The Gods Must be Crazy

Sapaco Tourist Busline is apparently the company of choice when travelling from Phnom Penh to Ho Chi Minh.   $13 USD, 6 hours, 1 Mekong ferry crossing, and 1 Cambodia-Vietnam border crossing later should see you safely delivered to Ho Chi Minh city.  Sapaco buses have all the mod-cons including aircon, TV and a toilet (bizarrely used to smuggle vast quantities of hats across the border on our return trip).  On both bus rides we were treated to a viewing of "The Gods must be crazy" I & II - apparently it comes with the bus, or maybe the owner is a fan.  The first installment at least is pretty funny and is worth a look if you've never seen it, the principal protagonist is an accident prone biologist living in the Kalahari Desert studying Elephant poo.  Whenever something goes awry, he looks on despondently and comments "Ay ay ay...".  The bigger the problem, the more "ay's" eg: landrover stuck in the river...ay ay ay.  Rhino chasing him up a tree...ay ay ay ay ay.  You get the idea.  I've taken to doing this myself, much to Emma's annoyance.  Anyway, back to the point, we got a lot more than we bargained for on both legs of our trip to Ho Chi Minh.  If this rambling introduction hasn't already put you to sleep read on and i'll explain why.

I find it's best not to pay too much attention to the road or quality of driving when taking a bus in Cambodia.  The drivers use the full size of the bus and the horn to intimidate and harass other road users, including driving on the wrong side of the road to force oncoming traffic into the gutter.  But something happened just as we were rolling into Ho Chi Minh which really disturbed me, even by Cambodian traffic standards.  

A slow moving motorbike trailer with driver and passenger was taking up the middle lane, preventing our bus from overtaking.  The driver leant on the horn for a minute or so until the decrepit machine finally moved over.  Instead of getting on our way, the bus driver pulled up alongside and asked the other staff member to open the door.  He shouted some abuse at the driver of the motorbike trailer and then to my disbelief threw a full water bottle at him.  It obviously connected with either driver or motorbike, and as we all rose to our feet we had a momentary glimpse of the bike and trailer careering across two lanes of traffic before crashing loudly into something on the road side.  The door was closed and everyone went back to their seats as we barreled on towards the city.  There was clearly no expectation that we should stop to see if they were alright or report the incident.

Ay ay ay...

So it was with some trepidation that we boarded for the return trip a few days later.  All was going swimmingly until the Mekong ferry crossing where we ran up on the back of a very long queue of traffic, two lanes wide.  After twenty minutes or so stationary, it was clear that something was going on with numerous discussions between some of the Khmer passengers at the front, the bus driver and someone outside the bus.  Eventually, a young Khmer passenger came up to us and explained that the queue was very long (possibly 5 hours wait), and that if we all paid $2.50 ($100 for the entire bus) we could bribe our way to the front and get straight onto the ferry.  We went with it, handed over our $5, and watched with interest as they plied their trade down the bus.  I was sceptical about their chances to persuade everyone and there were a few holdouts, but eventually they'd amassed the required $100.  

We didn't really see what happened next, but obviously the deal was struck.  I was a bit unsure how this was going to work.  The queue was very long and there were many military police dotted down the line keeping order.  I thought we would need to get a policeman on board to see us through or risk getting to the front only to be turned away or asked to stump up more cash.  Of course these guys are well practised at corruption and we had actually negotiated with a 'fixer' on a moto, clearly known to the police, who rode ahead of us as we overtook what must have been a 1km convoy of stationary traffic.  I guess this method has the added advantage of the police keeping their hands relatively clean (not accepting cash directly and not using official radio frequencies to make arrangements).  The police waved the 'fixer' through at every checkpoint with us following close behind, and we arrived at the front.  The ferry crossing had descended into dysfunctional chaos and the boarding area had a real circus feel.  People milled everywhere, sitting on the roadside and on top of vans watching us with a mix of resentment and envy as we drove straight to the boarding ramp.  The ferry was only managing to take 5 or so vehicles at each run due to the sheer number of foot passengers and motorbikes.  After a brief pause, we were pulling on and, unbelievably, crossing the river.

On reaching the other side the Khmer's on the bus clapped, presumably to celebrate their collective ability to overcome an obstacle, or maybe the power of their dollars.  I was very glad not to have waited 5 hours and $2.50 seemed like a small price to pay, but I couldn't bring myself to clap somehow.  We had just received an object lesson in endemic Cambodian corruption.  Clearly the crossing is woefully inadequate to handle large volumes of traffic - the required bridge joins the long list of essential infrastructure projects needing investment in Cambodia.  However, we had just been complicit in reinforcing the dominant view here that power and money is the way to get things done - the thousands of people in the queue had all seen us drive past and I wondered how many would now do the same with a few more dollars in their pocket, or worse still take a bribe in a position of power.

Ay ay ay ay ay...