Dengue Fever wakes up Battambang

When my friend Katie posted to her Facebook about Dengue Fever in Battambang, her loved ones were concerned. Drink more water. Be safe. Do you need to go to the hospital?

Perhaps she should have clarified. We’re talking about Dengue Fever, the band.

I was pretty damn excited when I heard an internationally known band would be giving a free concert in Battambang, Cambodia. Battambang is perennially described as “chill” and “laid back” and “sleepy”. What, I wondered, would it look like when a big act moved in?

The day of the concert, a stage was set up opposite the riverside noodle and fruitshake stalls. As it got closer to the concert time, the road was roped off from passing vehicles. This was a nice and unexpectedly thoughtful touch in a country that seems widely unconcerned with road traffic safety.

No parking was provided, so most people pulled up on their motorbikes, formed a large semicircle around the stage, and sat on their motorbikes for the duration of the concert. The rest of us stood near the stage, surrounded by the protective contingent of bikes. Despite a decent showing of a couple hundred people, there was ample room to stand and dance without feeling claustrophobic.

The lead singer from Dengue Fever lives in Los Angeles, but was born in Battambang. When she came out on the stage, she pointed out her old primary school and told us in Khmer and English just how happy she was to be there.

She, and the rest of the band, knew how to work the mainly Khmer crowd. They played almost exclusively Khmer songs, many of which had a psychedelic Dengue Fever-edge to them. The crowd danced and sang along to many of the songs.

The only thing that marred the night was the advertising coup of the Cambodian mobile company, Smartphone. They had handed out inflatable green batons which many in the audience were using to slap together offbeat and playfully hit each other with.

So what does Battambang look like when it’s woken up?

Not a lot different, really. The concert ended by 9:30 p.m. and most people went straight home afterwards. Even twenty minutes later, the roads were empty again, save for the litter of flyers and fluorescent leaflets carpeting the ground.

But for a few hours, a crowd gathered in Battambang and danced and sang together, Barang and Khmer side by side.

Back in the Saddle Again. Plus, Endemic Corruption in Cambodia

It’s safe to say that after cycling 3000 kilometers through Cambodia and Vietnam last year, I was harboring some major cycling nostalgia. But after recently riding a bicycle the 100 kilometers from the Thai border into Battambang, Cambodia, I can confidently say that the best way to cure nostalgia is to revisit it in person. This acts as an antidote to rehashing it in your mind.

In other words, as I cycled up hill after hill, baking in the tropical sun, I often thought, “Oh yeah, cycling sucks sometimes. Hmm, I guess I had forgotten.”

Not to say that I didn’t enjoy myself. I did. The scenery, possibly because it was so hilly, was beautiful. Rolling green hills, luxuriantly green after the recent heavy rainy season. Fruit orchards on either side of a wide paved road. (Wide paved road? Where am I? Can this be Cambodia!?)

About 50 kilometers into the trip, I met a man who had lived in Minnesota, often passing through my home state of Iowa. He spoke with an American accent and while I lay in his hammock, exhausted and sunburnt, he regaled me with stories and cultural references related to the states.

What I remember most, though, is what he told me about Cambodia. There’s a saying I’ve heard bandied about here: In Cambodia, the system isn’t corrupt; corruption is the system. I could illustrate this point with a laundry list of examples, but instead, I’ll relate something that my new acquaintance told me.

There are police checks along every stretch of highway in Cambodia and it’s no secret that these policemen will often pull you over and fine you for any offense—real or imagined, big or small. A truck driver who owned his own transport company said that he regularly paid over $2,000 US in these roadside bribes just to pass through the country.

None of this is a surprise. But here’s what I didn’t know, those policemen have to pay their supervisors (in dinners, socializing, and under-the-table bribes) to stand on that road. They often must pay up to $1000 US just for the privilege of standing roadside and, of course, the busier the highway, the more the police officer must pay to be there.

This puts things into a bit of (depressing) perspective, doesn’t it? Of course the policeman is taking bribes from vehicles. He needs that money to pay off his supervisor and he must keep paying his supervisor to keep his position. The supervisor, in turn, needs the bribe money to pay his superior and to keep his lofty position. Etc. etc.

As conspiracy theorists are so fond of saying, the corruption goes all the way to the top.

These thoughts kept me company as I cycled the remaining and tediously slow 50 kilometers to Battambang.

Another though which kept me occupied: Why are there so damn many Toyota Camrys in Cambodia?

The Road Well Traveled

There’s only one road between Battambang and Phnom Penh—the second largest and largest cities in Cambodia, respectively. Maybe I’ve been spending too much time in Thailand, with its broad avenues, lush medians, and lane-respecting traffic, but it seemed to me that this, er, highway had deteriorated since I traveled it last year.

I was on my way to Phnom Penh, but my visa run was feeling like a slow crawl; the heavy rain and flooding during this year’s wet season created hula-hoop-size potholes, potholes that I could curl up and got lost in. The bus driver was doing his best to avoid them, but the traffic on the road was not helping matters. And the range of traffic rivaled that of India. I saw water buffalo, bicycles, SUVs driven by government bigwigs, cows, pedestrians, motorbikes, dogs, and legions of Camrys. In fact, just a year or two ago, the roads in Cambodia were dominated by Camrys, so much so that every street looked, to a fanciful observer, like it was hosting a Toyota Camry parade.

I sat near the front of the bus and I could see our driver’s face reflected in the oversized rearview mirror. He looks like a criminal, I thought reluctantly, wishing I weren’t so judgmental. He wore Top-Gun-esque aviators which covered half his face but could not cover the permanent scowl he wore. His lips were tensed, pulled into a tight line, and he leaned on the horn as if it were his only ally against the traffic riffraff surrounding his bus.

At a narrow stretch of the road, our driver honked vociferously at two motorbikes in front of us. When they refused to yield the road, refused to pull over onto a graveled, muddy shoulder, our driver’s mood turned from dark to foul. Instead of whizzing by the motorbikes, he slowed down, tightened his mouth in concentration, pulled alongside the bikes, and slowly, gently inched over to the right. He inched over, taking his time, until the bikes were forced off the highway. Had a middle finger carried any impact here, I’m sure he would have flipped them off. Instead he looked over at the motorists and watched with a passive face as they precariously edged onto the muddy, potholed shoulder.

Minutes later, I really knew the driver’s mood was foul after a kid on a different motorbike lost his hat. His neon, bedazzled trucker’s hat found a gust of wind and flew into the middle of the road. The kid slowed down and looked back, trying to negotiate a u-turn. Casually, our driver drifted into the middle of the road and aligned the left wheel of the bus with the bright orange trucker hat. Smush. I watched in the rearview mirror as the driver’s face relaxed and his lips turned up into a smile.

I was surprised. I was initially sure he was trying to dodge the hat. When I realized he was aiming for it, I couldn’t hold back my laughter. This man had a stressful job—six hours of driving on terrible roads, amongst lousy drivers, surrounded by tiny buzzing vehicles, illogical pedestrians, and animals unable to grasp the finer implications of a highway. For six hours he needed to be on high alert, every muscle in his body tensed, every reflex on edge. If he needed to turn a garish trucker hat into muddied roadkill, I certainly wouldn’t begrudge him such a small pleasure.

Just get me to Phnom Penh in one piece.

Feeding Hungry Ghosts in Cambodia

Yesterday morning at 3:00 a.m. monks began chanting over a loudspeaker near where I’m sleeping in Battambang. Today again, they began at 3:00 a.m.

Happy Pchum Ben Day! This holiday, translated sometimes as the Festival of Ancestors or the Hungry Ghost Festival, is the second biggest holiday in Cambodia after the New Year festivities. It’s officially celebrated for three days, but families who can afford it will often begin visiting the pagoda weeks in advance.

Photo courtesy of Erik W. Davis via Flickr and Creative Commons.

The holiday is similar to the Mexican holiday Dia de la Muertos in that it is a festival dedicated to honoring and feeding deceased ancestors. But in Pchum Ben, families don’t go to a gravesite; instead they often return to their rural homes and visit the pagoda a few times throughout the holiday.

The basic idea is that at this time of year, and this time only, ghosts can slip out of hell and wander back on earth. Because they’ve been in hell (less than ideal conditions) many are hungry. Thus it is customary to throws grains of rice or balls of sticky rice for these ancestors to eat and enjoy. When the festival is over, a few may gain pardons, while most will return to hell. The ancestors who go to heaven (assuming there are any) don’t get much mention as far as I can tell during this holiday.

Photo courtesy of Erik W. Davis via Flickr and Creative Commons.

Of course, like most holidays, Pchum Ben is a time for family to be together and to prepare and eat special food. One food commonly made (at least here, in Battambang) is Nom Ansom Jaek, or sticky-rice-wrapped bananas steamed in banana leaves.

Our neighbors here at the Kinyei office gave us some Nom Ansom Jaek which I enjoyed for my dinner last night.

Power Snacking in Vietnam and Cambodia

I often tell people that Southeast Asia, especially Vietnam, is tailor-made for cycling. All right, so the roads aren’t always great (see this post as proof), but the drivers are accustomed to cyclists, the hotels are cheap, the scenery is phenomenal, and the food is amazing and very suitable for vegans. The snacks especially are plentiful and healthy, providing the perfect source of long-lasting energy.

In Cambodia, if you see a roadside grill like this, pull over. Immediately.

At first I was too shy to buy any of these little packets as I wasn’t sure what was inside them. But soon I realized that at about $0.12 each, I could afford to take a gamble and open one up, hoping for a vegan filling! There’s something remotely Christmas-like about peeling away the charred layers of banana leaf to reveal the treat inside.

This particular variety (called something like An Som or Anksom) are popular near Kratie. The most common type is as pictured above—sweet sticky rice boiled with coconut milk and a hint of salt wrapped around a banana and then grilled. The rice becomes chewy and a bit crunchy while the banana practically melts and caramelizes. Beautiful. I also found these stuffed with taro and (my very favorite) shredded jackfruit.

Here’s a snack I was only able to find once in Vietnam, though I searched for it many times as it was truly the perfect cycling boost.

I’ve searched for more information in vain, but here’s what I can tell you about it. It was a chewy confection made from black sticky rice, black beans, fresh ginger, a bit of sugar, and topped with white sesame seeds. It filled me with energy and protein without weighing me down and the fresh ginger was an unexpected and invigorating touch.

Another one of my favorite cycling snacks in Camboda is krolan—sticky rice with coconut cream and black beans stuffed in a bamboo tube and cooked for hours over low heat. It’s labor-intensive work, as the tubes must be constantly monitored and turned to prevent burning. But the result is unique and delicious, and as with the above snacks as well, the packaging is sustainable and biodegradable—perfect for when you’re on the bike!

Waxing Poetical About Durian

How can I even begin to give durian its propers? Let me just say this: If I were to die tomorrow I would want nothing but the sweet, custardy flesh of a durian as my last meal in this body. No equivocation. No ifs, ands, or buts. Durian would be my death-row meal.

With a baby durian at a fruit orchard in southern Vietnam.

Okay, boring stuff first. Yes, it has a pungent odor. Yes, it is banned from many hotels and public transport. I, however, love the smell. The stronger the better.

I always tell people who are trying durian for the first time to not think of it as a fruit. It is too rich, too intensely flavored. Think of it as a sweet, almond- and garlic-flavored custard. But every durian is different, has a different flavor profile, so just as one can be a connoisseur of wine, so is it possible to be a durian connoisseur. But I have heard that durian doesn't ship well (though the Thai are developing a variety of durian which can stand up to long-distance transport, but naturally this results in a less delicate, less flavorful fruit), so it is only really possible to be a connoisseur in the appropriate climate.

I remember very clearly a moment in Battambang, Cambodia during the hottest months of the year when I suddenly realized, when it really struck me, I hadn't been dry in weeks. Weeks. Every time I showered, I began to sweat before the fresh water even had a chance to dry. For weeks. Only two things made the heat (and no chance of an air-conditioned refuge) somewhat bearable: the mango tree in the backyard and the fact that it was durian season. Ah, durian season! Durians were plentiful, extra-special delicious, and cheap! During the off season, durians ran about 8000 riel ($2.00) per kilo, but in season, I was finding them regularly for 3000 riel ($0.75) per kilo, sometimes less. Because we had a few durian haters living the in house, I never brought my spoils inside, instead splitting them open (an easy task once you know the trick) and eating them on the table outside. There were many days when all I ate for dinner was the creamy flesh of a ripe durian.

I've heard from Thai and Malaysian friends that the preference for durian varies in each country. The Thai tend to prefer their durian firmer, less ripe, and less pungent, while Malaysians like a very soft and ripe durian. I fall into the latter camp, which, counter intuitively, makes Thailand the perfect place to buy durian as the riper, stinkier fruits sell for less because they are less popular.

Durian is known in southeast Asia as the king of fruit, and mangosteen as the queen. Both fruits come into season at the same time, during the hottest months of April and May, and both are prized for their tastiness (understatement!). Another reason they are considered the king and queen is because durian is known to be a heating food, one that you should not eat too much of lest you aggravate your pitta (I'm taking some liberties here of course, because pitta is a dosha from the ayurvedic tradition and durian is considered heating according to Chinese medicinal tradition), while mangosteen is considered cooling and has the opposite effect. Therefore, you will suffer no negative consequences if you eat durian and mangosteen together.

The Nature of Hospitality

“Cambodians are different. They are not hospitable,” Chu, a surveyor from Shanghai who was working in the northeastern Cambodian province of Ratanakiri, told me this when I stepped off my bicycle for a break. Later, as I cycled on the desolate red dirt road between Kratie and Banlung this thought stuck with me, bouncing around in my head like tennis shoes in a washing machine. I agreed with him and pined for the hearty hospitality I had been shown while hitchhiking in eastern Europe and Turkey. I rode this train of thought as I rode my bicycle, slowly and ponderously. I was tired and lonely, the road was unmarked, there were no towns or other landmarks to speak of, and my map was proving inaccurate. Hotels awaited me in Banlung, but I had another full day of cycling until I would reach them. Consequently I didn't know where I would sleep that night.

How did I get here? On this desolate road in the buttcrack middle-of-nowhere Cambodia, covered in red dirt, which seemed to permeate my pores and settle into every exposed crinkle in my skin. As I rode along, I imagined myself talking to someone who was thinking of cycling in Southeast Asia. What would I tell him or her? “Don't do it.” Yeah, that'd be the first thing. I had only been on the road for six days, but those were five miserable days. It rained constantly the first two days, despite this being the dry season, and even my long pants and wool sweater were not enough to keep me warm. Then after the rain, the shitty roads began. Dirt had turned to mud, a thick red mud which made traction impossible and pushing my bicycle a necessity at times. Soon after, I began to miss the mud as it was replaced by powder-light dust which came at me like a tidal wave of red dirt every time a motorbike, car, or truck passed me. The soreness abated quickly but still lingered on, especially in my ass, crotch, and lower back. But the worst of all was the loneliness. For six days I had spoken nary a word of English beyond “hello”. Instead I spent ten hours a day on my bicycle, my thoughts on constant repeat. Did I spend the time pondering my plans, my aspirations, my goals? Not at all. Something about the repetitive motion of the bicycle, the repetitive scenery, the physical exertion seemed to make any sort of philosophical pondering impossible. Instead I spent the time decrying my state and setting tiny goals for myself to keep me on the bike and cycling as much as possible. So even for mundane activities like checking the map, getting a drink of water, putting on my gloves, and applying sunscreen, I would make myself wait as long as I possibly could just to eke out every extra kilometer.

The entire day I passed by the same dusty landscape—spindly trees and tall grasses which were as coated in powdery dirt as I. Around 5:30 p.m. the sky started to darken and I knew I had about a half hour of good light left so I began to search for a house I could ask to sleep in. I stopped at the first house I saw and bought a bottle of water. The whole family was huddled on the ground using large metal soup spoons to scoop up and reserve some oil which had spilled on the packed-dirt ground. I isolated the matron of the family and as I paid for my water I made a sleeping pose, then shrugged my shoulders in a cartoonishly exaggerated questioning pose. She stared at me for a bit, then nodded vaguely. I smiled and said, “Akuhn.” I didn't know the logistics of my sleeping arrangement, but she had agreed, so at least I would not be sleeping on the side of the road that night.

I was coated in an opaque layer of red dirt and my junk was feeling a bit itchy. I guess the dried urine combined with tight bike shorts and long hours pressed to the bicycle seat was not agreeing with me. I asked where the bong khon was, only to find that they didn't have one. But I saw the eldest daughter splashing in some water in a small basin out back, so when she was finished I grabbed a half-filled water bottle and a change of clothes and squatted on the flat rock which acted as both kitchen sink and shower. They didn't have access to running water, so I used the drinking water left in my bottle to quickly rinse the most crucial areas.

I sat at a table at the front of the house with my journal and wrote as the light faded around me. There were three children in the family—two teenagers and a young girl. The youngest was inquisitive and came to peek over my shoulder as I wrote. I showed her the half-filled page, then put my journal down and began to draw in the fine dirt around us. First I drew simple shapes—a star, a heart—then started writing basic English words, pronouncing them slowly as I did. “Hello. OK. Bye.”

Just as it became too dark to write, around 6:30 p.m., the father pulled up to the house on the family's one motorbike. Almost immediately I heard the chugging of an engine turning over and then the constant whirring of a generator. The lights came on and the two teenagers, clearly well versed in this routine, turned on the television and stereo and popped a disc into each. As the mother prepared dinner, the remaining members of the family, as well as a few neighborhood children, gathered around the television. I can only imagine the name of the disc was Extreme Bloodlust 3 or something of the sort, as the “movie” consisted entirely of the bloodiest scenes from all the Rambo movies, spliced together with nothing so distracting as dialogue or exposition between them. Not that we would have been able to hear any dialogue. Instead, a mix of Khmer and American dance music blared over the speakers, including my favorite Khmer rap tune called, as far as I can tell, “Mien Loy,” which translate to have money though is used in this sense to mean payday. The lyrics, as they were earlier translated to me, are something to the effect of “I've got money, so I'm going to ride on my motorbike and buy some beef.” I appreciated the prosaic, mundane lyrics—a far cry from the seeming-hyperbole of their American rap counterparts. I tried to continue writing in my journal under one of the three light bulbs hanging from the bare ceiling, but the gruesome scenes on the television entranced me. As I watched Sylvester Stalone slash and shoot everyone around him, an American hip hop song I had never heard came on the stereo. The lyrics were pure poetry: “Don't want no short dick man. Don't want no short dick man. Eeny weeny teeny weeny shriveled little short dick man.” I smiled as I looked around at the four or five young children gathered around the television.

When the matron of the house came out with dinner—a big covered bowl of white rice and a smaller bowl of meat and vegetable stew—the neighborhood children left and the family relocated, their necks craned so they could still watch the television, to the dining table. The mother offered me a bowl, but I declined, saying, “At nyam satch. I don't eat meat. Nyam bai. Eat rice.” This simple phrase accounted for about half of all the Khmer I knew, and didn't entirely get my point across, as the phrase nyam bai, though literally meaning eat rice, is more commonly used to refer to eating in general—such is the importance of rice in Cambodian culture. But after a little gesturing she handed me a bowl of hot white rice and I topped it with soy sauce. I cleaned my bowl quickly but felt far from satiated.

So it was with a half-empty stomach that I prepared for sleep. It was about 7:30 p.m. and the family was closing up their house for the night. The mother brought out a tiny pillow, placed it on the table I had eaten dinner on, then joined her husband and three children on a wooden platform no larger than a full-size bed. The platform was covered in a flat, primary-colored plastic woven mat and sheltered by a light blue, rectangular mosquito net. The family huddled under one blanket and shut off the light. I contemplated my makeshift bed. Just thirty minutes prior I had eaten my bowl of rice on this table. Despite the early hour, I was tired, so I put on my warmest clothing—a pair of cotton pants, short sleeved t-shirt, and a wool sweater—and climbed up on the table.

I slept fitfully, turning from side to side whenever my hips became bruised, laying on my back until my tailbone ached. Around 2:00 a.m. my warmest clothes were no longer warm enough. I slept nonetheless.

The mother arose and began making rice around 5:00 a.m. and when I got up at 5:30 a.m., the kids were still sleeping. I shuffled around a bit awkwardly as I tried to say my goodbyes. I fumbled with my purse, but the mother would not accept any money. Instead she smiled quietly and gracefully as I tried to communicate my gratitude by pressing her hand and saying, “Akuhn,” over and over. I got on my bicycle and waved an enthusiastic goodbye. The air was soft and cool and the sun cast long orange shadows on the red dirt ground.

As I cycled on the silent road, reflecting on my night, I felt a familiar pang of guilt. The family had opened their home to me and allowed me into their lives. All I had left them with were some scribblings in the dirt, a few smiles, and hopefully a story to tell.

Oh Battambang!

Listening to this song transports me immediately back to Cambodia, back to Battambang.

I had been traveling through the country for a few weeks before I overheard this song and realized he was singing about Battambang, about a city which was becoming increasingly dear to me. (I use the word "city" in only the loosest of terms; Battambang feels more like a low, sprawling town.) Months later, this same song was still being played in every restaurant, every bus, every store I went into but I wasn't tired of it. Not at all. In fact my housemates and I often spent mornings listening to "Oh Battambang" on repeat and at least two of my friends translated the song, using it to help them brush up on their Khmer. And it didn't stop there.

I remember going to a pizza restaurant with a group of Peace Corps volunteers and requesting "Oh Battambang" be played over the speakers. The waiter was happy to comply, and soon, those of us who knew the song were singing along as loudly as we could and teaching it to the rest of the group.

When we heard the music video for the song had been shot in Phnom Penh, we were outraged and became inspired to shoot a video for the song based in Battambang, showcasing the landmarks of the city--Aek Phnom, Phnom Sampeau, Ta dambang statue, the bamboo train, and of course, the Stung Sanker! Unfortunately, as with many of our inspired ideas (making a song out of gecko chirps, sweding Double Indemnity, building a swimming pool in the yard) this one barely made it off the ground.

Here's a link to the official music video. You can see that the only shots of Battambang are actually on green screen. For shame!

Food Rhapsody: Dessert Soup (Che)

I realize that this picture may not inspire appetites or get anyone salivating, but behind that speckled glass window, in those metal mixing bowls lies my favorite dessert in all of southeast Asia--dessert soup. Known in Vietnam as Che, dessert soup involves any number of ingredients served with a simple syrup, ice, and often coconut milk.

A few standard options include stewed bananas, stewed pumpkin, sticky rice, black beans, tapioca, yellow mung beans, black eyed peas, jackfruit and sticky rice, pandan leaf noodles, and various colored jellies.

The standard Western palate is unused to eating legumes in a sweet dish, but I hope that won't stop anyone from trying this dessert. It is the perfect mix of sweet, salty, creamy, and refreshingly cold. When ordering, you point at the metal bowl of your preference and the proprietor will scoop your choice into a small

bowl, followed by a ladle of clear syrup, a ladle of coconut cream, then a spoonful of crushed ice.

A standard offering of cooked black-eyed peas and white sticky rice with syrup and coconut cream.

My favorite che of all is this one, known in Cambodia as Boua Loy. It is composed of glutinous rice balls (similar in texture to the Japanese mochi) filled with yellow mung bean paste. The balls are served in a ginger syrup with fresh coconut cream and a topping of crushed white sesame seeds.

My Imminent Engagement and Turkish Connection

A common language is magic. It opens up worlds that were previously inaccessible, landscapes that were previously unseen.

My Turkish has served me well. Though I've forgotten a lot of vocabulary and grammar since I lived in Istanbul in mid-2009, I've had the opportunity to use and practice my Turkish all over the world.

At the Halal Indian restaurant in Phnom Penh, I heard Turkish being spoken and invited myself to join the speakers, two men who worked at the Zaman language school. They offered me a chance to practice speaking Turkish as well as a job at Zaman. I appreciated both offers, but only took them up on the latter.

While hitchhiking in Hungary, I began to notice that several of the kamyons had Turkish license plates and while I didn't target them specifically, I sent out a silent request, and sure enough, a Turkish driver pulled over for me. Our common language was Turkish, and through it I was able to communicate basics about myself--where I was going, where I had been--and learn about him and his family in return. He bought me çay and offered me lunch, explaining that while I was in his truck, I was his guest. As we were parting, he pressed a 20 Euro note into my hand, and though I repeatedly refused, telling him thank you but I couldn't accept it, he insisted. I walked away with tears in my eyes.

How excited I was, after ten months in southeast Asia, to hear Turkish in the markets in Skopje, Macedonia. When I asked, "Türkçe biliyor musunuz?" and the market seller replied, "Tabii!" a giant grin spread across my face and I felt a sense of home.

Most recently, while staying in the small village of Krushevo in the southern mountains of Bulgaria, I have found and/or been found by the two Turkish speakers in a village of 250 inhabitants. The first, an elderly cross-eyed man, broke into a wide, gapped grin when I began speaking to him. And what a delight it was for me to finally be able to communicate first-hand with someone from the village! The man asked me if I was a maiden or if I was married, and upon hearing my answer, invited me to marry one of Krushevo's many bachelors and settle in the village. "We'll see," I responded. "Only Allah knows."

As if on cue, the next Turkish speaker I met was one of the afore-mentioned bachelors--a blond-haired, blue-eyed, high-cheekboned young man--who was training to become the village's next imam. We flirted very modestly while my friend Tracy looked at us and raised her eyebrows suggestively. He invited me to drink çay with him, "beraber" (together). We'll see. Only Allah knows.

Cycling in Cambodia: Videos from the Road

Cycling along the Mekong river between Kompong Cham and Chhlong. The river is not visible here, but it is never far off. You can see how its proximity affects the style of housing in this region. Here, as with every populated place I cycled in Cambodia, I was greeted with a rousing chorus of hellos.

Cycling in Cambodia: Videos from the Road

A video I took while the day was drawing to a close. You can spot my long shadow in the lower left corner on occasion. This region (northeastern) is one of the most sparsely populated in the country. I went three days between towns here--only seeing a stingy sprinkling of houses. The loneliness was at times difficult, but it was also a gift. During this stretch of my trip, I began to feel liberated from sanity, a phenomenon of which I will write more later. Until I found myself liberated from its constraints, I had never before considered sanity a boundary I would want to break through!

Getting Twered*

I left my journals along with the bigger of my two backpacks (neither of which are large enough to reach backpacker proportion) in Battambang. I guess that means I'll be going back. Either that or it means that I'll have yet another cache of my stuff scattered throughout the world. I'd like to go back though, I think.

My last day there was a delightful one. We (Mel, Katie, Alanna and I) got twered Khmer-style with inches of makeup and joyously tacky sequined outfits then had our photos taken by a young man who pushed and posed us very meticulously and who often struck the poses in demonstration with such panache that I felt ashamed and shy to try to replicate them. It struck me that his job would be one of the only niches in a conservative Cambodian culture for a man on the effeminate-to-flaming scale. He had more grace than I. Do I sound bitter? I think I've come to terms with my clumsiness; surrounded by dainty, elegant women at all times has had the effect of releasing me from any notion of my own grace.These pictures were another nail in the coffin. I think I've never looked more like a man, if that man were dressing and posing like Barbie.

The photoshoot was followed immediately by a dance party held at Casa de Battambang—a party at which other people actually showed up. It was such a fun night, filled with yummy drinks, mildly interesting conversation, new faces, and (especially fun) dancing. Justin led a swing dancing lesson right there on our driveway. The men stood in a big circle with the women in a smaller concentric circle. Every few minutes, the women would rotate clockwise and dance with a new partner. I was surprised by how well Justin taught the group. He was appropriately patient, but not too slow, and gave clear instructions and allowed enough time for practice. We danced with and without music. I hate to overuse the adjective, but it was delightful. Smey and his friend, whose name I never caught, both said it was the first time they had danced with a girl. And on that night, they got to dance with seven different girls!

*"Twer" is a very useful Khmer verb which essential means "to make". It has the added benefit of sounding, when spoken in a Midwestern drawl (gettin' twurred), like something a rap star of the last decade would say ("right thurr").

Fear and the Vagabond

The following is an excerpt from my journal, taken over one year ago after I had just arrived in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

For me, fear is a necessary, even desirable part of traveling. I love to wake up with adrenaline tying my stomach in knots--it reminds me that I'm alive, that I'm learning. Without this fear my life becomes stagnant.

November 18, 2009

First night in Cambodia, in Phnom Penh, and I feel like crying. But by now I'm used to this feeling--it always happens on the first night of a big journey, but only when I've flown to a new place--something to do with the combination of a faraway place with jetlag with being alone. And besides, I only feel a little bit like crying and that is something of a victory and probably related to Elma, my Couchsurfing host. She picked me up from the airport in a black Lexus SUV, took me to what was essentially my own private apartment, then introduced me to her eight dogs and five cats, and to the city of Phnom Penh.

November 19, 2009

I spent the day on a borrowed bicycle, mixing it up with the swarm of motos on the right-hand side of the road, trying to avoid the big SUVs except when I used them as shields while I crossed a busy intersection. I didn't want to end up like the guy near the apartment who quite literally rode his bike into the siding of an SUV, leaving his front wheel smashed and misshapen and the car undamaged.

When I got back to the apartment, it was already dark. There I met Lulu, a fellow Couchsurfer from southern China. We introduced ourselves and we talked, or rather, she mainly talked. I realized that every time I meet a traveler and we share information about ourselves, it feels a bit (or so I imagine) like two insecure guys bragging about and comparing penis size. Like it's some kind of competition to see who is the more extreme traveler.

'Oh you've been on the road for ten months? I left home eleven months ago.' 'You hitchhike? Oh yes, I hitchhiked around Turkey and then around eastern Europe--alone!'

Why do I feel the need to convince people I am a 'real' traveler? What the hell does that even mean? In reality, I don't feel like an extreme traveler, or even an extreme person. I feel that the things I have done do not really match who I am, but I think they do match who I would like to be. I've learned that the people who do these seemingly extreme things (like hitchhike from Copenhagen to Syria or cycle around the world) do not need to be unlike me--they do not need to be brave every day or be completely unattached from all people. In fact they can often be scared and unsure and just take their travels one day at a time.

One day at a time; I can do that, truly I can. I just have to decide whether I want to or not.

Where did I sleep last night?

My traveling, my life, has a soundtrack and often particular songs are inextricably linked with certain places or memories. In line with this phenomenon, I'm starting a feature called (cheesily) melodies and memories.

When I started cycling through sparsely populated northeastern Cambodia without a tent or any camping equipment, I soon realized that I would need to think creatively about where to sleep each night. So every evening around 5:00 p.m. as the sky started to darken, I kept watch for the next house and would pantomime to the owner my desire for a place to sleep. I often slept on the floor (naturally):

but the strangest place I slept was on a family's dining table as they didn't have enough floor space.

Because I never knew where I would sleep each night, and because I had ten or eleven monotonous hours on the bicycle, I began singing, as if on continuous repeat, Nirvana's Where Did You Sleep Last Night, especially as dusk began to fall.

The adventure begins

Oh Lordy, could I be any cheesier?

Here's the story, told some six weeks later. I've polished it up a bit after multiple tellings and retellings. After the aforementioned punch in the gut, I wandered the streets of Phnom Penh. Should I go to Vietnam or Laos? The question pestered me. If limes can be trusted, the answer was Laos. But limes might be fickle and Justin has good aim. Let me back up even further. "Laos or Vietnam?" I asked my friend, the imperturbable Justin. "Let's solve this in the only suitable manner," he replied (or, possibly, I'm fabricating this entire speech). "See those two pots hanging on the wall?" I did. "The left one is Vietnam; the right one is Laos. Whichever pot this lime hits," he picked up a lime from the lime basket on the table, "is the country you'll go to."

"Well, this sounds entirely reasonable," I responded.

"Thump," went the lime as it hit Laos.

Laos it was.

But days later, the question still nipped at me. And so I wandered the streets, unable to make even the most mundane decisions. I needed to flip a coin to decide where to eat lunch. Then, in one moment, everything changed. I walked past The Vicious Cycle, a bicycle shop near the riverside, and I thought (God, it's fucking tempting to add, completely unnecessarily and against all rules of style, "to myself" after those two words), Why not? I don't want to take the bus, but hitchhiking hasn't been working out. Why not cycle?

Once I made the choice, everything fell into place. It seemed the universe was smiling on my decision. For as I walked to the Russian Market the next day, dodging street sellers, refuse, and the near-constant chorus of "Moto madam?" and "Tuk tuk miss?", I passed a hole-in-the-wall bike repair shop with four used mountain bikes for sale. The owner, a former resident of Atlanta, Georgia, quoted me a reasonable price for the shiny white beauty with big front and rear shocks I was eying and he agreed to show me some basic repairs.

The next few days passed quickly, as I ducked around the city in a haphazard manner, collecting the gear I would need for my trip.

I decided I would cycle through northeastern Cambodia before crossing into Vietnam, but beyond that outline, my route was hazy, and I preferred it this way. No sense in making plans that would be changed anyways.

So, four days after purchasing my bicycle, I crossed the Mekong River and rolled out of Phnom Penh.