Knhum tau Tai Ches bi dong (Dec. 07) - part 1

Another week has passed, time sure flies fast. It’s time for another update. Last week was quite a busy week, but fun. Earlier in the week, I had the chance to invite two of the youth interchurch committee members out for lunch/dinner fun day just to encourage them. They are also the same two I prayed for in Viet at the first interchurch youth meeting that I attended. Each was the youth leader at their respected church. My goal is to get to know each youth leader as well as encouraged them for the good work that they are doing. Because of the lack in entertainment in this city, I decided to take them to Sorya mall. It is a seven-stories mall, the second biggest/newest mall in Phnom Penh. It is a popular hangout place for teens. I see a lot of teens playing hooky here daily. The mall itself does not have a lot to offer in term of products wise. It, however, offers the ability to kill time through window shopping, the food court, the arcade, and the rollerblade rink at the top level of the mall. I guessed that is the same with the Western mall. However, there is an interesting event which I would like to tell you guys about.

As I was driving Lam and Thuy to the mall, I have a little run in with the traffic cops. Rest assured, I know I was not breaking any traffic law at all. If you wondering about the legal limit of the number of the people on a motorbike, it’s the number that you can fit on your moto. So I know I wasn’t breaking any law regarding this limit. However, as I was driving, this traffic cop came out to stop my moto. He tried to stop me by taking his plastic red and white barber /candy cane batton and smack one right in my chest as I was trying to slow down. I don’t see why he should hit me when I was slowing down. But as I come to a complete stop a little further away due to momentum, the two behind me urged me to just leave. Adrenaline was pumping, all I can hear was “Go, go, go”. Reacted to my impulse, I revved the moto and booked it. It was pure joy to see that traffic cop started to run toward me only to catch me looking at him driving off. It was bad I know. But before you say anything about my poor judgment I really think it is from hindsight), the cop were just pulling me over to haggle some money out of me because he saw that I am a foreigner. Reflecting back at the situation, I had the legal number of people on my bike and my bike has the useless side mirrors which nobody ever used but can be finable if you don’t have one. After driving off, those two pointed out even more cultural issues which I started to notice a lot more during the trip to the mall.

First, traffic cops can fine you for anything and everything. Your moto does not have the useless side mirrors. FINE. You turn on a green light. FINE. You turn with 5 seconds left on the turning light. FINE. You drive through the intersections with 10 seconds left on the green light. FINE. You are driving normally, obeying all the international traffic laws. FINE. You drive a moto. FINE. Do you see a common theme here? Everything is finable.

Second, there is no common spoken / unspoken rule in regard to driving / riding motos here. The laws vary from corner to corner as traffic polices enforces their own laws. You may say it’s usurp but it’s true. It is hard to follow rules here when the rule changes from one intersection to another. Also, they can fine you for anything and everything. Remember in my first post I talked about the fact that polices here are to serve and to extort and that foreigners are cash cows? Well, it has been reconfirmed. I see the locals runs red lights, turn on red lights, drive on the wrong side of the street, making illegal u-turn, and out running cops when the cops try to stop them but the cops would just stand and watch. However, try doing that when you are a foreigner driving a regular moto / car and they will have a welcoming committee waiting for you.

Third, the fine money does not go to the treasury of the state but to the individuals giving out fine. From what I learned and observed, the traffic cops will have a little box with them at the corner. This box contains all the fines collected throughout the day. Oh yeah, one thing I forgot to mention is that the traffic cops collect fines on the spot. There is no ticket given, no place to go to pay fine, and fines are bargain-able (I have heard story of missionaries refusing to pay fines. The missionaries ended up sitting there for half an hour before the police let them leave because the police know that they can’t make any money from the missionaries). At the end of the day, a decent percentage goes to their officer in charge and the rest are divvy up equally amongst those who are present.

Fourth, the missionary rule ‘When at lost, do what the local do’ do not apply to all situation. Since the traffic police are looking out for foreigners, they will skip / turn a blind eye to 10 locals who are breaking 100 traffic laws just to catch 1 foreigner who may or may not be breaking 1 traffic law. So doing what the locals do would only get you in trouble with the traffic cops. Or you could do what the locals do and just drive off when they try to pull you over.

Having said all that, I do not have any negative thoughts regarding the culture. In the words of a missionary I know, ‘It’s not bad. It’s just different’. I found out that learning the culture is a day by day immersion of experiences. It’s not something you can learn in a few months time by reading a book. As the day progress, I am learning more and more about Cambodian culture and I am learning to appreciate it more and more. Days of reflection tell me that all culture has its good and bad. I am just praying that I can keep the good and block out the bad. But that is enough, back to the day with two youth leaders.

Having undergone the traffic experience with them, I have plenty of questions to talk to them about and learn from them. Honestly, I thought it was going to be awkward considering there is a huge age gap, cultural difference, and different mindset but that traffic incidence really helps the conversation going. We ended up walking around the mall a bit before heading to the arcade to play. The arcade here consist of a lot of those ‘claw-to-win-stuff-animals’ machine, a bunch of poker machines, a row of machines contain shooting games. That is it. It is smaller than what I expected. Even so, this is considered pretty fun for them. We poke fun at each other miserable attempts at the stuffed animals machines as well as each other extremely poor hands-eyes coordination at the shooting games. We followed it up by having dinner at a restaurant inside the mall called Master Grill. It is basically a hybrid of MacDonald and KFC. They sell both burgers and fried chicken. Each combo ranged from 2-3 USD. The food was cheap according to Western standard and extremely expensive according to Khmai standard. Considering an average person wage is around 2-3 USD a day. It is quite expensive. I asked them if they have ever tried these kinds of food and they both shake their heads saying that it’s impossible for them to try because they don’t even work. It made me realized what a privileges it is for me to be able to afford these kinds of meal for myself. It is somewhat a cultural shock for me to be able to witness this as I could never imagine somewhere else in the world can be this impoverished. I mean sure you can read book, read newspaper headlines, and even watch TV news about world poverty but all those do not come close to the first-hand experience I just experienced.

Afterward, we went around the mall for a bit and just did more window shopping. It was fun and we ended the day with ice cream at Swensen. For those of you who don’t know what Swensen is, it is an extremely pricey ice cream parlor with extremely delicious ice cream. I am not trying to flaunt my wealth to them by inviting them to eat here with me. Rather, I want them to know that the work they are putting into their respective church and the interchurch youth group is greatly appreciated. I confirmed over and over that I really admired their willingness to serve even though it may be more than an inconvenience for both to do so. We had a blast just talking and eating ice cream. It was fun. We talk about their lives and how they are coping with the business of school and church. It was fun. They tried to hide from me when I went to pay the cashier. It was cute. Little did they know that I had the key to the moto and could easily left them behind. But it was their act of playfulness which makes me feel at ease with the both of them.

The following day was horrible. I was extremely thirsty throughout the whole day. I do not want to eat anything except for drinking glasses and glasses of liquid all day long. I tried to work on my sermon for the monthly interchurch youth group meeting this Saturday but eventually give up because of the constant run to the washroom. I later found out that I have a minor MSG reaction. I found out that MSG doesn’t like my body and vice versa. The good thing is that I found out the source of the problem which cause my body to behave erratically. The bad thing is that I have to be extremely careful of what I eat because MSG in food is as common, if not more, than salt and sugar in food. Khmai people love sugar and MSG. They go together like fish and water; grass and cows, etc. (pardon my poor attempt at being a poet). The rest of the day went fine as I was able to meet up with Duc and had a venting session with him. He told me about various things and we also went to get his Bumblebee painted. The bike looks really sweet after the paint job. It now resembles the real Bumblebee. It looks sweet.