30th March (2020)

 

30th March

There is nothing like being ‘skin taxed’ for reminding you of your foreignness, even though, technically, we are all in this anti-Covid 19 boat together. 

I have been to the Old Market, here in Siem Reap. I bought a chicken and potatoes to cook chicken curry. Now this is no mean feat in a foreign country, where each has their own language but no language in common. 

Coming back to Colors of Cambodia I learned the error of my ways. While walking to the market and attempting buy things for lunch may have been just a tad heroic, in some minuscule way, it was also extremely foolhardy. I paid well over the odds, even for a supermarket. I had, once again, been skin taxed. I paid the very same amount per Kg for chicken, as I would have paid for pork in the supermarket. The supermarket is nearer too.

But hey I’m a white guy therefore I’m rich yeah. Well no, actually. I earn little at writing, and stretch my meager pension as far as it will allow. If you see me in your country, it is because I have gone without other things to enable me to save to be there. I don’t have any form of transport, no bicycle, no motor cycle, no car, just my legs. Personally I own no property, do not have investments, no gold, jewels, only a few dusty books. I am, perhaps, the poorest expat that you will meet. 

But you, native to which ever land, will not understand that. You will know of the ‘ahem’ ‘Great’ British Empire, perhaps know of those white fellas who ‘trade’, or work for big companies and spend far too much money in your country. You might know of young backpackers spending their middle-class parents’ money, but I am none of those. When people think of The Raj, The Commonwealth or even United Kingdom, they inevitably think of the middle and upper classes. Those who own. Those who have. 

What many fail to remember is that countries are made up of all sorts of people, many of whom are poor. When jolly old England was off invading other countries, it was the poor, under-paid soldiers and sailors, not the rich, who actually did all the work. It was the same back in England. It is and was those poorly paid people who held/hold the nation on their shoulders. That is my heritage. What am I? Who am I? Some might say a whingeing pom. 

I was born into a working class family. We never had a car. My father rode motorcycles. At one point we didn’t have a bathroom or indoor toilet either. For some time my mother was a housekeeper to the gentry, enabling us to have a rented ‘tied’ property, known as farm labourers’ cottages. My father, for a while, was a tractor driver. He had exited the British Army as a Sergeant Major (non-commissioned officer), having worked his way up in the ranks, but two years too early and never got his promised pension. We struggled. My family never owned their own house. Never had savings. When the last Lord and Lady moved, we were housed by the council. I was 13.

Today’s spend is $9 for a scraggly whole chicken and .50 c potatoes at Old Market

$10.25 breakfast at Common Grounds bagel (cheese, egg, bacon) and 2 large flat whites.

Therefor = $19.75, call it $20