The Best Barbers in Phnom Penh
Getting a haircut in Cambodia can be a massively unpleasant experience as, to be quite candid, the average barbers shop in Phnom Penh is unbearably hot and humid flyblown backstreet sweat box where 3,000 riel will get you a trim (of sorts) from a shambling common-as-muck bloke puffing away like billyo on an Ara Light. All in all, the whole experience is about as agreeable as being accosted by Sam Campbell in a g-string.
Eons away from that is my dirty little secret; a traditional gentleman’s barber where one can step off life’s treadmill and enjoy a little pampering. I’ve been going to the Khmer Barbers for years now and have no shame in giving this place an 89 trombone salute, for it hints at Cambodia being a kinder, happier and generally more civilised place where everything works properly and runs smoothly.
Inside you’ll find half a dozen uniformed pretty girls in soft pastel colours (co-ordinated to match the walls) industriously cutting nails (the exact opposite of some other ‘hairdressers’ I can think of near Psah Thmai where the young female staff stay very busy in other ways) and a team of cutters – all looking straight out of Hollywood central casting of ‘a traditional barber’- who, reassuringly, are mainly older chaps of sixty plus.
The customers tend to be well fed, older and affluent local men usually to be found tilted way back in their chairs having long wires thrust deeply into, and then twiddled around in their ear holes. There’s the zesty smell of perfumes and sprays everywhere, cups of complimentary green tea, subdued muzak (often a highly incongruous Kenny G) in the background and, best of all, a total absence of fat Germans with tattoos and sandals or other assorted Barang riff raff.
VIP cubicles, face and feet pampering and a range of other goodies are available through a curtain to the rear, although I’m usually quite happy with a trim which together with a manicure and pedicure comes to a very reasonable $6. Not bad at all for some rather luxurious male grooming in Phnom Penh.
The Khmer Barbers can found on Norodom Boulevard just south east of the Independence Monument. Look out for the gleaming SUVS and uniformed flunkies usually to be found outside.