But something is not quite right here: the old gents are not sharing little plates of tapas, they're munching from bowls of rice; the young businessmen's designer watches read 5:30pm, surely too early for sunset in summertime at this latitude; the labels on the beer bottles say 'Angkor' and 'Kingdom' not 'Estrella' or 'San Miguel'; the air is not a still, dry heat that hints of olive groves and vineyards, but an overbearing humidity that whispers of a coming heavy rain; and most of the people have not the deep olivey skintones of Southern Europe, but the Sunburnished browns and yellows of Southeast Asia
No, this can't be Spain. So where in the hell am I? Angkor is the clue that solves the puzzle. The great temple complex of Angkor Wat is regarded as one of the jewels of Southeast Asia, so important it is celebrated in thirst-quenching, fermented grain form. In fact, I find myself in Cambodge, Kampuchea, the ancient Khmer kingdom of Cambodia.
But what in the holy hell am I doing here...Didn't I spend months applying for teaching jobs in Europe? I could've sworn that I took that skype interview for a school not far from Cordoba in central Andalucia. I'm pretty sure I accepted their job offer and started planning for my adjustment to life in small town Spain.
But this is definitely not small town Spain, this is big city Cambodia. Phnom Penh to be precise, the biggest city The Bodge has to offer.
So how on earth did I end up here? What possessed me to abandon my best laid schemes and guaranteed job in Europe to travel to a part of the world I've never shown the remotest interest in with bare weeks to prepare for the move.
Oh, hold on, that's right. It was about a girl, wasn't it. That Australian one, the one I met in Kyrgyzstan. Something about long, dark, shiny hair, a tendency to mock me in a vaguely enticing way, eyes that you just can't stop looking into and conversations that follow a thousand tangents late into the night, and sssssrrrrupppp all the plans get torn up and thrown unceremoniously into the bin.
But that's normal right. I mean, everyone drops everything to travel halfway round the world to be with a beautiful girl that they only met a few months ago, arriving with no idea about the country and no guaranteed job prospects. Don't they? No. Well, more fool them then.
- - -
I step out of Phnom Penh Airport to be berated by a ridetocitypleasesir of tuk tuk (kind of like a horse drawn carriage, but for horse read motorbike) drivers offering to take me to wheresoever I desire. I chose the smilliest looking gent, said 'Circa 51 hotel please, street 51 and 220'. He nodded with great confidence amd offered me the price recommended in the guidebook (about US$7 if my memory serves me).
So I hop in and he drives me through the breakneck, overladen-motorbikes-zooming-through-every-conceivable-gap traffic of Phnom Penh, talking merrily about the fast pace of developments in his city, and takes me directly to hotel
Unfortunately, it was the wrong hotel. I wander in to be informed I'm in fact at the Circuit Hotel not Circa 51 and that 51/222 is on the other side of town. Fortunately, the tuk-tuk guy is still there and happily tuktuks me to 51 and 222 (with a couple of minor detours) for no extra charge.
Khmer hospitality 1, Khmer sense of direction 0.
On first impressions, Phnom Penh is like one great big building site. There is construction work everywhere. Partly as a result of Cambodia's troubled past, Phnom Penh has become a hub for NGOs and foreign aid workers and with them has come a slew of boutique hotels, coffee houses with free wifi, upmarket restaurants and luxury serviced apartment blocks. New buildings seem to go up overnight, and based on the 'get it done quick and make it look posh' manner of the building, could probably be blown down just as quick by a wolf with a bit of puff.
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| A new cafe being built on the corner of the street that I'm living on |
Now, I'm not quite foolish enough to have arrived entirely unprepared. As soon as I decided to make the move, I contacted various international schools in Phnom Penh, including the Turkish-owned Zaman School. I shared correspondence with their Head of English, who expressed positivity about my working as an English Teacher there. We agreed that I should meet up with him on September the first to discuss this.
So on the morning of September the first, I defy the stultifying muggyness with my trousers, shirt and tie (perspiring mightily) and head to Zaman School for an interview.
I arrive at what could best be described as a really well-healed limbo. The school is extremely impressive: modern, well-equipped, with a plush theatre, projectors in the classrooms and all mod cons. It is also extremely empty. There is literally nobody bloody there. I sit in the waiting room, and wait...and wait.
After half an hour or so, a cleaner turns up. After an hour or so, one of the other English teachers wanders in in full mufty, flip-flops (that's thongs for any Aussie readers) and all, and engages me in idle chat. Yep, it's a great school to work for, lots of support, good pay and if you come in on saturdays (which you don't have to) you get free doner kebab as well. A smattering of admin staff are starting to filter in. The teacher takes her leave of me, but leaves me a copy of the Phnom Penh Post (one of Cambodia's English language newspapers) to keep me amused.
After about two hours waiting, the Head of English still has not arrived. A smiling receptionist takes my number and says she'll get the Head of English to call me when he arrives. Call me he does not,,,
Strike one!
Several days later, tired of awaiting a call, and having left two more messages. I decide to take matters into my own hands and answer an ad for a job at Wale International School. A few hours pass and I receive a message inviting me for interview the next day. The school is located on street 1974, which is not marked on googlemaps but would, following the grid system, be the unmarked raod between stret 1972 and street 1976, up to the north-west of town, just past an area called Tuol Kork.
I hop on a tuk-tuk to investigate, we make our way slowly through the heavy traffic out past Tuol Kork, to street 1976, we turn one way up to street 1974...it is not there.
We head the opposite way past street 1976...next street, 1978...buggar!
Now, I ask you, what's the point of a bloody grid system when the numbers only occasionally go up and down regularly and sequentially.
And then the rain came, and poured and poured.
After a few minutes of this downpour (approximately long enough for me to get soaked through) the tuktuk driver stopped and dropped the sides to protect me from the elements.
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| In my juddery plastic cocoon |
We stop occasionally to ask a series of people who direct us confidently back and forth up a series of dead ends and back alleys to no avail. Eventually, we stop at the local police station to get some reliable information. My tuktuk man pops in and returns a few moments later, smiling:
<<The police tell me there is no street 1974>>
This is one of my first experiences of the Cambodian tendency to smile and laugh in awkward situations, when they are embarrased, when a difficult question is asked, or if they've just got nothing else to do at the time.
After another 40 minutes or so we find ourselves trundling down a dirt track in the middle of nowhere and I give up the ghost
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| Probably not the entrance to an International School |
<<Did you find your school sir?>>
Slightly bemused, I say no. He responds in a conspiratorial tone
<<I know where it is...Wale School...I know >>
Who is this Khmer Hercules? This enigmatic saviour? This fount of PP's equivalent of The Knowledge.
<<You find me tomorrow. I am the Man with the Pink Tuk-Tuk'>>
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| The Man with the Pink Tuk-Tuk in all his glory |
All my problems were solved. The next morning I found him on the corner and he took me direct to where the school was.
Except it wasn't...
What there was, was a big pile of rubble and open fields.
I check the school's phone number on my mobile but it has mysteriously vanished. So we scoot to an internet cafe and get the number from the internet. We call the number and the man on the other end directs The Man with the Pink Tuk-Tuk to the school
When I arrive, I'm ushured into a classroom which appears to have only recently ceased to be a bedroom (the marks left by four bedposts on the floor, an airing cupboard). I share the room with two rather-stressed looking Khmer ladies filling in some sort of question sheet.
I'm given a copy and I have to define a series of words vaguely related to the field of teaching and education and occasionally spelled correctly.
My testing complete, I'm brought before the headmaster and given a 15 minute grilling in broken English. At the end of this, he tells me that his is a new school, that he'd be happy for me to work for him and he can pay me $5 an hour. I figure $5 an hour is better than $0 an hour, shake his hand and ask him to email me the details in a job offer memo. Next morning the offer arrives. I email back to ask when I start...no response. I ring the school, no response...
Strike two!
So...back to the drawing board
