IN CAMBODIA

1 Feb 2010

Arrival in Phnom Penh
I arrived in Phnom Penh January 28th to start a three month mission at Emergency's hospital in Battambang, the 2nd largest city in Cambodia located in the country's northwest corner, near the Thai border. This is my fourth trip to Cambodia, but only the third to work with Emergency.

The Hospital
The hospital was established over 11 years ago to deal with the large number of landmine and other war-related injuries in this Khmer Rouge dominated area. With the end of the civil war, de-mining operations, and rapid post-conflict aid-generated development the boundaries of the killing fields have shifted to now include the roads. Every day hundreds of shiny, new motor scooters are added to the many thousands already crowding the country's improved and expanded road system. The growth in the number of cars follows at the same rate, though the numbers are smaller.

Changes
Fifteen months absence from a rapidly developing country can seem to the returned visitor that she has landed in a completely different country. Readily observable change is the operative word. It is not just that buildings exist that were not present before or land use has transformed the landscape. The style, materials, and shapes of the structures don't look like the old. New means the sharp, modern lines of glass and concrete that typify global urbanization. The new buildings could be in any city. Even traditional houses sport new bright red, green, or blue metal roofs that make them stand out rather than blend with their surroundings.

The changes seemed particularly impressive because I was driven from the airport to Battambang skirting Phnom Penh through the early stages of a brand new "international city". Not until we completed the by-pass loop and turned onto route 5 far to the north of the capital did I find familiar landmarks: irrigated rice fields, roadside stands selling lotus flowers, jars of pickled bamboo--each particular item of merchandise clustered along a short kilometer of the road where they have been in the past. Most telling of all the familiarities were the delicate spires of Buddhist temples rising above the trees in the middle and far horizons.

Battambang
Though much building has taken place in Battambang, such as a new 5 storied police building and high rise, flash hotels--the grounds and buildings of the Emergency Surgical Centre have the same clean, white walls that set this NGO apart and give the hospital an inviting, peaceful air.

The market in the middle of the city remains unchanged. One end is filled with the smell of dried fish and the fragrance of Khmer food cooking. The other end houses seamstresses fashioning tight-fitting sequined and beaded peplumed wedding attire on their treadle sewing machines in their tiny shops. Around the periphery the fruit and vegetable sellers set up their wares in colorful pyramids.

And in the park along the river a red shrine sits in the crouch of a gnarled much hacked-at Banyan tree--Ficus religiosus, the holy fig of Buddhism. Fine ash from the spent wands of incense litter the flags as they have for many years