Phnom Penh is a city “teeming with energy and enterprise,” said Thomas Beller in Travel + Leisure. This wasn’t the case in 1994, when I moved to Cambodia’s capital as a reporter. Back then, the communist Khmer Rouge still controlled large chunks of the country, and the threat of renewed internecine violence remained an undercurrent in a city that served as a “lawless haven for adventurers, layabouts, and hedonists.” When I booked a recent return visit, I was expecting a city that would be bristling with high-end hotels, fancy restaurants, and hip boutiques. What I didn’t know was if modernization had obliterated Phnom Penh’s old charms.
Stepping out of the airport, I’m immediately relieved to find that the city hasn’t been completely made over. “It still has that fantastic smell!” I tell an old friend as we catch a “sweet, smoky” odor, like roasted cardamom. Other changes make the familiar bustle simply feel more civilized. Streets previously dominated by bikes and scooters are now filled with cars, and stoplights have replaced traffic cops standing on pedestals. Changes are also apparent outside the capital. Battambang, the country’s second-largest city and a previous Khmer Rouge stronghold, is now a serene place—its air is filled with the chants of monks, and its river at night resembles “a tiny Seine, dotted with elegant lamplights and arching bridges.” From there, we head for Siem Reap and the nearby Angkor Wat temple complex. “Legions of brand-new hotels” line the main road of the city, which “has justifiably become an international tourist destination, an item on the bucket list for every collector of the ancient and monumental.”
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