Catching a capital in midst of transition
Cyclos tour of city reveals contrast of history, community with prosperity
PHNOM PENH, CAMBODIA— We merge into the centre of the street, ready to make a left but veering maybe a little too closely to a huge, churning cement truck, big buses packed tightly with rush-hour commuters and little motorbikes carrying families of five.
The flow of traffic on the roaring and buzzing Preah Monivong Blvd. morphs, by the second, from five lanes to six, then back to four as the vehicles occupying every square inch of asphalt create a kaleidoscope of hurried formations.
Along the edges, buildings from decades past give way to glassy skyscrapers, so shiny and new I imagine my reflection in their windows as we whiz past. And the septuagenarian man behind me? He’s pedalling like there’s no tomorrow.
Cyclos, a leftover from the French colonial era, can be spotted around Phnom Penh, a sort of cross between a pedicab and an oversized pram — one big enough to comfortably seat a single adult passenger, even one like me, who has swelled considerably from eating a few too many buttery Khmer curries.
I’m in Cambodia’s capital to experience a unique moment in time. China’s prosperity is overflowing into this Southeast-Asian nation, bringing with it modern condominiums, designer boutiques and even outlet malls. I’m here to see a more traditional cross-section of Cambodian life, the best way I know how — in the seat of a cyclo.
I’m part of a group tour consisting of roughly half a dozen North Americans riding around in these charmingly antiquated contraptions — pedalled exclusively, it seemed, by men as elderly as my own driver — a young, smiling architecture graduate named Virak Rouen. With impeccable English, he leads our daylong journey through the dynamic streets of Phnom Penh.
Rouen takes us from era to era, starting at the Raffles Hotel Le Royal, a grand hotel that retains its 1920s charm. We pile into the cyclos and make the 10-minute trip to the former heart of the city.
French rule began in 1863 and in 1866, Rouen says, the colonial decision-makers moved the capital to Phnom Penh, formerly a sleepy fishing village. They proceeded to build a city in their own image, laying out a grid and creating administrative structures that today, if you squint a bit and use your imagination, could look at home in Paris.
We visit the imposing central post office, view its high ceilings and louvred windows, perfect for keeping things cool in a time before air conditioning, then see the former Hotel Manolis, once one of the finest lodgings in the city.
Rouen explains that after the Khmer Rouge essentially emptied out Phnom Penh during its reign of terror in the1970s, those returning to the city afterward grabbed whatever rooms they could find, and the hotel now serves as a sort of ersatz apartment building.
Rouen takes us up a back staircase and through well-worn halls, and we view the original-but-tarnished flo- ral and checkerboard-tile floors and wooden doors, still inscribed with hotel-room numbers.
We stop for a break at an outpost of Brown Coffee, a homegrown Starbucks doppelganger that sells $5 lattes in a country whose average income hovers around $1,400 per year. I ask Rouen about the changes he’s seeing.
“Someone who left a few years ago and just came back — they wouldn’t recognize this city,” he says. “All these highrises . . . I think the first ones were built just five years ago.”
Perhaps in response, he takes us next to Phnom Penh’s Chinatown, a lengthy pedal to the north. After a quick visit to Chinese House, a 1903 Chinese villa that now operates as an upscale restaurant (“We do dinner, drinks, the whole nine,” a hipster bartender in a tight white T-shirt tells me in breezy English), we visit a 1913 Taoist temple, then delve deeply into the labyrinthine lanes that snake behind it.
Reminiscent of Beijing’s now-endangered hutongs, every bend brings a new slice of life. In one small room, a circle of friends play cards on the floor; in another, a woman cooks a chicken with a blowtorch. Barefoot children chase after us, gleefully crying, “Hello! Hello! Hello!”
“You could call this a slum,” Rouen says, his brow furrowed thoughtfully. “I prefer to call it an informal community.”
More lay ahead on our tour — 19thcentury canals and classic shophouses and plenty more harrowing twists and turns on Phnom Penh’s packed streets. At that moment I realize, for better or for worse, this particular, dynamic community probably won’t be here five years from now. Tim Johnson was a guest of Raffles Hotel Le Royal, which did not review or approve this story.