'Squid' training in Cambodia

No! It's not part of the SKWID volunteers' training, it's about eating these delicious quintessential squid on the beach .... 

Happy Khmer New Year to all you! The Cambodian New Year or 'Chula Chnam Tmey' in Khmer means ‘Enter the New Year’.  This New Year, is particularly special, because it enters 40 years of liberation for the Kingdom of Cambodia and, ironically, it has also coincided with a 3 day celebration.

The holiday lasts 3 days, and usually falls on April 13 or 14, marking an end to the harvest season before the rainy season begins.  Over these three glorious days of celebration, the most important and significant holiday of the year, families from all over Cambodia, have resided to their home town to take part in the celebration. 

Getting ready for a night out

Like everyone else in the country, we too have joined the crowd, and,  decided to take some R and R time away, to spend our three day holiday on the southwestern coast of Cambodia -in sunny warm Sihanoukville. SK is a beach town that sits in the centre of a small peninsula that juts in the warm waters of the gulf of Thailand. Serendipity beach, where we’re staying, is one of the most popular beaches, busiest, and a party place too. 

At the beach, by day, we watch with delight the daily goings-on, the colourful threatre of humanity unfold.  

Throughout the first part of the morning, a traffic of rickety fishing boats arrive two by two or in three, to shore, from their night's catch to deliver to their family-run restaurants. The same group of fishermen returns to their boats with a packed up breakfast, before settling to a well-deserved nap.

Soon, beach chairs and colourful parasols dot the beach for anyone to claim for the day, to enjoy the various humanitarian scenes, background music, barbecued seafood smells permeating throughout the day ...  It is interesting how by nature, we tend to be creatures of habit. Therefore,  during our time here, we have claimed the very same seats, sat beside the very same people on the beach, the Danish girls on one side of us, and an English couple on the other.  
 

A beautiful Khmer woman

By noon, the beach is packed, I mean jam packed, even the sea is dotted with a mass of bobbing heads and, amusingly enough, they’re synchronized with faded rickety green fishing boats who too are bobbing up and down with the waves.  Other lively activities in the water, tubing, numerous tour boats traveling to and from other islands, sea does who unfortunately are making an unnecessary racket  ... 

 
Added to this enchanting scenery are beautiful Khmer, Vietnamese women-young girls, fully clothed with their colourful hats, who patrol the beach, scanning potential ‘bikini’ or ‘trunk’ customers for a massage, beauty treatments, custom-made bracelets and more.  Others,  balance, either large plates of fruit on their heads or, lug heavy yokes on their shoulder, balancing their goods, like a pendulum -a yoke is a wooden beam with 4 wires that hang down on both ends of the beam, holding two large containers of produce of some sort. The fairly large bowls can carry a BBQ with squids on one side of the four wires and Styrofoam containers, to balance, on the other for instance. 

Squid anyone?

Squids are the quintessential beach snack in Sihanoukville. (I don't think they sell them anywhere else other than in this coastal neighbourhood). The squids are freshly barbecued in front of you and, they come with a delicious chili sauce. Cost -a mere 10,000 riels, translated to $2.50 for 10 big ones. Mmmm, yummy … Our usual routine, order a batch of ten of these delicious squids at lunch, and another batch of these quintessential wonders for snack before our evening meal. What a treat!   Oh yes,  while here, we've tried to introduce 'squid, training in Cambodia’ to our Danish comrades.  However, today, our last day here, Kevin did convince them to taste and eat at least one squid each.  Success!

Threading

Threading seems to be another very popular pastime here in SK, where a group of spectators surrounds you to watch your legs, arms threaded -your hair removed with a piece of thread. These women always seem to have a knack of mastering the art,  of shaving legs, arms and anything else that take your fancy with a ‘magic’ thread.  As I speak, intrigued by these women's ancient art, the two Danish girls who have diligently sat beside us, since we've arrived, have bravely taken upon themselves, to learn the art of threading their legs.  Mind you, even yours truly took a crack at it.  Not an easy task!  

Wishing lanterns

By eve, thatch roofed shack style family-run restaurants, take a life of their own, serving delicious grilled BBQ seafood dinners for a phenomenal low price.  Of course, we each order a range of fresh grilled seafood  fired up on large grills: two squids, two prawns , barracuda or tuna, clams, French fries with a mixed salad.   Indeed , a welcoming break from the regular curries in MDK. 

The evening ends with an explosion of ‘rainbow’ fireworks bursting into tiny bright stars, followed by paper lanterns slowly released in the air,  to give a cheer to the Khmer New Year and, of course to 40 years of freedom.

More later ...