Quote:
Originally Posted by Gigglegirl
I've travelled a lot in SE Asia (Thailand/Cambodia/Viet Nam/Laos).
I lived for a year in Cambodia from mid 2005-mid 2006. I spent most of my time in the capital Phnom Penh as a volunteer teaching English to street kids and low and unwaged Cambodians.
I went to Sihanoukville for about 3 weeks and it was more of a town than a city at that point, I guess it's grown a lot.
I thought it was a nice place and think that living/grinding there could be a good lifestyle.
Cambodia is poor and corrupt sure but I didn't drink/take drugs or do the hedonistic backpacker lifestyle and I would say it's a hell of a lot safer than any western countries in regard to crime if you live simply and don't go to the seedier areas.
In regards to sex tourism, I thought Cambodia was probably worse than Thailand. I saw westerners with really young Cambodian boys when I was in Sihanoukville. I mean these kids might have 10 years old and they would openly proposition you when you're walking down the beach! I hope they've cleaned that up.
1. I've been all over SE Asia. Cambodia is safeish for the most part, the main problem being is if you have a problem its likely to be a big problem. If you get into a scrape with a local its not going to end well for you. Unfortunately most westerners mouths get them into trouble a lot of the time as they don't understand what raising your voice etc can do for you in this part of the world.
2. If your talking about sheer quantity of sex tourism, Thailand wins hands down and its not even close. I do however concede that what goes on in Cambodia is of the worse variety, forced prostitution, underage etc. There has been a big crack down in recent years but its still around, in fact the local prostitution market is way bigger than the tourist one, the same goes for Thailand too but most don't realise that.