I still can't decide how I feel about the Riverside, the touristy backpacker neighborhood of brilliant rooftop bars with exquisite views overlooking the Mekong and crowded fast food joints featuring untraditional pizzas littered with marijuana flakes. The banana pancakers abound, their colorful sagging pants plastered with tacky Om symbols while their dreadlocks absorb the sweat from the backs of their necks. They carry oversized backpacks, filled to the brim with more material nonsense than most Cambodians own entirely, and they sneeringly offer to Educate you on Spirituality and Local Culture. The young twenty something expats arrive in droves, eager to celebrate a work of saving the world through one NGO or another with a cold, happy hour Anchor beer and a plate of nachos. And there are those who come to reminisce, who are reminded of the Cambodia of yesteryear they once visited a decade earlier.
But then, in contrast to the helter skelter foreign population, there are the clans of young Cambodian classmates, sitting crosslegged in small circles along the riverside walkway, sharing rice cakes and drinking from a personal beer supply while catching up on the latest hallway gossip. And three dozen Khmer women dance in perfect sequence in full, enthusiastic participation of the nightly jazzercise class, cooled by a gentle breeze wafting from the river's blue waters. They wear matching headbands and brightly colored socks. The palm trees behind them dance in tandem, swaying along to the beat of the peppy music as they bathe in the Royal Palace's golden glow.
The Riverside is gaudy and eager, with neon signs, crowded pubs, and flashy five-inch high heels, yet it echos each whisper of wind with a giggle. It's designed for casual strolling, one lazy step after another along a moto-free sidewalk, and it embodies the young spirit that has captured Cambodia, vivid, lively, impatient. The steady, booming bass from a nighclub pounds into the night, a heartbeat by which the neighborhood paces itself. Boom, boom, boom, it says, pumping energy into the city, keeping time with the dance of tuk tuks as they collect tired partygoers, ready to collapse into their beds.
Sometimes, I wonder if the poetry graffitied by the wind across the streets was written just for me.
But then, in contrast to the helter skelter foreign population, there are the clans of young Cambodian classmates, sitting crosslegged in small circles along the riverside walkway, sharing rice cakes and drinking from a personal beer supply while catching up on the latest hallway gossip. And three dozen Khmer women dance in perfect sequence in full, enthusiastic participation of the nightly jazzercise class, cooled by a gentle breeze wafting from the river's blue waters. They wear matching headbands and brightly colored socks. The palm trees behind them dance in tandem, swaying along to the beat of the peppy music as they bathe in the Royal Palace's golden glow.
The Riverside is gaudy and eager, with neon signs, crowded pubs, and flashy five-inch high heels, yet it echos each whisper of wind with a giggle. It's designed for casual strolling, one lazy step after another along a moto-free sidewalk, and it embodies the young spirit that has captured Cambodia, vivid, lively, impatient. The steady, booming bass from a nighclub pounds into the night, a heartbeat by which the neighborhood paces itself. Boom, boom, boom, it says, pumping energy into the city, keeping time with the dance of tuk tuks as they collect tired partygoers, ready to collapse into their beds.
Sometimes, I wonder if the poetry graffitied by the wind across the streets was written just for me.
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