Keeping house

Prices in developing countries can be cheap, shockingly cheap sometimes. Meals in Cambodia can cost a dollar, my 70 channels of cable costs 5 dollars a month, and photo-copied books cost 4 dollars. The child hawkers tell me I can buy postcards and bracelets for a dollar too.

However, Cambodia is not a powerful manufacturing country, so imported goods cost the same as back home, possibly more. That covers things like a washing machine, a good computer, or a cell phone. I was thinking about a new computer, but I figure that it is better to wait until I get back to the States and get the purchase with a warrantee.

Where Cambodian prices are sure to impress is in labor. Anything involving a high degree of man-power will be fairly cheap here. A haircut cost from 50 cents to 3 dollars, a private driver and car cost about $30 per day, and a foot massage will cost you five. The reason I mention all this is because it was recently suggested to me to hire a cleaner.

I have never been a fan of cleaning. I believe I am like most people in that I wait until the mess becomes intolerable and then I break out into cleaning mode. I am not a pro-active, maintenance cleaner.

On average, I clean about three rooms every month, alternating between my bedroom, bathroom, foyer/living room, kitchen, and upstairs. Lately, I have been ignoring the unoccupied upstairs to the point where it has accumulated an astonishing amount of dust. There is enough dust on the floor to make the dust equivalent of snow angels.

After my trip to Singapore, I have thought it would be fun to open this unoccupied third floor to passing travelers and backpackers. This is providing, of course, that I clean up the dust. The problem that arises is that I don't want to spend the time cleaning up.

Nonetheless, I don't really like the idea of someone else cleaning up after me. It all seems like a slippery slope to complacency, laziness, and elitism. It is common for wealth expatriates to hire cleaners, and I am fearful that hiring a housekeeper will cement me into that role.

As time passes, the economic justifications will shrink. The value of my time already seems quite high, and I anticipate it will rise. The monetary cost to hire someone to clean once or twice a month would probably be about $20, so it is already quite nominal.

The bigger hurdle to overcome is the ethical debate. When is it justified to have someone else clean up after you, when you are capable yourself (I am not talking about the already unpaid and unthanked work of mothers and significant others)? Are you doing someone a good-turn by providing them with a job or lowering their self-worth? Does hiring a housekeeper perpetuate the belief that Westerns are lazy and frivolously wealthy? Will my Khmer friends and co-workers think less of me? Will I think less of myself?

I would be interested to know what people think on the idea. I know only a few people who have cleaners/housekeepers. My initial idea was just to move to a smaller house with fewer rooms to clean (I don’t pay rent, so a less expensive place isn’t my concern). The problem with that idea is that moving is even less enjoyable than cleaning.

Vacation: Part 2

I made a quick decision and purchased a ticket to Singapore. My intention was to meet up with my sister, who stated that she would be passing through for a few days as part of her world tour. Unfortunately, prior travel plans delayed my departure date and I ended up missing her by a day and a half. (I also missed the arrival of a friend I really wanted to see by a day.)

This left me with two day of pure tourism to explore the city of Singapore. With a few hours before my departure, I can say that this city mesmerizes and infuriates me simultaneous.

The city is quite stunning in all aspects. In my two days, I experienced cultured theater, diverse ethnic foods, breathtaking architecture and city planning, and stunning wildlife. Of all the cities I have been to in SE Asia, I can say without doubt that Singapore is the most developed, cultured, and diverse.

Nonetheless, Singapore gives me a feeling of covetousness and jealousy. This feeling does not come from a desire to live here. Although, I think it would be a very easy city to live in. What infuriates me is that Singapore has it made in every way.

Singapore has made it, while the rest of the world is sitting in second gear. The city is proof that good governance, investment in education, and fostering good economics works in the long-run. By no means is Singapore perfect. By many measures, I am sure that it ranks lower than it should, but in the ways that count the most they have succeeded. Primarily, they have succeeded in giving each of its citizens the opportunity to grow as an individual and achieve their personal dreams.

The rest of SE Asia has achieved this only to a partial degree. In the case of Cambodia, the country has barely begun. In Cambodia, only the luckiest are able to rise by their merit and hard-work. The majority of adults must be satisfied by the hope that their children will have a better life and opportunity than they did.

However, on reflection, it is not Singapore's success that infuriates me, but the rest of the region's inability to achieve it as well. Singapore caught up with "Western world" in about 50 years, which means that Cambodia has at least 50 more years to go. Half a century seems like a long time, and I question whether I can maintain a positive outlook on development if the path is so long.

What I will take from my brief time is Singapore is not despair but renewed hope. Singapore is an oasis of development and achieved dreams in a world full of slow change. For a few days, I had the opportunity to eat in nice restaurants and enjoy museums without second thought. I reunited with a past friend and met a new one. I walked along pristine sidewalks and alongside buildings that reached into the sky. I passed luxury sports cars and never had to wonder how much the owner of the car had stolen from public coffers. For 60 hours, I did not see a single beggar, a single child out of school, nor even a stray, sickly dog.

What I am left with is a thought, "If Singapore can achieve it, why not Cambodia?"

Sihanoukville is a city on the verge of claiming an identity. I do not believe that I have ever been to a place so much in flux. The city lies on the south coast of Cambodia on the Gulf of Thailand. It was a seaside resort prior to the Khmer Rouge, when every place became topsy-turvy.

Now, Sihanoukville is undergoing a massive transformation being driven by tourism and commerce. The city is the only major seaport in the country and the turquoise waters are suffering from this. The city is also swelling with new citizens seeking job opportunities and tourists seeking the sun. This leads to more garbage and a further degrade in the quality of the beaches.

Meanwhile, the investors are trying to determine what kind of beach town to make of the place. Some are taking the casinos and prostitutes angle, others want it to be a hippy paradise with cheap beer, fire dancing, and mushroom shakes. Still others are planning mega-resorts. It is a bit difficult to say who will win out in the end, but I would be willing to put money on "not the environment" and "not the average citizen."

In the midst of all these forces, I had the opportunity to stay in an oasis of calm. With the exception of regular tantrums from my good friend's infant son, the vacation was idyllic. We spent the majority of our time either relaxing in hammocks, eating and drinking, or sitting in the surf.

As per Asian culture, meals were performed with many dishes and orchestrated by young and old women making sure that plates were never empty. I cannot recall a time when I have eaten so much seafood nor a time when the seafood tasted so good. I have never been a huge fan of crab meat or shellfish, but that mindset melted away on this vacation. The majority of the seafood was cooked over a ceramic pot heated with charcoal. Shrimp and cockles came off the grill with alarming heat. Nonetheless, we snapped off their shells, dipped their sweet carcasses in various sauces, and washed them down with lager.

For all the fun that I had, I can’t say that I was unhappy to leave the seaside city. My legs were becoming polka-dotted with mosquito bites, my clothes were all beginning to smell of seawater dampness, and my nights were being shared with three friends on a wooden floor with a plastic mat as cushioning (two of whom snored and rolled in their sleep).

The great thing about a beach bungalow vacation is that it invites you to do nothing at all except relax, and then it encourages you to return to your climate-controlled home, take a shower, and put on some clean clothes.