Hope and Anchor Hotel/Bar - Phnom Penh

After a three day stay in Sihanoukville Nick and I had enough of the sea, sand, and sun. We booked next morning's bus to Phnom Penh and checked out of the Angkor Arms. Upon hearing about our departure the hotel owner Roland wrote down the address of a salubrious hotel in the capitol.

It's a good drinking bar by the river."

"Thanks for the suggestion."

"Let me buy you a round."

One round gave birth to another round and we drank ourselves into oblivion, but made the 9am bus.

We slept all the way to the Cambodian capitol.

Three hours later we deboarded at the bus terminal near the city's central market. I searched my pockets. The scrap of paper was gone. I had probably used it as a toothpick and Nick laughed, "You can't hold onto anything."

"Do you remember the name?"

"My mind's a little blank after last night's twenty vodka-tonics."

Stepping off the bus nearly fifty tuk-tuk drivers crowded around us echoing, "Where you go? Where you go?"

"No idea, thanks to genius." Nick lit up a cigarette. "Let's stay the same place as last year. You remember the name?"

"Who can take us to Mike's?" The name dropped from an old branch of the brain stem.

"Not Mike's anymore?" The youngest driver pushed his way to us. "Now Hope and Anchor."

"There's a Hope and Anchor in Islington." Nick loved pubs. He also loved bars. I shared the same affinity for a wooden counter with a cold glass in my hand.

"Hope and Anchor, it is."

I nodded to the driver and we scrummed through the rejectees, who muttered Cambodian curses for not having chosen them. Business was slow this time of year.

"You come to Phnom Penh before?"

The tuk-tuk gracefully weaved around the market's stupa structure.

"Many times." Nick and I had made several trips to the Cambodian capitol to renew our visas.

"We're avoiding Songkran." The old Thai celebration had gotten out of control in the new century.

"We have Songkran here. Not same Thailand. Pheap sabbayrikreay."

"Pee-ap sabbyik reah?"

"Fun."

"I know fun."

"Where you want go tonight?"

"Sophie's, Martini's, and Sharkey's," answered Nik.

"Pheap sabbayrikreay."

I was broken-hearted and not after any girls.

"Drink was my fun."

"Now many girls go home for new year." He veered onto 51 street. The public sanitation squad were still recovering from the Khmer Rouge purges and garbage lay uncollected on every corner. Vagrant families camped before vacant buildings. The pace was hundred times slower than Pattaya.

"What about Sophie's?" This bar was rated #1 sleaziest bar in the world by anyone who had been to the short-time lounge.

"Closed for the holiday." We were nearing the river.

"Closed?" Nick and I chorused in unison.

"Governor say close for religion."

"Damn." That closure blew out our first destination.

"But many other bars open. I drive you later."

"No, we're going to rent motorbikes, so after the hotel you can take us to Lucky's Bike." I was acting as tour leader, since my memory was better than Nick's battered brain cells. Not all the time, he was really strong on 80s pop hits and 70s punk classics.

The driver stopped on Quai Sisowith before a renovated colonial building.

The Hope and Anchor.

Nothing had changed since a year ago other than the bar staff.

We took two rooms.

"Which one you want?" I asked Nick.

"I don't care."

I picked the better one and Nick complained, "Why you always get first choice?"

"Because you always tell me it's up to me."

25 Bucks for AC and Cable TV plus a good bed.

Beers $1 baht for drafts and $1.50 baht for a can of Angkor. Vodka-tonics $1 baht too. The dollar was still accepted everywhere as the nation's second currency. Phnom Penh was a drunk's paradise and the Hope and Anchor was a good harbor offering a storm of libations. Food was not bad either. Nick and I swore by the creamed spinach.

"Makes you regular in the morning."

The attractive girls behind the desk are most helpful in arranging travel plans and the boss, Peter, was a good man to drink with as the night nears the dawn.

But I'm not sure if it is still there.

The website is gone.

Same as Nick and I.

Wish we were back there.

Eighteen years ago.

STINKY'S RETURN 2007

Back in 2007 Nik Reiter and I decided to avoid the madness of Songkran by leaving Pattaya for Cambodia. My wife was up-country. She was seeing family. Things weren't good between us.

Nothing like a road trip to cheer up a man," Nick said and he booked a van for the border.

The next morning the van stopped at my house on Moo 9.

Nick was already inside and looked unhappy.

"What's wrong?"

Take a whiff."

I inhaled the air.

Damn."

"Someone stinks."

"That Dutch cunt in the back."

Stinky was a young backpacker.

We hated travelers.

And they hated us ex-pats.

"Where's he headed?"

"Sihanoukville."

"Same as us."

"Damn."

The Thai driver thought the same and drove with the window open.

We opened ours too.

Stinky complained.

Nick and I told him to fuck off and slept with the warm wind in our faces.

The mini-van skipped the food stop and we ended up at Trat, the last big town before Koh Klong, the Cambodian entry point.

"This stop," announced the driver.

We got off and Stinky asked, "How do we get to the border?"

We walk. It's only a half-mile." I wanted rid of Stinky. " But we're going to have some beer, so piss off."

The mini-van driver was complaining to the other Thais about the Dutchman's smell, but stopped upon hearing the tone of my voice.

"Piss off?" asked the blonde Dutchman.

"Yeah, fuck off." Nick shoved him and the driver muttered, "Pai ke kii."

Stinky got the message and wandered off toward the border.

It was another fifteen miles away.

When I explained that to the driver he laughed and we drank a quick beer before continuing to the checkpoint at Cham Yeam.

We saw nothing of Stinky.

At the crossing we tipped the driver 200 baht.

Passing through the Cambodian frontier was easy.

$25 for a month-long visa.

A young boy wrote out the particulars and offered to drive us into Koh Kong for $5. We bought 4 beers and got into the car. Nick laughed to himself.

"What's so funny?"

"You throwing Stinky off the bus."

Ï didn't throw him off. I just gave him the wrong information."

"Same result. We're breathing normal air again."

The driver paid the toll for the bridge over the river. I had stayed in Koh Kong before. It's a sleepy border town. No beaches. No go-gos. No tourist attractions. Just beer drinking. Not a bad thing, but the driver could arrange forward travel to Sihanoukville.

5-6 hours on a mini-bus, but we needed one other passenger.

"Wouldn't it be funny, if it was Stinky." Nick chuckled under his breath.

"Yeah, funny, but not ha-ha."

We drove into town. Cambodians were splashing water, yet without the viciousness of the Thai Songkran. The driver tried to entice us into a visit to the Chicken Farm. "Have many girls?"

"How many?"

"50."

Nick and I shook our heads.

Most of the girls would be sleeping off the last night's labors. Plus he's faithful to his girlfriend and me mine. Not that we're good guys, but unlike Bill Clinton we don't make exceptions to the rules of monogamy.

Except in cases of extreme discretion.

We arrive at the guest house. The mini-van was waiting in the driveway. So was Stinky.

"That wasn't nice." He hadn't changed his shirt and smelled as bad as before.

"What wasn't nice?" I acted innocent.

"Telling me the mini-van didn't go to Cambodia."

"I didn't tell you that."

"Yeah, we were wondering why you got off the bus." Nick backed me up. As an English football fan he hated the Dutch. "And you still smell."

"I can't help it."

Nick looked at me. His eyes said he couldn't stand 5-6 hours with Stinky. The driver spoke Thai and I said to him, "We pay more if only two people."

The driver could smell Stinky too and agreed to the deal.

We loaded our bags onto the bus. Stinky tried to get on. The driver stopped him.

"No go Sihanoukville. Go casino. Two men. Come back for you 30 minutes."

Thirty minutes later we were speeding over a red dirt road.

Stinky nowhere to be seen, heard, or smelled.

And we were very happy men

Escape from Songkran 2007

In 2007 Songkran started early, despite the cool rainy weather. Drunken bar girls and their patrons jump-started the water festival two days before the official opening date, April 13. My wife and daughter deserted Pattaya for their family celebration of the Thai New Year. I had no intentions of enduring the expected aquatic mayhem, but my good friend Nick and I waited for the traffic frenzy to subside.

Good news.

Only 100 vehicular fatalities on the first day. 10 off last year's pace.

No worries, because our destination was Cambodia via Trat and Nam Lek, the Thai town bordering Cambodia.

Departure time: 8am 4/14/2007 on a mini-bus.

800 baht one way.

Neither of us had hit the bars the previous night. The mini-van was crowded with farangs seeking sun on Koh Chang. We had nothing to say to them and read our books for the first leg of our journey. There were little signs of Songkran other than a few police road blocks and several groups of well-wishers politely sprinkling cars with scented water.

"Think it will be like this in Pattaya?"

"No." Nick was dying for a cigarette. "The cunts will be going mad for the next seven days. Best thing we could do was leave."

I buried my face in BONES a novel about getting work in TV comedy.

It was easy going and my fingers turned the pages with an unexpected eagerness. By the time we arrived in Trat to change buses, I was almost finished with the book.

"Don't tell me you read that fast?" Nick was on the last pages of Danny King's THE BURGLAR DIARIES, a tale about a cockney housebreaker. "You must skim the pages."

"No way. I read every single words." I just don't register them all.

"What's that smell?" Nick's slender nose wrinkled with fisgust. Someone hadn't bathed, but it wasn't me, Nick, or the old man next to him. Thais are devoted bathers.

"Someone hasn't learned about personal hygiene," I said this loud enough for the backkpackers in the rear of van to hear.

"Yeah," Nick covered his nose and said to the old man. "Menh."

The old man nodded in agreement. Several of the other Thais glared at the backpackers.

When we pulled into the next stop, I felt I had to say something. "Excuse me, one of you needs to take a bath."

"What do you mean? We showered this morning." The taller one smelled his armpit.

"You use deodorant?"

"No, we don't use chemicals." His accent was Dutch.

"Well, you really smell bd. And the Thais are upset about it."

"There is nothing to do about it." He stood up straight, as if to say he smelled like a rose. "Does this bus continue to the border?"

"I don't know," Nick admitted honestly.

I did know the answer and spoke to the driver in Thai before saying, "NO, you have to wait for another bus. Should be coming soon."

"Where are you going?" The cheesehead was suspicious.

"We're going to the casino."

They took out their backpacks and the driver drove off with us breathing easier.

"You lied to them." Nick's tone was apolegetically accusatory.

"Yeah. Thought it was for the best."

"Good man."

And we reached the border safely and sound.

Good-bye Thailand. Hello Cambodia.

Road Trip - To Sihanoukville 2007

2007 road trip with Nik Reiter from Pattaya to Sihanoukville, Cambodia. A ferry crossing over the Preat River powered by a dragon boat car engine. No one stays in the cars during the trip. Up river a jungle to the sea a bridge under construction spelling the wooden ferry's demise in the future. On the southern bank an old German sells frikadelle, fried German meat balls, from a wooden shack. He recounted a story about having flown out of Stalingrad. How he had been a Luftwaffe corpman on one of the last planes out of the beseiged city. The wounded were stacked inside the fuselage. One atop of the other. Triage with the more seriously wounded atop the potential survivors to keep them warm. Tears rolled from his eyes. Over fifty years later now on a tropical river far from the Russian winter. He was that old.

A Dutch tourist smelled so bad, the van passengers voted to leave him behind. Old Stinky.

I loved ferry crossings. Bridges aren't that interesting.

December 20, 1978 - East Village - Journal

My Christmas shopping is nearly complete, except for my brother Frank and sister Pammie, but accomplishing that should be easy thanks to a bet at OTB with Bill Yusk coming through. Wise Philip at Aqueduct. An unexpected boon thanks to a dream about the race. Like DH Lawrence's The Unrealistic Dream Of A Horse Rider. A naked man with a cowboy har riding a bathtub gave me a name. Wise Philip. I had once dreamed him before and Bill and I had bet of Johnny D ridden by Stevie Cauthen. The naked man came through again. I told Bill to not talk about this to anyone.

"It might break the link."

LATER

Alice called from West Virginia and said, "I want to travel."

Her father had given her an Amex card for Christmas. She didn't mention anything about her missed period. She hasn't said anything about an abortion either. I'm thinking about being a father. She doesn't really want to have a baby. She hasn't said anything, but she wants to be an actress and there aren't too many roles for pregnant women in the movies.

I want to travel too and not just to West Virginia, but Boston is the only possible destination for the foreseeable future. It's been over four years since I hitchhiked to California, something I had done three times from 1972 to 1974. I've been stuck here on the East Coast for years. I doubt I'll ever hit the road again.

Alice on the other hand could leave me in a heartbeat and I couldn't blame her. Her absence was felt this week as I walked home from CBGBs along the dark street hurried by winter winds, searching the empty sidewalks for faces, finding none only the shadows of destroyed buildings. The ruins of the Lower East Side. AS much as I fear her fleeing to Paris or LA, I'm sure she will return. Where else can she go? Anywhere.

A bullet struck Malcolm X Snipers struck at JFK A sniper killed Martin Luther King Assassins surrounded RFK.

These men died before their time Why did they die and I outlive them? Boy Dylan also lived Nixon survived his disgrace Why did he live with so many others died Thousands of American dead in Vietnam, hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese, Million of Cambodians. A curse on Kissinger

In 1960 my friend Chaney drowned in Sebago Lake

If he had lived He might have died in Vietnam AS I might have If my mother signed my enlistment papers At age 17. I so wanted to leave home. James McNeil, a hometown boy, died in ASia, Struck my lightening. The young die young. Kissinger still lives Nixon, Pol Pot, and the Shah The Pope too The Eternal Church.

My only choice. Live a joyous life With the evil far away Worshipped by the people Not as Gods, but as leaders, Leading us the Armageddon Where the evil and good will be burned in an atomic hell Freeing Earth of Man For anyone that remains the charred flesh of the living The crumbling bones of the dead. Paradise.

John Kemp and Grant Stitt are coming over. I haven't told anyone about Alice's lateness for her period. We were heading up the GG Barnums, a Times Square transvestite disco with a trapeze act appealing to the three or more genders of humans. I like a brunette there. Shannon. Skinny and looking like a Vogue model. Maybe I'll see her there.

With My Bare Hands - Anthony Bourdain

I have always admired Anthony Bourdain, but never more than when he wrote in A Cook’s Tour: Global Adventures in Extreme Cuisines, “Once you’ve been to Cambodia, you’ll never stop wanting to beat Henry Kissinger to death with your bare hands. You will never again be able to open a newspaper and read about that treacherous, prevaricating, murderous scumbag sitting down for a nice chat with Charlie Rose or attending some black-tie affair for a new glossy magazine without choking. Witness what Henry did in Cambodia – the fruits of his genius for statesmanship – and you will never understand why he’s not sitting in the dock at The Hague next to Milošević.

I felt the same way after my trips to S-21, the school/execution center in Phnom Penh and the haunting ghost hotel in Sihanoukville. The haunting ghosts of millions still roam the Killing Fields.

Our problems with Iran began when Kissinger convinced President Carter to admit the Shah of Iran into the USA for cancer treatment. The next week protestors storm the American Embassy in Tehran setting off forty years of animosity between the two nations.

Chile, Timor, the emigration of the Soviet Jews to Palestine, Nicaragua, his hand was deep in the mix of hundreds of unseen evils around the world. It's an outrage that no one in politics has the courage to call Kissinger out for what he was. A war criminal.

Not so Anthony Bourdain.

You we miss.

And I know nothing about him other than he had a good life.

Bien fait, chef.

As for Kissinger.

Non restem in pacem.

War Criminal # 1

Written Sep 28, 2016

When I first visited Cambodia in 1998, I arrived at Phnom Penh airport on a comfortable Bangkok Air flight from Bangkok. The previous year the Khmer Rouge ceased their guerilla war against the government forces and the country was deemed safe for tourism. up After landing the plane rolled across the tarmac to halt before the ancient terminal. My sunglasses offered little protection against the glaring sun, as I descended the stairs and stumbled toward the terminal seeking relief from the heat, then stopped as a small bus deboarded its troop of young passengers. All of them missing limbs. Some several, but everyone of the children were dressed in their best clothes. A flight attendant informed me that they were flying to Thailand to be fitted with prosthetic limbs. Hopeful smiles disguised their the agony of missing arms and legs as well as the nervous anticipation of a long journey away from family and friends.

Throughout my weeks long stay in Cambodia, I saw amputees were everywhere, for the landmines laid during that long conflict reaped new victims without a vacation. I never heard Cambodians expressing anger about Pol Pot, the mines, or the long war, almost as if it had happened to someone else or that talking about the horror might revive those years.

Not me, I’d be out for revenge and my #1 target would be Henry Kissinger, who was portrayed in William Shawcross’ book, SIDESHOW as the principal architect of Cambodia’s descent from a neutral monarchy to the Pentagon’s secret front of the Viet-Nam War.

Prince Sihanouk had kept his country out of the neighboring conflict by skillfully waltzing between the USA and Vietnamese combatants to maintain his dynasty's reign over Cambodia. By 1970 this non-combatant status was unacceptable to the Nixon regime and Kissinger condoned the secret bombing of suspected NVA bases in what was known as the Parrot’s Beak.

"I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to the irresponsibility of its people." Kissinger.

Armed incursions followed in 1970 as well as an invasion. Sihanouk was deposed and supported the Khmer Rouge against the Lon Nol dictatorship. This country of fertile rice paddies and vast flood plains joined Laos and Vietnam in the holocaust. As usual civilians paid the heaviest toll and the Nobel Institute disgraced itself forever by awarding Kissinger with the Peace Prize.

A little know fact is that Senator McCain’s father was the admiral directing the unauthorized bombing of Cambodia. He was offered his son’s release if the bombing stopped. It never did, because the USA doesn’t speak with terrorists, but worst than the bombs was what the Cambodian suffered at the hands of the Khmer Rouge and as of yet none of them have gone on trial.

The Khmer Rouge numbered in the thousands. They lived amongst the people like fish in water as suggested by Mao. Calls for justice are muted by the quiet resignation that righting a wrong was for big people and not poor peasants. No one was asking Kissinger to appear before a judge or the Chinese or the Vietnamese. The frontiers of guilt died at a country’s borders.

Back in 1982 I was working in Hamburg, Germany. A reporter friend took me to the trial of a Nazi. The accused must have been eighty and my friend said, “The Polizei found him hiding in a nursing home.”

Despite the horrors portrayed in SIDESHOW, the Cambodians are a much more forgiving people than others who have suffered through a holocaust, mostly because they have to live with the perpetrators. They love Americans and only a few older people have any idea about what Kissinger or Nixon did to them. The rest live life as best they can without any help from the bombers of 1970.

Along the path to Angkot Wat’s Bayon Temple a quintet of amputees plays traditional music. A tourist stopped to take a photo and the leader of the troupe asked the visitor’s nationality. When the middle-aged voyager replied Texas, the band struck up YELLOW ROSE OF TEXAS.

The tourist left a dollar and I left two.

Small reward for such forgiveness.

Forgetting is another matter saved for another time.

Thankfully Kissinger died yesterday, mourned by the Washington establishment and media as a great diplomat.

A war criminal finally brought to a long overdue death.

A pox on his grave.

DA CHICKEN FARM IN SIHANOUKVILLE by Peter Nolan Smith

In 2007 I was losing my mind. The mother of my daughter has deserted me to live in the hicks or 'bannok'. I had given up everything to move to Thailand and be a father. Angie's mom was scared that I was planning to kidnap her. She was stupider than a bucket of mud. I would do nothing to hurt my daughter, but it was too late to make things right. I was lost in Asia.

My good friend Nick Tottenham suggested that we leave town for Songkran and head over to Cambodia. I rejected the trip at first, but Nick recognized the depths of my depression and said, "Mate, nothing says you've fucked up like a binge through Cambodia. Beer, pussy, and me will cure your ills."

It was worth a shot and we took off two days before Songkran to Sihanoukville.

The beach resort had been a nothing town for decades. The Khmer Rouge had seen to it that beaches were off-limits to the masses. A major pollution spill in the 90s had scared the most durable of backpackers, but beachfront property was a seller in the 2000s and we pulled into a forgotten town on the verge of a boom.

I had been here several times and we booked rooms at the Angkor Arms. The hosts were two Froggies named Roland. Beers, the Who, and ganja killed the early part of the evening, but Nick was used to spending his nights with women.

"Ou est les femmes?" Nick asked the straight Roland. The other Roland was asexual.

"Les putas ou les filles?" Roland understood Nick's query.

"Whores."

"The best place is the Chicken Farm."

"I know where it is."

On my three previous solo trips to Sihanoukville I never ventured over to its infamous ‘Chicken Farm’ or street of ill repute near the harbor. Red light districts are never really fun, unless you’re with a friend.

“You ready?” Nick paid the bill. $5 for five beers and cheaper than Pattaya, which was why many farangs on a budget had offshored their retirement to Cambodia. Money went further. Rent was cheap, but due to a fatal accident a year ago the governor prohibited westerners from riding motorcycles in Sihanoukville, so we stepped into the street. Two motorcycle taxi guys appeared as if they were beamed from the sky.

“Where you want go?”

“Chicken farm.” Nick and I said at the same time.

The drivers knew the way to ‘Phum Thmey’ or the new village.

As we rode down a dirt road, my driver explained that the port expansion had wiped out half the shantytown of working girls. The remaining brothels exuded an aura of authentic seediness untouched by trendy travelers. The offerings were mostly older women and they were fat.

Nick’s driver said, “New Year. Many girl go home.”

They drove up to BIBA.

The hottest disco in the Chicken Farm.

Nick and I entered the dark karaoke lounge. Girls snapped to attention. None were under 30. It was a horror show. The girls smelled of bad food. No one wanted them home for the holiday. We bought them a round of drinks. It cost us $20.

One of them begged me to go into the backroom.

"I do everything cheap." She probably had worked sailors for $2 a go. Her breath stank of rotten teeth. I guessed her age to be close to mine. The red light made her 30. I gave her $20. Tears warmed her eyes.

"I do more than everything."

"I don't want anything." Sex was a destination a long way from the BIBA.

"You no think I pretty?"

"No, my wife leave me. I have a broken heart."

"I sorry."

"She is not. You want some tequila?"

"Yes." She understood broken hearts better than a professor of romance languages at Harvard. "We forget."

"Forgetting is everything."

After three shots Nick and I fled the BIBA and told the drivers to go to Victory Hill for drinks. They detoured by every possible knocking shop in Sihanoukville, hoping for an extra pimping charge.

We blanked every one of them.

The drivers dropped us at the Angkor Arms. The Rolands were waiting in the bar. Two girls sat at a small table. They were better-looking than any of the girls from the Chicken Farm. Nick booked them both. I wasn't in the mood. Angie's mom had put me off women. He went upstairs and I ordered a Tiger beer for me and the Rolands.

"What about your friend?"

"He's English. He shoots quick. He'll be here soon enough."

And that was the truth.

No Sophie's Bar Phnom Penh - Songkran 2007

In 2007 Nick and I had scheduled our Cambodia trip to avoid Songkran in Thailand. My wife thought this voyage was simply a sex tour, but we passed through Koh Kong and Sihanoukville without a passing glance at the local talent, mostly because S-ville's Chicken Farm has been dramatically reduced by the port expansion and the bars of Victory Hill were devoid of pulchritude. The taxi drivers vainly attempted to hook us up, but we opted to wait until Phnom Penh.

We arrived in the capitol in the late-afternoon and installed ourselves at the Hope and Anchor Hotel on Quai Sisiwoth. Several beers smoothed the edge of a five-hour bus trip and darkness turned our minds to Sophie's Bar.

The sleaziest bar in the world.

We rode our rented dirt bikes around 153 St.

For 30 minutes.

Finally finding the infamous haunt of sex tourists.

No lights.

The doors shut.

I asked the taxi drivers, "What's up?"

They signaled with their hands.

Closed.

"Closed?"

Nick asked, "Why?"

"How the fuck should I know." I tried to hide my disappointment, because I considered Sophie's Bar one of the Seven Wonders of the world. Its closure was more tragic than the Taliban's blowing up the giant Buddha statue in Afghanistan. After all those statues were stone and Sophie's Bar was flesh and blood.

Martini's and Sharkey's were too tame for my taste and I returned to the hotel alone to sat with Peter, the owner.

"Is Sophie's closed permanently?" I had to know for socio-anthropological reasons.

"No, only for the Buddhist holiday by order of the mayor. He didn't consider it a holy place of worship. Not like some. But it will be open after the New Year."

"I'll be gone then."

"Win some, lose some."

"Yeah." Next year I would have to plan my trip more carefully.

Anything to preserve antiquity.

SOPHIE'S Bar - #9E, Street 118/53

Short time - $10 for one/ $20 for two.

Par 4 at the Killing Fields Country Club

Eleven years ago in a move destined to have the late Cambodian despot Pol Pot spinning in his grave _ if he had one _ the former Khmer Rouge cadres in their stronghold of Pailin embraced a plan to cash in on the country's tourism boom and build a golf course. Not that they know much about the game. If football is the beautiful game, to the ultra-Maoist former guerrillas, golf is the mysterious one.

The golf fanatic Prime Minister Hun Sen visited the remote area, traveling more than 100km of rugged dirt road from the nearest city of Battambang, and proposed a golf course for the municipality.

Pailin is perched on the nation's north-western border with Thailand just four hours by road from Bangkok, but up to 10 hours from the Cambodian capital.

Hun Sen was possibly the only country leader in the world to list his golf scores on his website.

Cambodia was so serious about developing golf as an industry that it has appointed a special representative to the Council of Ministers. The former Khmer Rouge are ecstatic.

Once rich in gems and timber, these resources were all but stripped bare by the Khmer Rouge as they tried to finance the remnants of the rebel movement by selling off the country's resouces before the rebels finally conceded to join Hun Sen's government in 1996.

Even journalists don't bother to go Paillin any more since four of its most infamous residents _ former Khmer Rouge leaders Ieng Sary, his wife Ieng Thirith, Khieu Samphan and Nuon Chea _ were arrested on orders from the court set up to try them.

Pailin's biggest draw currently are its mainly Thai-owned casinos, which operators say draw up to 10,000 Thais per month. But thiese gaming houses lie within a quick sprint of the border and more than 12 rough kilometres from Pailin town, so most gamblers drop their money there and go no further. Nor does Pailin have the attractions of other former Khmer Rouge border strong-holds such as Anlong Veng, which at least boasts the makeshift cremation site of the movement's leader Pol Pot and Khmer Rouge military commander Ta Mok's home, complete with war room. So the former hardline communists, who drove the country to destruction in their 1975-79 failed bid to turn the nation into an agrarian utopia bereft of social classes, which left up to 2 million dead, have joyfully embraced a new ideology _ golf.

"We don't understand this game and at the moment it is just a speech by the prime minister, but it would be great for Pailin,'' says local Information Chief Kong Duong, once a Khmer Rouge propaganda chief.

He says he has never seen a golf ball, except on television. "We don't know where we will put [the course], or how big it should be, but the idea is good."

Pailin Tourism Chief So Korng is candid. He freely admits that to him, an iron is for pressing clothes, a wood is something you cut down to make furniture, and Tiger Woods is a place you never go alone or unarmed. But he agrees that the concept is attractive.

''People will have more jobs, and many people inside Cambodia and from overseas will come to visit Pailin and also see our natural attractions like our waterfall, gem shops, mountains and our agricultural programs," he said.

Revenue from the golf course may even pay for a road to the municipality's spectacular, but remote waterfall.

A former soldier who fought the Khmer Rouge in the early 1990s said the now-tamed rebels should also make good caddies.

"I've seen them climb mountains with two B-40 rockets strapped to their backs, so golf clubs should be no problem."

That would be a whole new revolution for a movement better known for its infamous black pajama uniform than plaid and plus fours. But not everyone is convinced. A spokesman for local non-government organization Buddhism for Development says golf was for the rich, and he doubted there will be much trickle-down for the impoverished former Khmer Rouge farmers in the area.

"The former Khmer Rouge are poor. They are too busy farming to have time to play golf," he said. And then there is the image problem. In a 2006 interview a senior Pailin tourism official laughingly admitted that the very concept of tourism remained somewhat alien. ''Before, our orders were to kill them, but now we invite them to visit and please spend money,"

It won't be on the killing fields

NO MAN'S LAND by Peter Nolan Smith

Farangs consider themselves smarter than Thais. This superiority complex is based on the centuries of Western domination over the rest of the world. Foreigners boast about their education and well-paid jobs to each other with pride. The Thais regard farangs kee-nok or bird shit. The West never conquered Thailand. Farang food is tasteless and the men are drunks.

Western prestige means nothing.

Thais love Thais.

Farangs come and farangs go.

Thailand forever.

I had moved to Thailand to raise a family . Her mother betrayed my trust by signing another man's name on our daughter's birth certificate. She told me it was her cousin. I refused to marry the farm girl at the wat or city hall, but stayed with her to raise our daughter. I loved Angie every second. Her mother none.

After three years her mother went up-country with the car. I kept asking about her return. Her excuses for staying varied from month to month. I didn't lift them to the light, because the truth is an onion with many layers. Once you peel them all, you have nothing.

Neither did I question her returns, which coincided with my wandering farther from home. I was happy to end my pseudo-philandering, because their arrival meant I got to spend time with my 3 year-old daughter.

During my 'wife's' visits, my friends understood that they wouldn't be seeing me at the Welkom Inn or Buffalo Bar. My daughter and I swam at the Shaba Hut and rode around town with our little dog in the motor scooter basket. No bars, no late nights, and I laid in bed reading WINNIE THE POOH to my little angel in horrible Thai. I was happy and my 'wife' wore her misery like a chador.

Five years ago the monsoon season had given way to the glorious weather of November. My 'wife' had been in town two weeks. She wanted to see her older sister. Pi-yai and I had nothing in common. The fishmonger was after my money and I wasn't giving her any. Her little sister suffered a lost of face and her older sister berated her for having found a farang without money.

"You go out. I go see sister. See friends. Get mao with farangs."

A freedom pass was an easy command to obey and I busted out of the house off Soi Bongkot with a fugitive's dispatch.

Sam Royalle was waiting at Heaven Above A Go Go.

His girlfriend had a posse of girlfriends retired by out-of-town boyfriends. They were stars on Walking Street. Men surrounded our table offering drinks and money to the trio of beauties.

I was soon bored by the action. They were too loud to speak over the boy band disco and ’suck-my-dick’ rap. Naked girls held no thrill. Not when they’re shuffling the old bored one-two step, but Sam kept ordering tequilas. After three my tongue reverted to Neanderthalism.

As Sam called for a round of Kamikazes, I escaped from Heaven and staggered down the stairs to Soi Diamond. Every step was a challenge and I wondered how to negotiate the two blocks to my parked bike. A catapult seemed my only solution, until a New York voice commented, “Man, are you really that fucked up?”

"Fuck you."

"Are you sure about that?" It was Jamie Parker. "You're in no condition to fight."

The ex-con slipped his arm under mine. My legs regained partial use.

“Tequila on an empty stomach.” I tried to pull myself free. My head hit the headrest wall. Jamie caught me before I hit the pavement.

“Are you thinking about driving home?” Jamie had a good hold on my arms.

“I’ve driven in worst condition.” I hadn’t seen the Lower East Side native since the memorable 9/11 opening of his defunct PIGPEN A GO GO.

“Which is why your wrist looks like a Klingon warship.” He was referring to my near-fatal motorcycle crash on the Burma border.

“I wasn’t drunk then, only distracted.” My concentration had been distracted by the ageless scenery of opium fields.

"You're drunk now and you're not getting on a bike. You have a daughter, remember."

"And a 'wife'."

"Another reason you're not going home." Jamie and I went back to New York. Our tempers were well-known in East Village. Few expected us to live past 30. "You're not getting on that bike until you can walk in a straight line."

"Straight line no problem." Free on his grasp I veered right and then left with my arms swirling to regain my balance. I hugged a wall like a mountaineer clinging to a cliff and lolled my head back onto my neck. "Jamie, I'm all yours."

Jamie frog-marched me over to the Jennie Bar, famous for the world's most beautiful TVs in the world. He ordered a gin-tonic and a soda water. A tall kathoey sat next to me.

"This is Glaie. She will nurse you back to sobriety." Jamie tipped her 200 baht.

Glaie was the spitting image of a young Beyonce minus 20 kilos.

"Dhim." She held the glass of soda water to my lips. Her hands were devoid of veins.

"Yes, m'am." I obeyed Glaie without hesitation. She was six-feet tall in three-inch heels. I would do anything she asked me to do, which wasn't a good sign.

"I saw something weird today."

"Only one?"

"I was on a visa run to the Cambodia border this morning. I get on the minivan. 6:30. Crack of dawn. Sleep two hours. Listen two hours to the various bullshit from the other visa-runners. The only one not speaking was this old guy. Maybe 65. He’s reading a book. I like reading like you and ask him what he’s reading. He says with a German accent, “Zarathusa, but this version is called BANGKOK 8.”

"We spoke about the ubermensch and the untermensch. The old guy originally from Austria. Fled the Nazis but he wasn’t a Jew. Father was a commie or a criminal. He’s been out here since before electricity. Runs a restaurant in Made in Thailand.p

“I know the place.” His wife made a great veal schnitzel. “His name’s Frank.”

“Yeah, that’s right, but I have bad news.”

“What?” I was expecting him to ask me for money

“Frank’s dead

“Frank’s dead?” He was only 65. I knew his daughter. She was beautiful.

“Yeah, we crossed the border into Cambo. No problem. He’s fine. Gets his visa stamped and lowers his head into his book. I thought he was asleep and went to get a bottle of wine. Nice Bordeaux. I come back and see he hasn’t changed position. I touch him and he’s cold.

“Frank's Dead."

“Deader than a bucket of nails.”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought. I told the guide and he said the same thing. We had a little conference and decide to risk taking him back across the border. I mean, I didn’t want him stuck between the borders like Orson Welles in A TOUCH OF EVIL.”

“No one would have wanted to take responsibility for him.” Frank could have been stuck there for days. “Bad luck

“The guide wasn’t too happy about the situation, but we got him upright. You ever notice how heavy dead people are?”

“A bucket of mud in a plastic bag.” I had worked as a janitor in a terminal ward during university. The orderlies were my friends and I helped them move the dead to the gurneys. The difference in pay was five cents an hour.

“You know the border. Shitty muddy waiting area. Crappy bridge.” Jamie downed his drink and ordered a refill for my soda water. Glaie poured it down my throat, as if she had learned her trade from a CIA water boarding school.

"Get him another." Jamie sipped at his gin-tonic. "So where was I?"

"Frank's stuck in no-man's land between Thailand and Cambodia."

“We get to the passport control. The officer looks at Frank and asks what’s wrong. We say he’s drunk. The officer knows drunk. Frank is more than Mao-kah and he signals us to come to the side.”

“How much he want?” Thai border officials are quick on the take.

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

The guy had been stamping Frank's passport for years. One more newer visa was no big deal, but only if we declared him dead in Thailand.”

“Good guy.”

“That’s why we live here. Thais understand reality.” A Britney Spears look-a-like TV sat on Jamie’s lap. “We carry Frank’s body into Thailand. Everyone waied his corpse. They respect him as an old man who loves Thailand. The minivan driver sat him in the front seat. The other farangs never noticed he was dead."

"Good." Nosy farangs were a pain in the ass. Glaie made me drink a 3rd bottle of soda water. I was about 50% and thanked her for her ministrations with a 200 baht tip.

"How Frank's wife take it?"

"She cried a bucket.”

They had been together more than 30 years.

“Guess we’ll be going to the wat for cremation.”

“Better than being buried in a box.” Jamie and I never thought we were going to die. We clinked glasses and I headed home to sleep on the couch. It was the final refuge of the unloved, but my daughter would understand why I got drunk.

She was my blood and flesh.

As for her mother.

I didn't give a shit what her mother thought.

And that was a good thing.

Khmer Rouge Duch on Trial

In 1975 the Khmer Rouge converted the Tuol Svay Prey High School of the outskirts of Phnom Penh into the murderous Tuol Sleng or S-21 prison. An estimated 17,000 prisoners were subjected to the following code of behavior.

1. You must answer accordingly to my question. Don’t turn them away.
2. Don’t try to hide the facts by making pretexts this and that, you are strictly prohibited to contest me.
3. Don’t be a fool for you are a chap who dare to thwart the revolution.
4. You must immediately answer my questions without wasting time to reflect.
5. Don’t tell me either about your immoralities or the essence of the revolution.
6. While getting lashes or electrification you must not cry at all.
7. Do nothing, sit still and wait for my orders. If there is no order, keep quiet. When I ask you to do something, you must do it right away without protesting.
8. Don’t make pretext about Kampuchea Krom in order to hide your secret or traitor.
9. If you don’t follow all the above rules, you shall get many many lashes of electric wire.
10. If you disobey any point of my regulations you shall get either ten lashes or five shocks of electric discharge.

Only 12 survivors exited from the three-story building at the end of Angkor's 4-year reign of terror in 1979. The architects of this massacre remained at large throughout the civil wars of the 80s and 90s. Now almost 30 years later Duch of Kaing Guek Eav the warden of S-21 will stand trial in Phnom Penh and face several of the survivors in a specially constructed courthouse.

Whenever I've been in Phnom Penh I've asked the older people what they think of the Khmer Rouge and their reply comes as a surprise to most westerners raising on the litany of 'never again' for the Nazis.

"It's over. We want peace. Nothing more." A taxi driver said waiting for two dutch tourists visiting S-21.

"What about the trials?"

"We don't understand trials. All we know is that it's over." He was old enough to have lived under the Khmer Rouge as a teenager. He spoke a little French. That linguistic skill was a death sentence under the eyes of Duch.

"Au revoir." i doubted I would see him again, but we shared a beer later that night on Quay Sisowith. He laughed with all the joy 5 Angkor beers can give a man who has lived long enough to wake up from a nightmare with his humor intact.

Duch Choi Ch'kai Anh