Author Archives: Peter Hogan
Angkor Wat Tourist Brochure Circa 1937
Hat Tip to Jeff at the Jungle Blog
Cambodia Daytrips: The Road from Battambang to Ek Phnom
The northern route out to Ek Phnom will take you along the river road with the normally benign and muddy stream of brown water weaving its way to your left of Battambang old town. This route has recently been sealed…
Unexpected Phonecalls from Khmer ‘Good Girls’
Unexpected phone calls from potential female Khmer suitors (of the Persil white variety, rather than the grey around the gills type or, heaven forbid, the black as the devil’s arse sort) can be a cryptic experience. They can often go…
Samlot: The Historical Context and Comrade Duch
Why go to Samlot? Aid workers, both foreign and Khmer go there as do missionaries, but rarely do tourists or visitors get to this isolated, edge-of-the-world north-western district of Cambodia. Apart from the aid workers and missionaries, Samlot, as a…
Battambang: The Historical Context
Now Cambodia’s second city, Battambang was for centuries a rather ordinary Asian town which was transformed into a 19th century Thai outpost. At the time of the Thai occupation in 1795, the invaders deported the town’s population to Thailand and…
Northwest Samlot: Mines, Waterfalls and Angelina Jolie
Tasanh Market in the clean early December morning light was a disorderly place with hyena like dogs trotting through piles of rubbish and chubby, greasy faced children wrapped up well in colourful nylon jackets. As we picked at bai suh…
Living and Teaching in Small Town Cambodia
City life or provincial life in Cambodia can make for two parallel but very different interpretations of single country. One’s expatriate life can have a sweet childhood in the city when experiences are fresh, shiny and new but can then…
Travel: Phnom Banan
After scaling the 358 stone steps up the recently renovated stairwell you will have a commanding view for miles around Phnom Banan. Looking down below the steep stairwell and slightly beyond into the rice fields you’ll notice, quite clearly, the…
A Postcard from Battambang: 3
Tourist season here is in full swing, a conspicuous manifestation of which is the number of redfaced people charging around town in their holiday socks and sandals talking loudly to one another. They even appear to outnumber the enthusiastic hot…
Teaching 6am Classes in the Cambodian Provinces
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Inertia sits quite well with me as a few years living in Cambodia has, over time, given me an enormous appetite for doing very little as often as I possibly can. So imagine having to wake up and go to…