Oh Cambodia! What a magical country. I keep expecting elves – or maybe garden gnomes – to pop up somewhere, directing traffic or picking up trash or building a coffee shop or doing one of the many things that make this country so much more clean, quiet, peaceful and comfortable than Bangladesh! Traffic flows smoothly, with rarely a jam; honking is reduced to a minimum, and people seem to have a genuine concern for others. Perhaps part of this is due to Cambodia’s lack of overpopulation – one of Bangladesh’s greatest ills.

This empty street in Phnom Penh thrilled me after being in Dhaka for 3 weeks.

Certainly, it’s unfair to compare the two countries. First, one is in South Asia and the other South East Asia, each area being dominated by different social norms and cultural standards. To continue to make matters different, each has different problems, development-wise. I’m staying with a friend who works for the US Embassy in the development sector. She has also worked in Bangladesh, so she has a very clear picture of the different challenges. The Bangladeshi population of 160 million continues to be one of the greatest challenges there, as there can really never be enough jobs for such a great amount of people when the population continues to rise at record rates. To make matters worse, there are few natural resources and many natural disasters claiming lives, land and livelihoods year after year. But in spite of all this, Bangladesh’s economy continues to grow and somehow, most of those 160 million people continue to survive. In Cambodia, which has experienced an human genocide, population is not a problem. The more oppressive problem seems to be the fractured psyche that years of war, bloodshed and holding on for survival have created. The educated class was completely wiped out in the mid-1970s during the Khmer Rouge era, and the instability and war that followed really did not cease until the Khmer Rouge was completely wiped out of political existence in Cambodia in 1998.  Currently, with 70% of the population under thirty, there are only now beginning to be college graduates again and those who want to be pro-active in Cambodian society are finally gaining a voice. So where Bangladesh has too many people and not enough resources, Cambodia lacks many of the key people capable of wisely using Cambodia’s resources and leading the country.

But in spite of Cambodia’s problems, what makes it so excellent? What makes development seem to work? What makes the streets clean, and how do the people deliver such beautiful, heartbreaking smiles?

Angkor Wat

I really can’t tell you why things seem to work here. (After all, I’ve only been here a week!)  The only thing I do understand about the national psyche is the pride Cambodians feel at the great achievements of their civilization, which have resulted in an amazing group of cultural and religious monuments that are known the world over. I’m not really sure how people get photos of Angkor Wat without any people in them: I’ve obviously failed at that in the shot to the right. But beyond the spectacle of the temples is some true Buddhist devotion, which I saw again and again over the days I visited the Angkor region. Perhaps understanding the Khmer’s practice of Buddhism is key to understanding who these people really are.