Midnight in the city of good and evil

24 May 2007,
Balcony, 1D Sothearos Boulevard, Phnom Penh.

It is past midnight. Phnom Penh is quiet. The only sounds wafting up from the silent streets are the rhythmic click click of crickets and the occasional, muted zoom of a moto in the distance. The breeze laps at my eardrums. The lane is asleep.

I cradle an orange juice, lean with my elbows against the cool balcony rail and gaze at where the laneway opens up into Sothearos. Both Thury and the pho restaurants on the corner have long ago drawn their shutters and I can now only just make out the netting hanging where the security guard has established his bed on the sidewalk. Across Sothearos, a white French colonial lamp illuminates a portion of the park and the Boulevard itself; grass, dirt, paved fountain and frangipani trees. Some light spills across into the lane, but doesn’t reach pass the balcony to uncover the mysterious turns beyond. The moon is a slice of orange in the sky, partially clouded. It hangs slightly to the left of the flashing red light marking the top of a tower, somewhere to the west. To the east lies the Tonle Sap river, not visible from where I am. Only the lights from the massive Cambodiana and Himawari hotels and, further along, the shadowy outlines of the National Assembly and Buddhist Institute’s sweeping, ornate (yet humble) roof indicate the Riverside.

The hammock swings in the breeze. Two geckos lounge on the wall. The little lizards are motionless, almost perfectly camouflaged against the yellow concrete. The sweat under my armpits cools in the wind.

This is a city of tense opposites. Light and dark, rich and poor, dirty and clean, expat barang and local, resident and tourist, volunteer and businessman, NGO and government, laughter and tears…

There is a season for everything. A time to rest, a time to work and play. The past eight months have been a hectic blend of parties, DVD’s, work, microsleeps, new people, new scenes, language, travel, church, beer, gin and tonics, throwing darts at balloons, bumper cars, flower girls, courts, police stations, drug rehab centres, mah jong, poker, khmer dancing and miscellaneous activity. I feel almost guilty that it is only now, at the end, that I take time out to reflect. I have been here, I have changed the city, people and laws and they have changed me. But I will go, as surely as day into night and night into day. And this city, despite all its woes, despite 30 years ago being a ghost town evacuated by the KR, it will endure and still be here when I go…as it is tonight, quiet again, but this time in peaceful slumber.

For now, the world is still. God whispers in the breeze and I am here. This is Cambodia…