This morning, I bought an $18 ticket for Don Det, Laos, so this is my last full day in Cambodia. Writing this, I’m sitting in a tiny cafe owned by a Khmer Krom, meaning she’s a Cambodian from southern Vietnam.
Most Khmer Kroms have relocated to Cambodia proper. Here, they don’t have to suffer the condescension, if not worse, from Vietnamese, but there’s another reason, I suspect. Arriving from more competitive Vietnam, they have an edge over laid back locals. Vietnam has 100 million people, compared to Cambodia’s 17. That explains a lot.
Arriving in 2005, the cafe’s owner and her husband were worse than broke. It took them four years to pay off the debts incurred to move here from Trà Vinh, 315 miles away. Back then, it took more than a day to reach this forlorn town. Roads were horrible, and rivers and streams were often crossed by ferries, which meant much waiting.
At first, she worked in a cafe while her husband did construction. At eight-years-old, her daughter became a dishwasher in the same cafe. Too short to reach the sink, the scrawny girl had to stand on a plastic stool.
Now, the same girl owns a jewelry store with her husband. Her dad is a contractor with more than 20 employees working several sites at once. Her brother got a engineering degree in Saigon, but after working there without saving anything, has moved back to Stung Treng.
I met this young man. Divorced just a week ago, he was morose. His wife, also a Khmer Krom, didn’t care to come here, so his son is a country away.
The cafe’s owner, let’s call her Nga, is actually a quarter Chinese and a quarter Vietnamese. Putting on some Khmer music, she told me, “At home we listen to Vietnamese music, but if we do that here, they’ll yell at us!”
They are her fellow merchants in the central market. Jammed with shops, this section is dominated by jewelers selling mostly gold plated junk to villagers who need to bling up for special occasions.
Nga, “If you throw these gold pieces on the ground in Saigon, people wouldn’t even pick them up!” Snarling “gold,” her eyes turn fierce. In her early 60’s, she has tattooed eyebrows and a small mouth that often erupts into hearty he he laughs.
When a thin Vietnamese approached to buy a 50 cent cup with sugar, Nga shouted, “So you are divorced?!”
“Yes, I’m divorced.”
“How many months?”
“Almost a year.”
“Why don’t you become my daughter-in-law. My son just got divorced.”
Barely smiling, the young woman walked away.
To me, Nga explained, “I’ve known her since she’s this small.” Then, “She got married in Vietnam.”
“Just like your son.”
“Exactly!”
So much for the stable Asian family. The hairdresser across from Nga is also divorced, so must raise two kids alone. Yesterday, she was also evicted from her space because, her landlady claimed, she was stinking it up with chemicals.
Seeing her sobbing, Nga decided to rent half of her cafe to this hairdresser. As I type, she’s standing on a plastic chair to put up glass shelves. The mirrors are installed. On casually slapped up red wallpaper are cartoon pigs, elephants, butterflies and hearts. Though she’ll have a new beauty salon in a few hours, there’s no income today.
[Stung Treng Market, 3/23/23]
Two days ago, Nga showed me a swollen ankle, “I stand so much.”
“You can’t take days off.”
“Sometimes I must, but only to visit Vietnam.”
Mostly for death anniversaries, weddings and funerals, and usually for no longer than two days, and sometimes just a few hours. Retaining her Vietnamese citizenship, she has built a nice house there for her parents, and that’s where she’ll retire, in perhaps ten years.
“You can’t do it sooner?”
“No. I must save some more, but when I’m done, I’ll just enjoy myself. I’ll go to temples!”
Since Nga has a girl employee, I ask Nga why she doesn’t let this girl take over for a stretch, so Nga can rest or stay longer in Vietnam. Her answer, I already anticipated, “If I’m absent for more than a few days, everything is ruined. I’ll lose all my customers.”
“Does she steal?”
“Even your own children steal!” she chuckles.
“If you ask this girl to do anything, you have to do it very nicely,” Nga adds. “If not, she’ll talk back! Sometimes, she just disappears. She comes back when she comes back.”
In Windhoek, Namibia, the cleaner at my gueshouse could sometimes be seen sleeping on the floor in the storeroom. “She sleeps when she feels like it,” my Indian landlord explained.
When France ruled Indochina, they brought many Vietnamese into Laos and Cambodia. The English imported millions of Indians to Africa. If a boss doesn’t know whom to hire, he won’t be a boss for long. Unlike the American government and military, sensible bosses pick the best men.
In Stung Treng, Nga also has a beautiful house, with high ceilings and heavy wooden furniture. She and her husband own a Lexus SUV, paid with $33,000 cash. Her jeweler daughter boasts the same model.
In Phnom Penh, I had a room within sight of its Central Market. In Stung Treng, I’m half a block from where most of its merchants, mostly tiny, gather.
Unlike in the West, small businesses thrive across Southeast Asia. This isn’t just good for people’s pockets, but their souls, and it gives these communities their distinctive liveliness. Across England and Wales in 2022, 400 pubs had to shut down.
Even if I wasn’t a writer, I would still be nourished and stimulated by this vivacious market. Plus, it’s reassuring to be surrounded by your own kind. In Europe, Africa or the Middle East, I was equally cheered in similar settings. In the US, they don’t exist.
In Sidon’s Old Souk, I gladly got lost. In the shadow of Norwich’s Norman castle, I bravely ate mushy peas, surrounded by fellow sufferers. Even after two decades, I still remember that cranky seller of tripes near Florence’s leather market. Too pretty for her job, she had reasons to be pissed. “Eat it with your hand!” she snapped at a customer who had dropped his plastic fork.
Like all of us, or the world itself, she rues what could have been.
So where are we? There are many who dismiss as hysteria forebodings of global disaster. The war in Ukraine is limited in scope, so OK, Russia may win, with Poland, Romania and Hungary also taking bites from that sacrificed nation. Since most Americans can’t find any of those countries on a map, who cares?
Having pocketed his reward, Zelensky will retire to Forte dei Marmi, Miami or Tel Avi. Flatulent with grafts, Jill, Joe and Hunter can slink back to their tailored hells. A superb actor on par with Obama, Trump buys time for his masters. Yes, folks in East Palestine may sicken and die off, but shit happens. Baseball is returning!
In Southeast Asia, the littlest people will continue to perform their tiniest tasks, day by day, and though some may be malnourished or badly housed, they banter and laugh more than their statistic superiors, for they’re not in solitary confinement, with bullshit for every meal. If your life still has meaning, you can put up with just about anything.
It’s not something you can quantify. You have to be here.
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