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Ian Woodford, the man behind Maxine’s

Ian Woodford, a throwback to the country’s bygone Untac era and a tall, wiry character whose colourful Australian language and endless Cambodian anecdotes were a cherished and longstanding part of Phnom Penh expatriate lore, died on May 23 in Sydney. He was 56.

The cause was complications following lung surgery, his daughter Maxine said.

In those heady Untac days, Phnom Penh was a town full of soldiers and mercenaries, chancers and grifters. Few would last; even fewer were worthy of keeping.

“I will always remember Snow as a fearless defender and supporter of anyone he considered a friend, which to my humble pleasure included me,” said Phnom Penh Post founder and fellow long-timer Michael Hayes, using the nickname by which Woodford was known. “Countless times in the last 20 years, when I’d see him somewhere along the riverfront or at his glorious, deliciously kitted-out oasis across the river, he would make a specific point of telling me that, first, he loved the Post and the stories we were running; second, that he admired what I was trying to do; and, third, that if I ever needed any help, no matter what kind or at whatever time of day or night, all I had to do was give him a call and he would be there – physically, in person, ready to do what was needed. And the thing with Snow that meant the most is that I knew what he was saying was a personal unwritten law among mates, not just some kind words thrown out in passing, but an eye-to-eye oath among kindred spirits.”

Born October 30, 1957, in Bega, New South Wales, Woodford grew up in Dundas, a suburb of Sydney. He moved to Phnom Penh in 1993, just as the United Nations Transitional Authority of Cambodia was winding down its $1.6 billion machine. Woodford found work as a contractor with a cowboy Australian outfit. His first job included working with Khmer Rouge soldiers in Ratanakiri, ensuring ‘safe passage’ of UN vehicles out of the province.

“It was just me and an American named Bob, who left after two trips,” Woodford told friend and fellow Australian Bronwyn Sloan in a 2008 interview. “It took five trips, 150 kilometres each way, at nine hours per trip, to deliver all the vehicles. Along the way, we regularly collected groups of Khmer Rouge, who would make us stop on secluded roads to drink homemade wine from plastic bags around the vehicles. Then they’d suddenly disappear into the jungle and we’d be off again. At Kratie, the UN helicopters would pick me up and take me back to Stung Treng to begin another convoy, but one night I got stuck in a Kratie hotel room with 31 Khmer Rouge soldiers because the choppers couldn’t land. I thought I was finished. When I returned, the UN soldiers looked at me very differently: they respected me… but they thought I was crazy.”

The UN left soon after, but Woodford stayed behind, enamoured with the Kingdom and its edgy, post-war disorder. He began teaching English at The American School, where he stayed for more than a decade. His reputation grew with each major news event, which, when at all possible, Woodford preferred to witness from the most dangerous vantage point available.

During the violent clashes of July 1997, Woodford and a few crazy-brave friends grabbed cold ones and roamed the streets searching for the ‘bang bang’. In the aftermath of national elections a year later, Woodford, cold beer in hand, ducked around trees and dived behind corners following the sounds of machine-gun-fire down Street 63.

“Whether it was about Islamic militants who were scouting the capital a decade ago or the constant political machinations of his commune, Snow’s knowledge and advice was as sound as it was welcomed, more so after a hot day with a cold beer,” said Luke Hunt, another long-time friend. “But what always struck me was the diversity in his character, a doting father who dabbled in the arts and ran one of the most celebrated bars in the country. Fleet footed, Snow also had the hands of a prize fighter, the soul of an artist and the heart of a lion: qualities which are often in short supply in this country.”

It was in 1997 Woodford rediscovered a childhood love of art, and in the small apartment he shared with his girlfriend Annie, he began drawing then painting in earnest. His only child, a daughter named Maxine, was born soon after in December 1999. Fatherhood turned Woodford from a fast-living thrill-seeker into a proud papa. As Maxine began to walk then run, the two left the capital for a quieter place on the Chroy Changvar peninsula, where Maxine could learn the joys of grass and trees.

In 2001, Woodford landed a small part in Matt Dillon’s City Of Ghosts. He played a drunk and belligerent foreigner in a red-light brothel. Roland Neveu, the film’s official photographer, captured the scene and a copy of the image still hangs in Cantina, one of Woodford’s regular watering holes. As Maxine reached school age, Woodford began to think better of Cambodia and in 2004 the pair returned to Australia, but neither one of them liked it much and they were back after only a few weeks.

In late 2005 Woodford opened Maxine’s Bar in a large, blue wooden house on the east side of the Tonle Sap River. It was as casual and quirky as he was. A table made from decommissioned AK-47s occupied centre room for a while. A thousand bells hung from the ceiling and when the wind blew they made beautiful music. More than one person thought it the best bar in Southeast Asia, maybe even the world. Dengue Fever played one of their earliest Cambodian shows there. National Geographic and celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain both used it for production settings.

Woodford worked Maxine’s at night and followed his passion of painting during the daytime. He worked in an aboriginal style of dot painting and filled the bar with his art: first portraits, then vases, masks and tables. Before long his art was fetching impressive sums and he finally gave up the day job. “I’ve always been decorative,” he told Sloan in 2008. “Even at school I always used to draw, but art was extra-curricular so I used to cop a lot of stick from the lads, teasing me and calling me a girl for wanting to paint. A lot of stick. But I have always loved things to be bright and vibrant and beautiful in any home I’ve ever had. This elephant lights up the room, doesn’t it?”

Just as things were starting to take off, a health crisis threw Woodford for a spinner. “I was sold some fake medicine [in 2007] by a clinic and before I knew it, it was touch and go whether I would make it or not. It took out my liver and part of my lungs.” He tried to continue painting, but the acrylic fumes were just too damaging to his lungs. In 2011 authorities told him he had to close the bar; the land was needed for drainage and road projects. Then the lung problems came roaring back and he and Maxine made a permanent move to Sydney.

Woodford endured two more major thoracic surgeries, he told friends over beers during what would be his final time in Phnom Penh late last year. Each time under the knife could have been his last, he said. They cut him open from the hip to the armpit. Twice. And he made it through both times, if just barely. Now he was back, if not 100%, at least well enough for some rest and relaxation. “The doctors cut me loose. They told me: ‘Take a vacation, mate. After all you’ve been through you deserve it.’”

“Excellent,” Snow replied. “I know right where I’m facking going, too.”

A local memorial service is planned for 9am Sunday June 1 at Wat Saravan.

(Photo: Bill Irwin)

 

Vintage Asia Heaven

estampe (French) n. print, engrave

I thought I had died and gone to heaven. The source of my out-of-body experience was a visit to Estampe, a recently established emporium on Street 174, situated right next door to the equally heavenly Romdeng restaurant. Estampe pays homage to what its owner, Lien Bouvet, calls “Vintage Asia”, with originals and reproductions of maps, books, posters, magazines and assorted miscellany from the region’s Indochinese past.

Experience wise, Lien and her husband are no novices when it comes to capturing the essence of this period. In the mid-2000s they transformed an old colonial house in Battambang into the city’s premier boutique accommodation option, La Villa. Along with  other projects, the Bouvets have amassed an impressive collection of antiques, which now serves as the base for Estampe’s collection.

Lien is quick to point out they are not selling their collection, they simply wish to share it: “Over the last ten years we have moved eight times! Each time we have had to pack everything up. It has become quite tiring. We also came to realise that we had several copies of different things, so it makes sense to sell these now. For the things we have only one copy of, we can make reproductions.”

Of the original items in the store it is the enormous range of maps that makes an immediate impression on entering the store. The breath of the collection is striking – as are some of the prices – and as a map aficionado myself I can’t help being envious of some of the editions the Bouvets have acquired.

One map, from the late 1800s, features Siem Reap and Battambang firmly ensconced in ‘Siam’ (‘Thailand’). Another map depicts the three separate sub-states that once comprised French-administered Vietnam.

Lien, quite rightly, is coy about where they have sourced their collection but remarks that it includes contributions, not only from Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos, but from further afield in France and the United States. “But it is getting harder to find things, and they are becoming more expensive.”

Still there are bargains to be had. A stylish vintage-inspired (as opposed to straight ‘vintage’, just to be clear) fridge magnet will set you back a mere $2, while a range of elegant period-enthused notebooks are equally economically priced at $7. But the merchandise is only half the reason for making the journey to Estampe.

The shop itself has been artfully renovated and outfitted to suit the mood of its collateral. Exposed bricks, fine-grained wooden window frames and a set of ceiling fans, rescued from an old Saigon cinema, create an ambiance that merges the stylish with the ‘feel’ of the store’s merchandise. This creates an impression of a retail space that is ‘curated’ rather than ‘stocked’.

And there is yet more to come, promises Lien. “We have more books, movie posters and postcard collections, which we plan to stock in the coming weeks.”

So if you are more of a Chinese House than a Public House sort of guy, and less a Sofitel and more a Raffles kind of girl, and you wouldn’t be seen dead in a late-model BMW but crave a 1930s Citroën TA, well then Estampe could well be your heaven, too.

Estampe, #72c Street 174; 012 826186 (open Monday – Saturday, 10am – 7pm)  

 

The wisdom of street vendors

On the streets of Phnom Penh and Vienna, a man with a self-produced oven waits for busy passers-by to slow their pace and join him for a free lunch. It takes two hours for a meal to be prepared on that primitive stove, long enough to make two perfect strangers a bit closer, share some humorous jokes and reflect together on the crazy race of urban life. Who is this man? Why is he doing this?

Rainer Prohaska, Austrian artist of international fame, is one of the six protagonists of On The Streets, showcased at Java Arts until February 22. The exhibition is a comparative look at the effects of migration and global capital in Phnom Penh and other locations, through the observation of street vendor culture.

But let’s go back to the man and the oven. “The world of street vendors is pure fascination to me. I have been working on street life thematic for almost 15 years,” Rainer says. The Viennese artist, who takes his cooking projects around the world, often makes kitchens out of shopping carts, symbolising the dynamism of street life and nomadic society.

Dialogue is another important element in Rainer’s art. This form of confrontation, to him, is a way we can see the other and not lose ourselves. As English poet John Donne said: “No man is an island.” Therefore, in this hectic world where people are too self-focused and distracted by urban life, projects like these remind us never to forget the importance of social interaction as a mean of growth. “I do more or less what people here in the streets do, using kitchen tools as a space for conversation. I always seek the participation of the audience. The rule is that people have to cook with me and use this time as a moment of sharing and confrontation.”

This project is one of many interesting artworks in On The Streets. On the ground floor, Sandrine Lloquet’s sculptural installation catches the eye. The artist turned a juice-and-coffee cart into a curiosity cabinet. An old drum, mysterious stones, a dusty book, glass ampoules and other enigmatic found objects talk about past stories and open up a space for meditation.

In a liquid time of globalisation and continuous changes, this installation is an invitation not to forget our own roots and identity, without foregoing a healthy curiosity and sense of wonder towards what differs from us. Only in this way people can avoid being dispersed in the levelling ocean of modern life.

Ashley Billingsley, Margaret Honda, Amy Lee Sanford and Kong Vollak complete this comparative exhibition made of chorographical artistic actions which bring visitors to a journey down the streets of Boston, Los Angeles, Phnom Penh, Saigon and Vienna. Are you ready to embark?

WHO: All and sundry
WHAT: On The Streets exhibition
WHERE: Java Arts, #56 Sihanouk Blvd.
WHEN: Until February 22
WHY: Avoid being dispersed in the levelling ocean of modern life

 

More than words

He cannot know it, but the resemblance to a young Charlie Chaplin is striking. Sokha, a sinewy 16-year-old with rouged cheeks and stencilled-on moustache, has an uncanny grasp of slapstick. In a quiet classroom, the aspiring comedy actor halts our interview for a moment, seizes my dictaphone and sings into it with theatrical gusto – a sweet, haunting sound that rises and falls like the lilt of a chapei. Not a word has been spoken.

Deaf since birth, Sokha lived in a silent world for the first four years of his life, unable to communicate with his own family. He made sounds, but no one understood them. Now, he communicates at lightning speed, fingers fluttering in fluent Khmer sign language. Twenty years ago, this would have been unthinkable. Today, it’s a testament to how Cambodia – with a little help – is challenging traditional attitudes towards disability.

In 1991, the signing of the Paris Peace Agreement brought an official end to the decades of conflict that had ravaged Vietnam and its smaller neighbours. Tens of thousands of Cambodian refugees, many of them children born in the sprawling camps set up along the Thai border, were finally allowed to go home. At the camp known as Site II, then the second-largest gathering of Cambodians in the world, a small bamboo centre that had sprung up to shelter abandoned children began preparing for the repatriation process. Funds were raised; school uniforms made.

Among the many waifs and strays at the centre, called Krousar Thmey (‘New Family’) – the subject of a documentary screening at Meta House this week – was Wanna, a blind 10-year-old whose parents had abandoned him in a hospital. As the young refugees readied to set foot on Cambodian soil for the first time, Wanna asked why he couldn’t go to school alongside them. “A blind school?” replied Benoit Duchâteau-Arminjon, then a 21-year-old who had relinquished his role as a financial controller with Accor in Bangkok in order to volunteer in the camps. “There’s no such thing in Cambodia.”

“It was not possible for him to go to school because there was no school for the blind and there never had been – ever,” explained Benoit at Krousar Thmey’s rousing 20th anniversary celebrations in 2011. “During the French, they never developed anything. During Sihanouk: never, ever. Nothing existed. When I went to see the Ministry of Education, they said: ‘The blind are not our priority.’ When I went to see Unicef, they said: ‘We do not have enough schools for normal children.’ And I said: ‘Why not the blind?’”

In Cambodia, as in India, attitudes towards disabled people have long been shaped by Buddhist beliefs. Handicaps are the result of bad karma; manifestations of faults committed in a former life. It is not uncommon for aid workers to uncover disabled children who have been hidden in their homes for years. “If I look back, I remember some families not showing or even accepting that they had blind or deaf children,” said Benoit. “We knew they were there in the districts, but the families were saying ‘No, we don’t have’ because it was a source of shame for them.”

Inspired by Wanna, aided by the Ministry of Education and under the tutelage of the Thai Foundation for the Blind, Benoit and his team tasked themselves to reverse generations of prejudice, one child at a time: in short, to create an education system for blind and deaf children where none had previously existed. “When Wanna came with us, we realised what life was like for the blind,” said Benoit. “Neither myself nor the children at the orphanage had ever seen someone who was blind. One put a krama on his eyes to blindfold himself and they started to play. Then they realised how hard it was to be blind, and this…” – the Frenchman clicks his fingers – “was the shock that made the children accept one another.”

Armed with a few progressive individuals, the team set about creating comprehensive local versions of Braille and sign language, hitherto unheard of. The decision to localise Braille was particularly bold: equivalents of the 33 consonants, 21 vowels and punctuation of the Khmer alphabet had to be invented in order for students to comply with all the subtleties of Khmer grammar and spelling rules. Fazed, several linguists suggested using abbreviations instead, but Benoit was resolute: this was not an exercise in creating ‘special education’, but in adapting normal education to meet special needs.

“Everyone was saying: ‘Why have such a difficult system?’ Why? In order for the kids to understand their language, their culture. Language is a vehicle for culture. Using the other [abbreviated] system, they didn’t know what was going on. For us, it was very important they understand what’s going on in order to integrate into normal schools. Today, with our kids having baccalaureates, having graduated from university, having changed the perception of being disabled, we’ve proven the system we chose — the system we created — was the right one,” said Benoit.

In 1994, it took three weeks, a Perkins machine and a perfect knowledge of Braille to produce one book. Today, the Braillo — a much more sophisticated printer — can produce about 600 pages an hour. Page by page, Krousar Thmey is in the process of translating every single book on Cambodia’s national curriculum into Braille. Integrate; don’t separate.

From being a shelter for 35 abandoned kids, the organisation is now instrumental in the care and education of almost 4,000 children, 700 of whom are blind and 300 deaf. In 2009, for the first time in history, two deaf students successfully passed the national High School Exam. In 2011, the first of two volumes of the Khmer Sign Language Dictionary rolled off the press. It’s also online.

Changing perceptions has been the most painstaking part of the process. When the first school was inaugurated in 1994 by the Queen at Chbar Ampov, a woman who had seen the ceremony on TV walked into the office. On realising her son was blind, she told staff, she had wanted to kill him and then commit suicide because she was ‘bringing a lot of shame’ to her family. Today, deaf and blind children are encouraged to do their homework outside, in front of everybody. “In order to integrate children within normal schools, first we must integrate them into their families,” said Benoit.

On arrival at Krousar Thmey, visiting primary school students are handed a book in Braille and asked to read from it. Insisting there is nothing written on the page, they then select a passage from their own printed textbook. A blind child, fingertips expertly interpreting raised paper dots, promptly reads the same passage aloud. Realisation creeps over the children’s faces: reading and writing can be done in more ways than one.

Facilitating such realisation at ministerial level presented rather more of a challenge. Parish Without Borders once wrote that ‘one of the difficulties in Cambodia is knowing which government officials are really interested and concerned about such issues as the disabled, which ones are worth working with and which ones should just be bypassed.’

Had Prime Minister Hun Sen not been blinded in one eye while serving as a guerrilla commander with the Khmer Rouge between 1970 and 1975, Wanna – now in his 30s and teaching music – might still be bereft of an education. Hun Sen, who once balked at being called ah kvak (‘blind’) by his fellow politicians, has publicly called for respect: “We must value people with disabilities.” During the anniversary celebrations, addressing hundreds of assembled dignitaries, teachers and children, the premier, with trademark embellishment, declared: “Being physically disabled does not mean being mentally disabled. Even myself, I am blind in one eye, but I can look so much further than most.”

It took 15 years for Krousar Thmey, now staffed exclusively by Cambodians, to be approved by the Ministry of Interior. Without Hun Sen’s support, one can only speculate on what fate might have befallen their efforts. At the Phnom Penh Thmey school for the deaf and blind, there is an interactive exhibition called Seeing in the Dark. Participants are led into a lightless room and, guided by visually impaired students, asked to perform a few simple day-to-day tasks. The idea is to simulate the kind of sensory conditions experienced by the sightless in order to ‘address integration issues in a tangible way’. Of the dozens of government officials present at the anniversary, only the Minister of Education would enter. The Ministry of Social Affairs asked for the lights to be turned on.

“Reeeaally? Are you suuure?” The drawn-out, teasing tone suggests I should be anything but. In total darkness, it has taken several excruciating minutes, fingertips fumbling over the raised markings on a child’s ruler, to work out that the 3D cardboard shape on the desk before me is a rectangle measuring 10cm long. Only it isn’t. My guides giggle. I start over: slide, count, slide, count. Peals of laughter erupt from the impenetrable gloom. I exercise a climb-down, much to my companions’ amusement: my first guess had been two centimetres short  – and that after stumbling repeatedly, trying to mount a scooter facing backwards and flailing my arms to avoid phantom obstacles.

Outside, in the daylight, 30-year-old Ngoun Chanthon is waiting. How did it feel? Was I afraid? As grillings go, his is tenacious. Blind since birth, he feels scared sometimes, too. Not by things he can’t see, but by his future. Like many former pupils, Nguon wants to stay on as a teacher, but worries what might become of him were it not for Krousar Thmey. In a display of far-sightedness, the organisation is legislating for the long-term. Today’s pupils will become tomorrow’s tutors as it embarks on a plan to train teachers across the country to accept blind and deaf children into mainstream schools. Ultimately, new arrivals at Krousar Thmey will initially be given special education within its walls before joining regular state-run classes. As disabled children are integrated into the standard schooling system, the focus will shift to developing peripatetic teacher training centres. Within a decade, the intention is that Cambodia will offer the best education for deaf and blind children available in the whole of Asia.

Mention equality, however, and Benoit snorts. “You will never be equal. You have to be 150% better than the others. We’re in Cambodia: there aren’t enough chances for everyone, so how will you have jobs for the deaf and blind? If you teach them they have rights, they will believe they have rights. No, they have a duty: a duty to be better than the others in order to be integrated. They have to push society to integrate them.”

Backstage, as children wriggle in and out of ornate traditional costumes (deaf dancers keep time by feeling the vibrations from blind musicians), we sit down to eat. Small brown hands swat the sweat from my face with an improvised cardboard fan. I return the favour, a tiny blind girl, feeling for my wrist, erupting in giggles. Sokha waves me over with an impish grin, gesturing that I’m not to go anywhere before the big show. After all, it is my turn to have my cheeks rouged. He laughs, making the sign for ‘fun’. Integrate; don’t separate.

WHO: Everyone
WHAT: The Children Of Krousar Thmey documentary screening
WHERE: Meta House, #37 Sothearos Blvd.
WHEN: 4pm December 19
WHY: Integrate; don’t separate

Warped traditions

WEDNESDAY 11 | Ikat is a skill that has been practiced in Cambodia for more than 800 years. Seen today in the sampot hol skirts women wear to ceremonies and in the form of pidan, tapestries used to decorate pagodas, it’s an ancient art form that involves dyeing individual cotton threads which are eventually woven on traditional looms into full bolts of fabric. Basik 855, based in Phnom Penh, are fast becoming the new custodians of this craft: they hope to stimulate a renaissance by imparting a modern, global aesthetic onto ikat which is created on traditional warps and looms. Today, through a combination of photos, text and materials, Basik 855 will demonstrate how its artisans move from conceptualisation, trend forecasting and colour testing to a final design reflecting generations of talent.

WHO: Basik 855 and their ikat artisans
WHAT: Warped Traditions exhibition
WHERE: Artillery Cafe, Street 240½
WHEN: 7pm December 11
WHY: Ancient weaving techniques given a modern twist

 

Guilty Pleasures

I’ve just taken up a light smoking regime after five years off the darts. For 20 years I worshipped the odious durrie as slavishly as the next sad gasper. Then, in the name of love, I went cold turkey. My pink-lunged, sweet-tongued bloke and I skipped wheezeless down the smoke-free bridal path of life.

But as addicts of any stripe will tell you, shit gets you when you least expect it. I now have three packets of risibly renamed Mevius cached in various orifices around our flat.

I shower after each secret, sordid suck. I feel dirtier than coal.

I blame my recidivism on another furtive and thrilling development in my deeply local apartment building. It’s not more German documentary filmmakers bent on scenic grit, or petrol-sniffing ne’er-do-wells with K-pop hair and bag-snatching on their minds. To a man they smoke like chimneys – not the wisest choice for the huffers especially – but it’s not them what made me do it.

Instead, a chain-smoking bookie has installed himself at the bottom of my stairwell. The siren allure of each freshly lit Ara has proved inescapable. I stump two flights down to increasingly futile gym classes, or waddle up 27,000 feet with groaning Lucky bags, reflexively scrabbling for my Bic. I’m Pavlov’s bitch to his fragrant butts.

As tourists sally past in green fleets of smoke-free cyclos, Ron, as I call him inside my head, arcs up another lung-buster and borrows wifi from the blind masseurs next door. Like a dapper bridge troll, he and his laptop lurk taking bets on the English Premier League. And he never lurks alone. Men of every ilk flutter around the irresistible flame that is Ron, his hot tips and the chance of untold bounty scored by 11 unpronounceable Poms. To Ron’s credit, and in contrast to the raucous chess smack-downs that daily ricochet round the neighbourhood tuk tuks, the transactions proceed with surprising restraint.

Given his nefarious career choice, Ron’s a twinkly and not at all shystery older fellow: natty from his backless loafers to blade-sharp safari shirts and a suspiciously jet-black combover.

He’s as close to a Cambodian OCD sufferer as I have ever seen. At 7.45am he folds out his tin table and computer in exactly the same place, to the centimetre, fastidiously wiping every surface over and over with a clean cotton handkerchief. He lights up on the dot of 8, cracks his first Angkor at precisely 10 and, fagging steadily, conducts brisk business with punters till 6 sharp. Then it’s up sticks with his meticulous tote book down the mini-mart for free wifi and a few more nails before heading home.

As I passed this fledgling enterprise for the first time I naively questioned, out loud, the legality of the whole setup. I was vehemently shushed by my Khmer-speaking husband. Ron’s customer demographic includes a good many patrons currently serving their country in a law enforcement capacity. Some days it’s like walkie-talkie Jenga down there.

But there’s another reason why my sainted other half likes the status quo. Apparently he places the odd wager with Ron and won almost 70 bucks on a recent Arsenal/Fulham match.

This is news to me. And, it dawns on me, golden leverage for later, when he hits me up about those filthy, dirty, delicious fags.

 

Diamonds in the rough

One problem with poverty is that we don’t have to see it. Caught in the play-Penh bubble of SUVs, cappuccinos and air-conned BKK offices, even the most dedicated of NGO do-gooders can conveniently forget what’s all around us.

Yet Marc Eberle’s short film As Good As Gold doesn’t seek to punch us in the groins, nor does it overtly address the complex yet manifest issues that face this country. Its purpose is rather to remind us of how the other half live and how, even in the most pitiful circumstances, there can still be kinship and kindness.

Filmed over the course of just one day, the documentary is a snapshot of sassy 11-year-old garbage picker Srey Thoy, once cast as (you’ve guessed it) a garbage picker in the bleak German 2009 romance flick Same Same But Different.

But As Good As Gold is no Slumdog Millionaire melodrama. As much as anything, it’s about the technicalities of Srey Thoy’s plight on the infamous Stung Meanchey dump. Through Eberle’s dispassionate lens, we learn the details of how a typical day’s earnings tot up to a princely 2,000 riel. We contrast Thoy’s girlish daydreams of finding silver and gold to the cans, shit and condoms she and other children actually turn up, and her desperate and depressed mother’s resignation to the grind of extreme poverty.

In perhaps the movie’s most harrowing moment, Thoy calmly recalls a 17-year-old aunt’s death by dumpster truck, telling it just as bluntly as Eberle approaches the wider story. “It took a lot of trust for the subjects to speak as candidly as they do,” he notes.

The film had lain on the proverbial cutting-room floor since 2008, but the success of this year’s celebrity-narrated Girl Rising inspired the maker of Aung San Suu Kyi: The Choice to pick up where he had left off. “I didn’t feel that Girl Rising really wins on an emotional level and I wanted to approach a similar story but in a different way,” Eberle explains. “I wanted to show how the family’s realities are governed and to explain the structures that direct their lives.”

Despite the film’s undercurrent of righteous anger and the relentless personal tragedies of its subjects, Eberle is meticulous to avoid the extremes of ‘poverty porn’. “I want to show people respectfully and avoid the traps of poverty tourism or the ‘human zoo’, while looking at the things other people don’t want to see.” We are therefore spared potentially voyeuristic scenes of utter destitution, but there are also no Angelina Jolies swooping in with Louis Vuitton handbags full of admirable intentions, until a surprising deus ex machina moment in the final credits.

It’s striking too how, freed from the burden of voiceovers and editorial subjectivity, we are permitted to observe Thoy and her fellow garbage pickers shift from petty turf wars at one moment to a real sense of community in adversity the next. They fight, they argue and yet they trade their findings, even share food, all before a sweltering, smoking, stinking backdrop that puts Dante to shame.

“In the midst of this horror and dirt there are these kids, almost from Oliver Twist, playing and laughing and staying human,” Eberle concludes. “This is the gold I found.”

WHO: All but those who most need to see it
WHAT: Everyday hopes and heartbreak in Phnom Penh’s own abyss in As Good As Gold
WHERE: Meta House, #37 Sothearos Blvd.
WHEN: 7pm November 20
WHY: There but for the grace of God go we

 

High spirits

THURSDAY  31 | “Things that go ‘bump’ in the night should not really give one a fright. It’s the hole in each ear that lets in the fear; that, and the absence of light!” So wrote slightly bonkers British comedian Spike Milligan once upon a time – words that should perhaps be borne in mind as the clock ticks round again to Halloween. Where to be? What to do? Here’s our pick of the best haunts:

Kids City Indoor Scaring Centre:
Free activities, face-painting, hot drink, 3D talking devil and haunted house. All day at Kids City, Sihanouk Blvd.
Halloween party by the pool
With live music from Adobo Conspiracy, Jaworksi 7 and Ringtail, plus win $50 for best fancy dress. 7pm at Sundance Inn & Saloon, Street 172.
Casillero Del Diablo party
Discover the haunting legend of the Devil’s Cellar, with free-flow wine and chilling beats by Kimchi Collective. 9pm at Chinese House, Sisowath Quay.
Trick or treat
Spine-tingling sets from monster rockers Jaworski 7, Psychotic Reactions and Rock X-press. 9pm at Memphis Pub, Street 118 & Riverside.

 

Let the dogs out!

FRIDAY 18 | The Underdogs all met at Music Arts School, a non-profit grassroots institution on Street 370.
“We started about a year ago, trying a mix of different styles: some Khmer songs, some English songs,” explains leader and singer Sammie. “Then we decided we should specialise in bringing back the old songs from the 1960s. Everyone knows Chnam Aun Dop Pram Moi (‘I’m 16’) and Svar Rom (‘Monkey Dance’), but there are many more songs that we play that are less well known. We want to introduce the young people to more obscure songs that are just as good… We search in YouTube, listen to old cassettes and we talk to the old people who remember the times.” The band members describe their mission as reconnecting their peers with the music of their heritage. “The new songs copy too much; they sound just like K-Pop. We want to make a real Cambodian sound.” The Underdogs have a more traditional wedding-band form with rotation singers: two girls and a boy. “This way we can give the singers a rest, each time they can come on fresh,” says Sammie. Also, it means a wider range of songs. The songs of Ros Sereysothea and Pen Ron are now widely known, but the band can also play tunes by the Elvis/Dylan/Sinatra of Cambodia, Sinn Sisamouth, as well as the wilder singers such as Yol Auralong, famous for Jih Cyclo and also responsible for the drunken raving blues of Syrah Syrah, and the funky soul of Voa Saroun. Long may the dogs run free!

WHO: The Underdogs
WHAT: Energetic Golden Era rock ‘n’ roll
WHERE: Equinox, Street 278 (Oct 18) and Slur, Street 172 (Oct 19)
WHEN: 9pm October 18 (Equinox) & 19 (Slur)
WHY: Look to the youth to drive the future

(Photo: Jeremie Montessuis)

Who wants to be a tycoon ?

‘You win the How Many People Can You Spot On One Moto competition! Receive R50.’ So declares one samnang lahor (‘good luck’) card in CambOpoly. ‘You get Dengue Fever (it’s not the musical variety!). Go straight to the Medical Clinic,’ warns another. This, as you might have guessed already, is the newly launched Cambodian version of what is quite possibly the world’s most famous board game.

The concept came about two and a half years ago, when friends of a couple about to get hitched hit on the idea of creating an original wedding gift. The bride and groom liked board games and what started as a small independent project can now be played by one and all.

Unwrapping the game, you’re immediately immersed in the Cambodia so many of us know so well. CambOpoly’s logo, a green square with white text, is based on local road signage. The strong vinyl board is decorated with typical Khmer ornaments. The six player tokens, all tiny animals, come from Russian Market. An ample supply of paper money is provided in Cambodian riel. And the properties you can buy vary from Phnom Penh sangkats (‘districts’) to prominent tourist attractions, from well-known cafés to landmark hotels. Got an uncontrollable urge to demonstrate your burgeoning wealth to the Joneses? Simply park a miniature luxury car outside your CamboPoly properties.

The object of what was known in its original 1906 incarnation as The Landlord’s Game – long before the involvement of Parker Brothers, the British Secret Intelligence Service and Hasbro – is to become the wealthiest landlord in the country. But the eagle-eyed will notice land grabbing and forced evictions don’t factor into the rules.

Players take turns rolling the dice and working their elephant or snake token around the board. Real estate wannabes can snap up prime addresses such as Street 240, Hotel Intercontinental and even Angkor Wat. If another player lands on your property, he or she owes you rent. In an amusing nod to local values, the exact amount you’re owed depends not only on the value of your property but also on whether your Lexus or Bentley is parked outside (clue: the more luxury cars, the higher the rent).

One of the best things about CamboPoly is that you can customise the game yourself: the board comes with five blank samnang lahor cards, their directives limited only by your own imagination. As with the reality of real estate in this country, you can even make up the rules yourself. Just try not to bulldoze too many villages in the process, please.

The game is handmade, locally produced and all proceeds go to Support for Children of Incarcerated Parents (SCIP), which funds social worker visits for jailed mothers and fathers.

CamboPoly is available from Smateria, #8 Street 57 (cnr Street 278), priced $55.