Week 3 in Cambodia

Hello again,

time is flying now... we are more than 3/4 through our adventure now. Work is going really well for the entire team. The Cambodians are really open to any suggestions and usually implement any proposals before the we are able to even finish the sentence.

This week we visited the CMAC (Cambodian Mine Action Center). This is an organization with more than 2,000 employees who have made it their task to clean Cambodia from land mines and UXO's (unexploded ordnance). The presentation was given by Mr. Oum Sang Onn, CMAC's Director of Planning and Operations - and also a war veteran and guerrilla fighter against the Khmer Rouge (the guy on the left). He has spent most of his live laying mines... and now he has dedicated the rest of it to cleaning up again.

The numbers we were presented were absolutely astounding... here are a few:

• Exact numbers are not known, but it is estimated that roughly 4-6 million landmines were laid during all the recent wars (don't forget that Cambodia was pretty much in some kind of guerrilla war with either themselves or a neighbor for the last 50 years)
• still now, 46% of the villages in Cambodia are considered "contaminated" with explosives
• since 1979, over 63,000 people were either killed or maimed by mines or UXO's
• during the US-Vietnam war, US planes dropped ~2.7 million tons of bombs (this is not a typo) over Cambodia - to cut of Vietnamese supply chains.

And then they showed us a bit of their work...

On Friday we were really lucky to be able to experience a Cambodian wedding. Weddings over here are a really big deal, and it is absolutely normal to invite 500 people to a wedding. The staff of our factory was invited to a wedding... and we were able to tag along for a little while. Work had to end at 4pm so that the women had time to get their hair done and whatever else women do before going out. The result was really amazing... the transformation from inconspicuous fruit cutting/office staff to eye-catching beauties was much more than could be expected. Here are a couple of pictures that are only a few hours apart:

Let's get back to one of my favorite topics over here... traffic and vehicles. On our return from the office, Patricia and I decided to count car manufacturers for a few minutes. It was pretty funny... "Toyota, Toyota, Toyota, Toyota" is clearly dominating this corner of the planet.

By the way - we do get driven to the office in a Lexus as well... and our average speed on that commute is 6.1 mph (pretty slow jogging speed). So the engine is not all that important... but a comfortable leather seats and a working AC are good arguments for a Lexus.

We did get pulled over once at the beginning of the trip, and our driver was informed by the policeman that the windows were tinted too dark. Nobody knows if such a law really exists... but the way things get settled here is that you give the policeman $1-2 in cash and then you drive on. 100% reliable system.

And here is another Trivial Pursuit question.... How many people fit into a Tuk-Tuk? (These little moped-powered couches)
Answer: 13 Cambodians (or 5 Caucasians)

Unfortunately I was too slow to get a picture of the family moped today that carried 6 (!) people... but I did manage to catch this family's return from the hospital.... the kid in between the parents is still hooked up to an IV.

And one quick comment about the extensive mosquito warnings we had received before coming here. Today I saw the second mosquito in the 3.5 weeks since we arrived.