, and those immense, sacred places of stone. Somehow, we did the shortened tour the next day.

We promised to return and did. The next visit was a few years later and included two weeks traveling the whole country.

And so I realized that the cold meds were speaking the truth. Despite— perhaps because of — everything seen and not seen, the Cambodians still welcome the visitor with the famous Khmer Smile.