Sylvia's Journal

I have a gravlax croissant and coffee for lunch in the small area in the Phnom Penh hotel lobby that is cordoned off for tea and pastries – as if to pay homage to Axel’s ancestors. But it is also to give in to a desire for coffee, even bad Nescafe, after having been coffee-less for 10 days and living on an entirely Cambodian diet. I like variety and the sandwich plate in the showcase seemed to offer just that.

I have returned to luxury, to a hotel that costs 5 times as much as my luxury room in the province and it is luxury indeed: no mosquitoes and geckos on the wall, a real bathroom with a full bath, internet and a mini bar (extra charge of course) – and down one floor all sorts of massages to choose from plus a bunch of restaurants. I think I’ll go for Japanese tonight.

We had our final meeting with the team in the provincial capital in which we celebrated once more the significant accomplishments of the last two weeks and gave ourselves another round of applause. I handed out my usual small symbolic gifts and received two real gifts in return, one for myself and one for Axel. Then Leonard focused the team on what will need to be accomplished in the next 6 weeks.

Back in Phnom Penh we met at the fortified USAID embassy in the center of the city to brief our funders on the accomplishments of the last two weeks and make promises for the next 5 months and then it was time for a second round of goodbyes. There are no plans for me to come back here as I am not in any budget but I wouldn’t mind another visit to this country, and, as Leonard reminds me, I haven’t tried the fetus-in-egg yet (plus a few other insects).

I rewarded myself with a massage by Nika at the Seeing Hands place. For the price of six dollars she gave me an hour long massage, exclaiming ‘Oh!’ each time she found another set of knotted muscles. Nika is 33 and has been blind since she got measles at the age of 1. The Mary Knolls Sisters send her to Japan to learn massage and English; as a result she speaks English with a Japanese accent. Stacked against the wall of her small room are several tomes about massage in Braille; a Braille version of the poem ‘The Gift’ is tacked on the wall – not framed of course. She massages me expertly even with one hand when she answers her cell phone.

The tuk tuk driver brings me back to the hotel and points at the Raffles Royal Hotel that we pass on the way. “The very special person room costs 2000 dollars,” he says. I wonder what this means to someone for whom 100 dollars is probably a fortune.

And now a leisurely evening in luxury – sushi, sake and a long warm bath.