I am in the middle of a ten day stretch here in Sihanoukville. Everything started out terribly as my first two sessions were losing ones, with one of them being my biggest losing day thus far. But in the last three nights I've won $168, $404 and $544 to bring me back in the black along with rakeback. In regards to the rakeback, I have to admit that I was a bit nervous when it came time for payment as I have been screwed so many times in the past year or so that I have just become used to it. But I have to hand it to the guys at the WM as when the day arrived they put the money in my hand on time and it wasn't a small amount. The rakeback amount for this period should be larger as I am putting in more volume. I haven't played too much $1-$2, but spent most of my time at $2-$5 and I discovered something interesting the other night.
It appears that in the eyes of the Chinese, I am the mark on the table or rather all foreigners. I do not say this to imply that myself or any of the other expats are bad players, but rather that the Chinese seem to thoroughly enjoy winning our money. Even if they are losing overall, they take great joy in the pots they are able to take off of us. This applies to me especially as I admit that I am playing a bit tighter than usual. It's been a while since I have played $2-$5 and let's just say my range has shrunk a bit. So the Chinese at the WM have given me a nickname as they call me "KK". Anyone who knows me from the old Riverking days should find this funny as players there called me "Queens Plus." So maybe I'm not playing tighter and there's just something to this. The Chinese players don't gang up on me or anything like that, in fact they go at each other pretty hard. And the weirder the hand they do it with, the better in their eyes. But they do like a good mix of people on the table so the game will often break when the last foreigner leaves.
So the room is looking to add a few more non-Chinese to the room as the ratio of whites to Chinese is a bit out of whack I suppose. They especially want a better mix in the bigger games as the bosses would like other people to play with. So they've started this insane deal for those who want to play $5-$10, $10-$20 or higher. The deal is somewhat convoluted, but basically when the game ends they are going to take half of the rake collected for that evening and divide that among the players according to the number of hours they played. So if someone plays eight hours and there is $5,000 in the box, they would get a decent chunk of $2,500 for that night alone. This is on top of the fact that they're paying for all transport within Cambodia and if someone plays eight hours for ten days straight, they'll reimburse the player for airfare from wherever they came. And it includes a free stay either in the WM casino or in the hotel across the street, which they also own. I'm fairly confident of them honoring this deal because I got two of my friends to come out from Vegas and they arrived last night/this morning. They arrived at 4:30 AM and there were two hotel rooms waiting for them across the street. I helped them move in and the rooms are insanely nice. I fuc*ing love these guys for coming over by the way. I texted them a couple of nights ago and asked if they wanted to come over, told them about the deal and they were on the next flight the following day and came over 8,000 miles in a 24 hour period to arrive this morning. I was assured that this deal is not limited and is open to anyone. Each player just needs to get a players card set up, which I did for my friends before they arrived.
They crashed pretty hard last night i imagine after the trip so I'm sure they're still asleep. I'll take them for a late lunch/early dinner once they wake up and then head into the poker room. I'm not sure if they're playing $5-$10 or $10-$20 tonight but the room manager told me they were going to play in one of the VIP lounges and showed me the new table they just got for this game. I just wish that I could play this game with them, but I'll have to slum it out with everyone else in the $2-$5 game. For dinner I'll probably take them to the Sokha Beach Resort as it's a toss up between them and the Secret Garden Otres for the best restaurant in town. They have a really good daily dim sum menu that is inexpensive and a nightly all you can eat Brazilian BBQ for $30. I would do that but I probably wouldn't be able to play poker after. I'm settling into a nice routine here, although I did bite it on my bike yesterday. I'm getting used to the travel and traffic and just the general condition of things around here. I was talking to pops the other day about this and the key is just to find those few places that you can escape to every day to keep yourself sane. There are a few great restaurants here still and some nice spots on the beach you can still get away to. And I'm not spending that much money as I am still staying in the $8 bungalow and I take most of my meals for free in the poker room. I wondered at the beginning of all this whether or not this venture would be worth it. Thus far it has proven itself to be and so I'll stay as long as I continue to win, and as long as they keep paying me.