TRAVERSE 10
The first thing that hits you in Phnom Penh isn’ t the traffic, though that certainly has ambition. It’ s the light. A flat, golden haze that seems to soften even the sharpest edges of the city, from the chrome-andglass towers rising along the riverfront to the faded shutters of old shop-houses where generations have sold everything from noodles to spark plugs. This was where our journey with Cambodia Motorbike Tours began: in the warm, slightly chaotic embrace of Cambodia’ s capital, engines idling, helmets dangling from handlebars, anticipation crackling louder than the scooters weaving past us.
Phnom Penh is not a city you conquer; it’ s a city you merge with. On our first day, before we even turned a wheel in anger, we acclimatised. We wandered along the riverside promenade where the Mekong and Tonlé Sap meet in a muddy, muscular handshake. We explored markets perfumed with lemongrass and dried fish, and we learned, crucially, that Cambodian traffic operates on a system best described as“ fluid negotiation.” Lanes are suggestions, indicators are optional, and eye contact is everything.
As motorcyclists, climbing into tuk tuks felt heavier from the outset. There is a particular humility to sitting in the back of one of these three-wheeled carriages, open to the air, the city sliding past at an unhurried pace. In Phnom Penh, the tuk tuk is both everyday transport and quiet confessional; you have time to think between traffic lights, time to watch the life of the city unfold in shopfront reflections. As we rattled toward Tuol
TRAVERSE 10