Damn! I arrived in Phnom Phen with $5 in my pocket and I have to reach to international airport from the bus station! My only choice was to make ATM just a few hours after returning to Bangkok, but how much romanticism would have lost that magical trip to Cambogia? If you only think about when there were no ATMs, and you had to face the same situation… Do you remember those moments of madness that sometimes lead us in life?
Well, maybe or maybe not, depending on whether you are really crazy ;). For example by those moments when you want to open the front door with your hands, full of ultra heavy shopping bags, having the narrow keys between two fingers that are about to fall, but thinking inside of you – I’ve got to reach the door lock and be able to open it in these precise and difficult conditions!!! – Those strange challenges here, I hope you get the idea.
And ‘the inner desire of challenge, when traveling backpackers use this attitude to see if providence, a particular coincidence, life will surprise us by answering the call. When we travel careless and with an open heart we’ll be really surprised by the cloud of coincidences, connections, guardian angels, magic, phenomena of nature, which are waiting us in our path.
Besides having to get to the airport at 13km away from where the bus had left me, I started to feel a great hunger. 7pm with childbirth-night bus from Siem Reap (prepaid ticket), 7 hour journey, laying in a narrow bed of a typical Asian overnight buses. On the way I alternated drowsiness to contemplation outside window of a sky full of stars and a brilliant moon visible in its 3/4. These images were sometimes varied by tropical foliage and stylized tenements in flashes, the bus often sounded the alarm to bumps, when it jumped on road’s holes “not asphalted”.
I finally came to the bus station, and as always, a gross of taxi drivers, motorbike taxis and tuk tuk were waiting for me. It was a “tuk tuk” Man that meet my gaze first, with magnetism, and that wry smile of who is about to trick you! In fact, he asked $ 15 buckets to reach the airport! I laugh in taste and with a very simple English, I told him i had already taken enough disappointments in my travels in Southeast Asia and the price proposed was absolutely disproportionate.
Dear friends, I was really broke with those 5 dollars in my pocket. This was my sincere reaction to its economic invitation:
– “Actually I have only 5$ for go from here to the airport, but, I need to eat too, because I am very hungry after 7 hours of travel by bus.”
– And him “Ohhh no my friend, now at 2:40 am my best can be 12$ only!”
I reply that having the flight at 8:30 I may as well walk 3.4 km and then look for a motorbike taxi for $ 3-4 leaving $ 1-2 for a meal. I give him the shoulders and hint a first step in a completely random direction taking my chances of being ignored and being attacked by a new dollar-hungry individual. But after he mumbled something to 2 sly colleagues perched on their means he replies: “My friend ok $ 5 and your hat! I like your hat.” And I: Oh maaan but i paid this hat around $ 25 in Italy!
Even I was competing with my grin as he who was negotiating on equal terms, inflating the price (fake brand hat paid € 4.5 in Bangkok). He smiles at me and invites to mount on. In that moment I realized that I might reach airport and something told me, and ate as well! Without a word, i took off my hat and placed in his head. He pulled on and thanked me happily for the barter. He sets off through the streets of Phnom Penh at night in an atmosphere that smelled of magical, fresh air, local closing and street food still at work.
Nearly is feeling guilty for having got my hat and reiterates me that ‘early in the morning, it was tough arrive at the airport for under $ 12-15 (although in my opinion it was fair to $ 8-10). I told him to forget it and rather asked him if he wanted to eat something together; He had already planned it and knew which street shack we would stop on the way to the airport! My initial request airport + eating had metabolized quickly and he wanted to respect, keeping the covenant. About ten minutes later, we arrived greeted by his gentle acquaintances.
We order our food and fresh tea ‘in pitcher arrived in no time at all, and will be included in the price! We talked a bit ‘. He has a wife, four children, going to school, keeps their education, he was 34 years old like me, then instinctively I ask what month:
– “April 1981” answered!
– “Wow even I” retorted.
– “which day??” Continued …
– “7 april” he said. “Oh My god! I am 8 April!”
Concluded after a sip of tea that called me a cigarette… And he laughs heartily from a forkful and a drink with the final cigarette satisfaction taste, simple happiness, magic, and that feeling that we are all brothers in this world. He wanted to see the photos of my age girl, complimented me, asked me if we could exchange the friendship on facebook, I asked him if the “street chef” could took a photo for us. I handed him my $ 5 and $ 2.5 paid the bill for both. He departed, and came to the airport in 10 minutes or so, instinctively shook in a hug and we promised each other to resent if one of the two in the future could be found in one of their cities of residence.
He raised the seat for me and grabbed a bottle of water. I felt a strange sense of excitement, of those who feel alone in such spartan conditions of travel, backpacking, bombarded by unique visual emotions and flash, when everything looks really materialize your path under the will of the stars, the Universe of God. The emotion to get excited with little, so they, free from any chain cross of your path. And the more you believe it, especially in magic and miracles, the more they take place and change inside you. Yes, even at the price of only $ 5 and a fake hat.
- Tuk Tuk: the classic vehicle with 3 wheels, open at the sides and roof, typical of some South-East Asian cities. And ‘generally used for tourist trips mostly in the city center and is much more expensive than the prices of classic taxi or motorbike taxi)