Lost In Translation

A Hologram For The King

A Hologram for the King (2012), by Dave Eggers, is a book that is specifically about where we (America) are as a nation in the world. Alan Clay is a man at the end of his rope in debt, unable to pay his daughter’s tuition, and almost unemployable. He is sent to Saudi Arabia to make a make or break presentation for King. There are echoes of a modern day version of Willy Loman at play here. There are some contrivances in the book in which would usually upset the rhythm of the book for me due to the obviousness of them: Clay is a former Schwinn employee who now works in the amorphous IT sector—we used to build things and now we create services; the two anecdotes in which he builds a wall, and other s of this variety. But what saves it from the ripped from the headlines of the decline of American capitalism and the rise of China and Middle Eastern states are the great characterizations of Alan and the people he meets, his driver Yousef, and the doctor with whom he has a brief affair, among others. But Eggers also creates realistic everyday dialogue and gives great details about Saudi Arabia, the IT industry, and Clay’s background that all of these things come alive in great detail. To me, this seems a hundred times more realistic and artful than Jonathan Franzen's attempt to do the same thing with Freedom. It is readable and the read is to get caught up in the flow of the story that has many digressions and flashbacks into Clay’s past that help explain where he is in the story. It is another fine performance form Eggers.

Sihanoukville 2013: Suntours Boat Trip

On our last full day in Sihanoukville we decided to take a boat tour with Suntours to Koh Rong Samlon. First we stopped at Koh Tas for snorkeling and swimming.



A concrete water buffalo in the marina at Victory Beach.

Taking a jungle walk on Koh Rong Samlon.

A $5 million yacht spotted on our trip.

Sihanoukville 2013

This is the inside of my room at the Beach Club Resort, simple but clean with a nice pool, massage parlor, friendly staff, and nice bar restaurant.

A view of the pool from outside my room on the second floor.

The Techo Morakot Bridge, funded by the Koh Puos (Cambodia) Investment Group, links the mainland with Koh Puos, the nearest island as seen from Victory Beach.

Victory beach up the opposite direction.

Tempura prawns.

The Golden Lions Traffic Circle at night.

The Shooting Range

This is my fourth time to Cambodia so I was looking for something new to try and was inspired by this article in the NY Times to have a go at firing some automatic weapons at a shooting range.

For $50 you can shoot a full clip on several types of weapons: AK 47. M4, Tommy Gun, and .22 pistol. Other options included shooting a rocket launcher or grenade launcher, throwing a grenade into a pond, firing a high power belt loaded machine gun, or shooting at live chickens. Most of the group chose to fire the M4 or AK 47. I choose the Tommy Gun due to my love of Prohibition era gangster movies ala Miller's Crossing and Boardwalk Empire.

Darrell's first session of three with an AK47. He was also the only one to try the .22 pistol as well as the assault rifles.

Taking aim, I only hit inside the target twice, I think I enjoyed squeezing off an automatic round a bit too much to worry about accuracy.

Characteristically the pre-shooting training was very lax...

If you haven't heard assault rifles being shot, you might not be aware of how loud it is. However, it didn't seem to bother these animals at all.

Eating Out in Phnom Penh

We decided to give a local BBQ restaurant a try.

The waitress recommended Beef Lok La, which is beef cube on a bed of cucumbers and onions with a fried egg on top with a salt-and-peppery lime-based dipping sauce. It was my first time to sample this excellent dish.

I also ordered some BBQ shrimp, which was off putting for some at the table since they are whole shrimp, I tore off the heads and ate the body legs and all. I'd prefer to have them properly cleaned, but when in Rome...

One of my lunches was spent at Bopha Phnom Penh Titanic Restaurant with a nice spot near the Tonle Sap River.

The restaurant had a nice ambiance with lots of traditional Khmer art decoration.

I was too busy eating to take photos this time. I started off with the coconut shake. We also ate prawn tempura with sweet chili sauce (it was more like deep fired prawn, excellent at any rate), Fried Chicken with Tomato and Fresh Coriander, Fried Beef with “Angel Hair” Noodles, and Vegetable Fried Rice.

Phnom Penh 2013

Here's the view from a mandatory stop, the Foreign Correspondent's Club.

I wish I can say that I ate here.

2013 CamTESOL crew Tanya, Sam, Jamiel, James, Darrell and yours truly.

Supanniga Eating Room By Khunyai

I recently stumbled upon this great blog about restaurants in Bangkok, Hungry in Bangkok, that had a review of this great restaurant:Supanniga Eating Room By Khunyai. It is located on Thonglor, which is nearby my hotel. And I can say that this is the best restaurant I have eaten at this year. (Perhaps the best restaurant I've eaten at in two years...it will give The Whale Wins in Seattle a run for its money). I liked the ambiance and the staff was very friendly. Apparently it has only been open since October as well. I'm already thinking about eating there again when I come back to Bangkok next week. The first appetizer was Mieng Young (dried shredded pork, peanuts, and sweet roasted coconut wrapped in cha plu leaves). This dish, as with all the ones that follow, combine a number of different tastes and textures. Meaty, crunchy, sweet, spicy, and minty all at once.



This appetizer is Crispy Prawn Wontons (whole-prawn wontons, deep-fried and served with sweet dip). The wontons were crispy, however not brittle, and the sauce was sweet, but tangy.



The last appetizer was Ma Hor (minced pork stir-fried with garlic and peanuts served on tangerine). It was a flavor explosion: sweet, salty, sour, acidic, and spicy.

I only ate one main dish, the Pad Ka Nah Pla Kem Koh Chang (Hong Kong kale stir-fried with salted fish from Koh Chang). This dish is somewhat like stir-fried Morning Glory with garlic and chili peppers with the salted fish that was almost overpowering but somehow worked with the garlic. I can't wait to come back and try some other dishes.

Update (Second Visit): I decided to go back after my visit to Cambodia and try a couple of the signature dishes here.

This is Ka Lum Tod Nam Pla, fried fresh Chinese cabbage gravied with premium fish sauce from Trad province, and it was extremely flavorful. How can they make such a simple vegetable so tasty?

I also tried Moo Cha Muang, chunks of pork meat stewed with Thai herbs and cha muang leaves. I have to say this was the only dish that disappointed me, it was too sweet for me.

Muang Boran

I spent a few hours at Muang Boran earlier today and took dozens of photographs of all the amazing sculptures and reconstructed architectural marvels only lose my camera in a taxi cab on the way back! Oh well, time for an upgrade I suppose. The 300B entrance fee includes the use of a bicycle. I really enjoyed cruising around and taking in all the great architecture. I took a similar route as going to the Erawan Museum: take the BTS to Bearing (40B) and then I took a long taxi ride (140B) to the ancient city. In fact, I think these both of these sites could be visited in one day.

Library Cafe

I wanted to go chill at a cafe instead of my hotel room and use my computer, so I did a quick search of the best cafes in Bangkok and found Library Cafe located on Sukhumvit Soi 24 just one Soi over from where I am staying on Soi 22. It has a very nice atmosphere. It doesn't seem as if there's much else going on on that Soi, so I'm sure I would have never found it on my own.

Erawan Museum

The main attraction for the Erawan Museum is the massive three headed elephant 250 tons in weight, 29 meters high, and 39 meters long. I thought it was pretty impressive. It's not exactly in the center of town. I think the fastest way is to take the BTS to Bearing (40B) then take a taxi to the museum (50B).

This is the ceiling inside of the elephant.

More interior shots inside the elephant.

This display was near the window that had a good view of the highway (hence no picture).

Some of the artifacts in the small museum in the base of the statue.

One ritual offering involves setting a lotus flower adrift in the moat surrounding the statue.

The rest of these photos were taken in the garden and stream surrounding the statue.