This country, although beautiful in nature, development, and culture, has endured a tumultuous process of remaking in the past 30 years. When you step off your Cambodia flight, expect to be a little overwhelmed. Traffic is absolute chaos, corruption is as petty as pick-pocketing and as prevalent as police payoffs. Poverty is beside you, in front of you, and behind you.
Cambodia’s present-day tragedy dates all the way back to the Vietnam War, when nations battled among other nations under personal agendas. During this time, underhanded leadership in Cambodia bounced back and forth between party members, family members, and even enemy parties. When finally, the United States raided the country in the 1970s, famine was prematurely induced, drastically killing off natural resources like cattle and rice fields, and devastating Cambodia’s last attempts at self-reliance. In its weakest moment, a rapidly growing rebel group, Khmer Rouge took over, destroying anything even remotely “western” including schools, libraries, and places of worship. Anyone involved in or experienced in academia was targeted and swiftly exterminated, causing millions of Cambodians to flee to Thailand. The following years meant brutal and forceful days for natives, until the 1990s, when the UN stepped in, calling for a cease-fire and new leadership.
When you book flights to Cambodia, remember that it is still on the mend.
It’s rocky past political situation has trickled down into the infrastructure, crippling sanitation facilities, offsetting malnutrition, and limiting available immunizations for illnesses like polio, measles, and diphtheria. Despite its sometimes sneaky and disturbed underworld, the government is slowly stabilizing, thanks in part to Non Governmental Organizations in developed countries who have extended a hand in the repairing process.
And while sometimes phone connections don’t work, time isn’t recognized, and laws fall by the wayside, you’ll see when you book a flight to Cambodia, that this healing country holds its head up high, proud of its ability to overcome, reproduce, and collectively move forward with hope. Many people book flights to Cambodia in order to help with humanitarian aid, mending infrastructure, rebuilding temples, and restoring the faith of a broken people.
