Cambodia wins ASEAN Gold!

Living on what is perhaps the busiest road in Cambodia , National Road 4 to Sihanoukville [beach resort and Cambodia's only deep water port] , which carries innumerable tourist buses, container trucks, VIP cars and police escorts [officials on the way to the beach] as well as the more common regular cars, motorbikes, vans, bicycles, ox carts and random cows, this article does not surprise me.



"Phnom Penh (dpa) - Cambodia is now officially home to the most dangerous roads in the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations, officials said.

Cambodian drivers are infamous for their blithe disregard for traffic laws, let alone the laws of physics, and as roads improve rapidly this combination resulted in an average of 4.5 people dying on the country's roads every day, new statistics said - up from 3.7 in 2006.

Figures by the Ministry of Public Works and Transport for the first half of 2008 show 3,870 documented traffic accidents, resulting in 6,839 people injured and 956 killed -nearly 15 per cent higher than last year.

The government spent millions on driver education-- television and newspaper ads,driver education centres, after the Asian Development Bank estimated accidents cost the country 3 per cent of its GDP in 2003 alone.

However, poorly paid traffic police often lack the will to enforce the law and a "fine" of 1.25 dollars (or 2.50 dollars if the driver insists on a receipt) usually makes the traffic violation go away.

Drunk driving is also rampant, but Cambodia has no more sophisticated ways of testing if a driver is over the limit than smelling his or her breath - usually after the accident."




In fact it's not too uncommon for me to see an accident on the trips up to Phnom Penh, sometimes with a body lying on the road. The ICRC runs a prosthetics factory here which was originally set up for land mine victims, but they say now the largest group is people who have lost limbs in accidents (wide use of motorbikes means limbs are unprotected and often damaged beyond repair - although i have heard that public hospitals here would rather amputate than treat a wound!).

On a personal note, I can't believe its September already! The time is flowing away and i am having very mixed feelings about it. The power problems have returned and upon reflection the times we had good power supply was during the election campaign. I have two mice in cages I caught last night which i didn't have the stomach to deal with this morning so I am hoping the cleaner takes care of them before i get home :)

Spent the weekend in Kampong Speu which was exceedingly quiet, but i managed to watch underbelly on dvd which i though was EXCELLENT and fascinating.

My best friend here, Cristy, is heading home this weekend so we will have her farewell at a North Korean restaurant owned by the North Korean embassy as a hoot. And the Jayvaraman VII wooden head has been successfully sent so should be interesting if it makes it to Oz.

Our jolly cleaner Bong Yung (the woman who I would have lengthy Khmer conversations with while she cleaned my office, me understanding about 10% of it and the rest were saying yes and smiling/laughing) has left and been replaced by another girl who looks like she wants to kill herself. Kinda a downer first thing in the morning but oh well.

Trying to plan out my remaining weekends to squeeze in a visit to a temple called Banteay Chhmar in one of the northern provinces but things look a bit tight this month. One of our drivers, Pliek, is from there so i am hoping to con one of his relatives to play driver/tour guide for me.

Bye!