As I sit like a true nomad watching the hustle and bustle of lunchtime. Hocker stalls tossing rice and frying fish, the bartering wails of the old Market over some lotus fruit or coconut warer and the continuous "hey mister you want tuk tuk?" I feel very much slap in the middle of the reality but almost in a bubble set apart.

On a normal day I earn in 10mins what these beautiful people make in a day. What I earn in a month would take them about 2years. The stark reality of this life is like a slap in the face! Yet the people here make everyone else look sour. They smile, greet you, thank you and share with you.

At first I thought there was hidden motive, my western scepticism that they want something from me. But it's not, they truly are just lovely people. I find myself with difficulty haggling in the markets over what....? 25p. Should I not bless these people? Are they scamming me when they double the price because of the colour of my skin or am I scamming them if they knew how much I would pay in stockbridge for the same item?

I love it here, which leads me to once again relate and share markean philosophy for this day.

Cambodia is a troubling paradox for me. They strive and strive to expand and modernise their country. There is the 'modern' Cambodian whose is clued in... Wants to go far and improve their countries situation. But I worry what makes this place so special, that quintessential Asian, the heart and soul will in a few years be just a echo or dream of what it was. A KFC on a corner forces a local stall holder out of business, a new hotel destroying a local guesthouse. I long to tell them to stop, to shout and make them aware but what arrogance gives me this right, this insight. It seems so sad a country ripped apart by communism still longs to be 'the same' as everywhere else instead of embracing what makes it most unique.

If Confucius says "wise man not eat rotten tomato" then maybe the west is a rotten tomato. Ironically the Genetically modified crop infecting an infantile society.

I hope change comes slowly.