Sihanoukville Revisited
Certainly, we all knew that the place had changed over the past two years, but that's the way some geeks like to put it because they want everything to be just like it was before, so it was not worth thinking so much about it.
But then - huuhaa! Ross and I walked along what was left of the stretch that once brought up Sihanoukvilles reputation as Cambodia's most decadent party beach, Ochheuteal Beach.
Daytime, the restaurants used to serve delicious fresh fish and seafood, huge portions too including salad and mash that happily goes down with 50-cent beers and two-dollar drinks; at night now, the bars used to compete with cracked loudspeakers; the dreadlocks were sitting around the campfires sucking to the joints like they were elevating to the next holy level, and local ladies walked around spotting for the next guy with an ATM card in his pocket.
So, if yesterday was happy happy go go, today the charm is overrun, torn and broken, by the deserted land showing a depressing combination of construction sites and garbage dumps.
"Fucking hell!" Ross said, shaking his head.
"I never hear you use curse words. Are you in a shock or something? "
"Yes, bloody well, I am! They even took the trees down! "
To the left of us there was a pile of junk and to the right lay the sea, lilac and forever. The waves broke loose. There was less beach left than before. I imagined that the sand that was eroding built up the beaches around the small islands a few kilometers into the sea belt. But what did I know?
Further down on the beach there were some restaurants but they looked hollow with their empty tables and chairs and sunbeds, because the tourists had moved to other places. Like Otres Beach which was only a few kilometers away.
So we went to Otres Beach.
Everyone we talked to were blaming the Chinese. In Siem Reap too, we already knew that the Chinese had taken over Sihanoukville.
"They are taking over everything down there and they own all the casinos," Arthur claimed. "And they are building new ones."
"Chinese money is everywhere in Sihanoukville," said Slim who recently had been there. "But Otres Beach is still what it used to be."
Lorraine said: "That's what happens when the communists are in power."
Ross said: "USA is fucked, China is going to take over as the dominant part over the world. And they are coming in through the back door."
And I thought that the Cambodians had been occupied by domestic and foreign forces at all times and now they were once again colonized by foreign bribery that the government and local politicians put in their spacious pockets.
There were many casinos here in Ochheuteal Beach, I could step outside my door on the first floor and count to seven, just there. In daytime they looked strangely anonymous with fronts that I would describe as nicotine yellow, but in the evenings they radiated in neon with different colours running down the walls of the buildings like waterfalls. I never went in there. And I never saw anyone walking in or walking out. It's funny. But they are not only casinos, they are also hotels. That's where the Chinese stay. They walk in and out through a different entrance and that's the hotel part. They always walk in groups on the street and they are cute. The guys and girls look and dress like their favourite pop stars on YouTube. A black cap on the head with some bling bling and brand new jeans with the knees torn wide open. It's almost like holiday. It's playing holiday.
So we walked over to Otres Beach. It reminds you of a few years ago. We look around. There are people from all parts of the world, different cultures and colours. Happy smiles and how are you? It is the same happy happy go go I saw before.
So we moved there.
And it would happen tomorrow.
