Spent New Year in Thailand. As part of the combat to protect their own, they had a really large road safety campaign. Fail yet again. In Bangkok everyone sticks to the rules but outside it's as if no rules exist. Many drunk driving and almost all motorcycles without helmets.
- There's quite a bit of news from Siem Reap.
'The days of dodging potholes and clinging onto motos for dear life in Siem Reap may finally be a distant memory. The streets around town have improved drastically in the past few weeks after a decree from Hun Sen, the prime minister'.
The Phnom Penh Post (25-12-09) is a bit mystified as to how the town first is turned into a quagmire with no future and then within 6 weeks achieves the unimaginable:'it’s unclear who exactly is in charge of the rapid roadwork, but — as per usual in Cambodia — when Hun Sen gives an order it gets done fast'.
Then going full circle Hun Sen claims that flooding in Siem Reap is due to hotels constructing roads. And there I was thinking it was water that's the cause of flooding.
- Hun Sen also has something against a bridge from his namesake's park to the other side of the river:
'Prime Minister Hun Sen said on Monday he would cancel a major bridge contract and slammed senior officials for negligence in the awarding of build-operate-transfer, or BOT, contracts'.
- On the Expat Advisory Services forum a discussion of a daily occurrence on Phnom Penh's street:
'The passenger feigned shooting at me-wow was i shitting-NOT'.
The advice part:'Unless you are in a Humvee adn well equipped , you do not want to get caught on the streets after midnight with all the drunk rich kids and bodyguards behind the wheel'.
- For those of you concerned with driving up Bokor:
'it turns out bokor opened for a day and a half at new year. a quarter of it has already been widened but not tar mac finished. the rest is still fairly rough. great fun on a dirt bike'.
That said the road to Kampot (at the foot of Bokor) is also worth a miss as the tarmac has disappeared and huge amounts of dirt are being dunked at random.
- Airline news: the Sydney Morning Herald manages to announce Cambodia Angkor Air's demise, coming shortly after their opening party:
'just 14 have gone bust in the last year – including Queensland's SkyAirWorld, Fiji Air and Cambodia's Angkor Airway'.
Odd that, seeing it was no news here and they were still flying yesterday ... The same source has a report on how the industry is not always as clear-cut as you would have thought. Jetstar invests in Vietnamese carrier. It makes huge losses. Management get arrested. Doubt whether the Cambodian authorities would have the same leverage over their Vietnamese managers in Cambodia Angkor Airways ...
- Anyway with possible links to I believe Kuwait and Oman on the cards, who knows an airlink to Russia is also in the pipeline.
'Direct lights between Russia and Cambodia are set to begin next year or 2011 at the latest, a Russian embassy official said Friday'.
It's a wonder actually how poorly Cambodia is served by long distance carriers for Europe. Going to North America, one can book with Chinese, Taiwanese, Korean and Japanese carriers so with 1 stop you can get where you want. Going to Europe one needs to take a short hop first before flying long distance. With the Arab nations vying for customers it's a wonder that neither Qatar, Emirates or Etihad have opened shop here. The first would have the market for itself ...
- Those flying can tack heart from the fact that Cambodian control over the air traffic control has been returned to the Thai management.
- Then again there are less of us flying to Siem Reap.
- Handicap International Belgium commend themselves for getting helmets on.
'Latest figures from the Road Crash and Victim Information System show that the helmet wearing increase has led to a nationwide 3% drop in motorcycle crash fatalities due to head injuries'.
A three percent drop? Can this be significant? Especially as the system of recording this seems highly flexible. Elsewhere the same press communique seems a bit confusing:'The law was strictly enforced, resulting in the current helmet rate of 85%'.
Strict enforcement means 15% still get away with violating the law? O sorry, this is Cambodia.
- Another Cambodia curiosity. Apparently authorities have let a company build a terminal for people leaving overland to Thailand. Unfortunately it's 5 k's from the border and you actually need to pay to get in. Tales of Asia has more comments and future predictions.
- A slightly older link. Solar power driven bicycle fails to find market. Local supplier spends 5 years developing bicycle and is amazed that it doesn't sell. Despite that
'it can help save energy'
(how does that work with a bicycle?) it's expensive and difficult to use ...
- The Christian Science Monitor (8-1-10) looks at the disppearing act of cyclo's:
'In Cambodia a decade ago, some 10,000 cyclo drivers – as rickshaws are called here – wheeled along Phnom Penh streets. Today there are fewer than 1,500'.
- Under the heading
'Road safety'
the police have proudly declared that they have apprehended more than 200,000 vehicles last year. 95% of those were motorcycles, 95% of the car drivers were apprehended for not wearing seat belts. Major causes for accidents in Cambodia: drunk driving and poor driving. 60 were cited for failing to adhere to traffic signs, none for drunk driving ... Anyway that's the official statistics.
