The Mystery of the Late Night Knocker

Every night at about 10pm - the same time that we are treated to an emotional rendition of "Hotel California" - we hear a strange knocking noise. It almost sounds like someone is playing a wooden cowbell. So one night, we ventured out to the terrace to observe the wooden knocking.

It is exactly what it sounds like: a guy walking down the street tapping on a block of wood with a chopstick. Our minds fill with the possible purpose of the wooden knocker. Is he selling drugs? Or women? Or worse? A few minutes later, as we stand and contemplate, another wooden knocker walks by on a perpendicular street.

With piqued curiosity, I asked one of my co-workers the next day. When I explained my concern that the wooden knocker may be involved in illicit activities, he laughed. Apparently the wooden knocker - and his counterparts across the city - sells noodles. He parks his noodle cart on a street corner and walks through the neighborhood, advertising his wares with his wooden knocking. That will teach me to assume the worst when it comes to sketchy goings-on on the streets of Phnom Penh.

Scuba Diving in Cambo

A few months ago Shanti and I were at a party with a group of friends when I overhead one of them mention that she was planning to get scuba certified. Moreover, a group of our friends wa going to Sihanoukville to dive together. I had always wanted to do a scuba course but was inevitably short on time, money, or both.

The day after the party, I went to Scuba Nation’s Phnom Penh branch and signed Shanti and I up for the PADI Open Water Diver course. Once we completed the course, we would be able to dive to eighteen meters (about sixty feet) and would be certified for life. I attacked the course book with relish and watched the complementary DVD over the next few weeks.

With the dive trip fast approaching, Shanti and I scheduled our pool dive for a Saturday morning. We met at the Scuba Nation office and drove up to the Long Beach Hotel in Tuol Kork. It felt a bit funny to be carrying all of the dive equipment – tanks, masks, fins, BCDs – through a hotel to its swimming pool and it felt even stranger when we realized that there was a wedding going on by the pool. Naturally, the wedding guests were intrigued and crowded around us; it was certainly a unique experience to be surrounded by 100 people watching your every move when you’re wearing nothing but a bathing suit (especially so for the ‘scantily’ clad Shanti and Vicky, our instructor). For a good fifteen minutes, an old man, glued to his seat, kept pointing at us and laughing. The large audience put some unneeded added pressure on Shanti and me. Once in (and under) the water, however, our movements warranted less interest and the wedding-goers left us alone.

After setting up our equipment and putting it on, we entered the pool and, over the next several hours, learned how to scuba dive. Within a few minutes of getting in the pool, we were transformed to fish breathing under water. Though it was a bit tricky to get a feel for everything given the conditions of the pool (shallow, small, no current, freshwater), Shanti and I were both surprised at how easy the entire process was. We did a run through of the drills we would have to complete in the open water to receive our certification and excitedly awaited our dives in Sihanoukville.

A few days later we caught the Mekong Express bus down to Sihanoukville. We had a nice seafood dinner on the beach and retired early, eager in anticipation of the next day’s dives.

We were up early in the morning for the drive to the Sihanoukville port where we set off into the Gulf of Thailand. We passed the Japanese navy conducting joint exercises with their Cambodian counterparts as well as the bizarre James Bond-like Mirax Resort. We went past Koh Rong Samloem until we reached Koh Tang, about four hours off the coast. As we approached, we donned our gear and prepared for our first real scuba diving adventure.

Within moments we were off the boat and in the water, descending to forty feet below the surface. There was no current and the visibility was good, so we settled on the seabed to begin practicing the necessary skills – mask clearing and replacement, hovering at the sea floor, controlling our breathing, navigation, etc. It was both amazing and disorienting to look up towards the surface, which appeared within arm’s reach. A multitude of vibrant fish and coral surrounded us on all sides with our divemaster, Klaus, pointing out particular items of interest. It’s hard to describe the sensation we felt when we began to swim around; it was somewhat akin to floating, but with a bit of work involved.

The time that we were underwater – one hour – went incredibly fast; it felt like we had been under for about fifteen minutes. With two dives already under our belts, we did one more quick one at sunset to complete our controlled emergency swimming ascent (CESA), a frightening and counterintuitive maneuver. With a mock CESA, your air is turned off when you're forty feet down and you need to swim to the surface with the one breath you have, exhaling the whole time (because the air in your lungs expands as you rise). After a delicious dinner on board, the novice divers donned snorkeling masks and followed the experts around as they did a night dive.

We woke up early for two more dives. As we gradually fine-tuned our skills, we were able to pay greater attention to our surroundings – the brightly colored tropical fish and corals, the crystal clear aquamarine waters, the landscape of the seabed, and the way the sunlight danced at the water’s surface.

All in all it was a phenomenal experience and a skill I look forward to using throughout the world.

Karaoke with His Excellency

I'm now back in the U.S. and starting to catch up on posts. I'll try and post several in the next couple of weeks. Here's the first:

It came about innocently enough. After several breakfasts, a few family lunches and dinners, and an election victory celebration party, His Excellency hinted at his desire to take us to karaoke. Having enjoyed our previous encounters with His Excellency and curious to see what karaoke means to a National Assemblyman, we were eager to accompany him.

Following several failed attempts to set up a mutually agreeable time, we finally managed to pick a Saturday evening that we were free and that worked for His Excellency. In his spotty English, he explained that we should be ready to go at 7:30pm. As we cooked dinner, we called to confirm the time and place. We were instructed to meet in front of the Cambodiana at the agreed upon time, 7:30pm.

At 7:15pm we left the house via tuk-tuk and headed for the Cambodiana. When we arrived, His Excellency's big black Lexus was already idling out front. We hopped out of the tuk-tuk and were greeted by His Excellency, who rolled down the driver window as we approached. As we climbed into the backseat we were introduced to his assistant, sitting shotgun, a round, portly man about the same age as His Excellency. Throughout the night, he didn't say one word to us, in either English or Khmer nor did he sing at all at karaoke.

We drove north along the river and cut west on Russian Boulevard before turning off onto Street 109 where we arrived at a very sketchy karaoke club. The building was several stories high with neon lights - including the telltale red - adorning the outside. A young and attractive hostess (probably also a prostitute) showed us into the elevator and took us to a private karaoke room with a long leather couch, glass tables, and a large television.

We ordered a round of drinks - beer for me and Shanti, tonic and lime for His Excellency and his assistant - as His Excellency started us off with a few songs in Khmer. Unsurprisingly, he was quite a good singer. And although I'd like to think that Shanti and I had a pretty impressive song selection ("Don't Stop Believin'" and "A Whole New World" were among our picks), we couldn't match the singing of His Excellency.

Throughout the evening, His Excellency and his assistant had the "accompaniment" of two much younger Cambodian women. Although they just sang and danced - someone had to make the headbopping and fist-pumping of His Excellency's assistant look better - we had little doubt that they would do far more than that. On the whole it was quite a strange night, but I suppose we should not have expected differently from a Cambodian National Assemblyman.