Tuk Tuk Ride - Part Deux

Since we do not have our own transportation as of yet, we use Tuk Tuk drivers on a daily basis.  Some are small and rickety and others are big and fast, there is more variety to the Tuk Tuks here than there is beer.

Here is what it is like to ride in a Tuk Tuk.  I started filming right after we left our apt building and then I ran out of space on the memory card (too many pics and video clips), but you will see a good minute of the ride, you'll also get to see me and my wife.

Below is a brief video of a Tuk Tuk ride in the rain. You will notice the canvas walls, which rollup into the ceiling, to keep you dry - some are more waterproof than others. On this trip the driver pulled over after the rain started to drop and fasten the walls and then sat in the back and bull-shitted with me in broken English/Khmer for ten-ish minutes until the storm calmed down a bit - he has a four year old girl and he's been driving for "many" years, in case you're curious.

Below are videos of us traveling home at night.  When we go out for dinner this is what it is like to ride in a Tuk Tuk. It is even sketchier than the daytime rides because you can't really see much - they have headlights and streetlights, but they are very dim. As you'll see, tour buses rule the roads in Siem Reap; if you don't back off, they'll push you out of the way. This was a tame evening, but you'll get the gist.

Now that we live here, the Tuk Tuk driver are recognizing us in certain areas of town.  When we walk past them they say things like, "Hey, I know where you live"  or my favorite, "Lay-dee and man, I know you."  There are so many Tuk Tuk drivers here, it is crazy.  It is the low season for tourism and you can sense their desperation - they pass out business cards (we have one from a driver that speaks English, Russian, Thai and Khmer) and they offer their phone numbers with a guarantee of "call me, I'll meet you in less than 10 minutes." Maybe when the town is absolutely packed with tourists the drivers will have more to do than ask us if we need a ride basically as soon as our feet leave a Tuk Tuk.

When a driver can speak English they are always nice to us, at first. They ask us where we're from and they always think America is great. If they ask what city and they know Chicago, they ask, "So... like, Al Capone, yes?" or one guy said, "Obama!" - America is still 1920s gangsters and Civil War style racism to most adult Cambodians I've met, what an impression we've made. This is something I find intriguing. After living here a short time, you can routinely see the obvious impacts of Pol Pot on the country - not educating mass amounts of people produces devastating impacts on that society. Pardon the digression. - But eventually the conversation turns to, "Do you want a Tuk Tuk to Angkor Wat tomorrow? the temples?" and when we reply that we live here and that we'll be at work tomorrow, the conversation generally ends and we travel the rest of the way in silence.

Below are the typical images we see as we ride into town via Tuk Tuk.

not  exactly the pic I wanted, but you get the idea of a family on a moto

there are 3 adults and 2 children and 1 helmet

a fruit vendor and a Tuk Tuk

A Tuk Tuk heading out of town

how to use a moto to move your belongings

a refrigeration moto

a roadside bar (for locals - I'd get sick there)

a large truck heading toward our Tuk Tuk

typical foot traffic

road construction

As I gather more footage, I'll create more posts to help those of you who have not been here see what we see. I really hope this is one of my last Tuk Tuk posts as I want to have our own transportation soon. A moto or a cheap 4x4 would be ideal for this small town. We'll see what we do in the next few weeks - I imagine that is a post by itself, when it happens.