This tightly compacted city holds some of Cambodia's best food and most tragic history. Without knowing its past of civil war and genocide, you would think Cambodians and Phnom Penhers in particular were just really friendly people. Once you learn their history and realize that everyone you see was affected by the notorious Khmer Rouge...

O ur Cambodian truck driver, who says his name is “Mr. T,” pulls the Nissan pickup to the side of the road and looks back at me expressionlessly. “You get out!” he says. As if to underscore this suggestion, he steps out of the truck himself, unzips his jeans and begins to urinate on the...

One of the most startling travel epiphanies I've had in recent years came on a trip to Burma, when I was counting out small change so I could buy a packet of toilet tissues. The Burmese kyat had recently suffered a jag of devaluation, and when I'd tallied up my toilet-tissue money, I noticed that...

GHOST MONEY by Andrew Nette Published by Snubnose Press, 2012. Available in eBook format and paperback . I believe that to be better travellers, we must know about the history of the places we visit. Ghost Money , a crime novel by Australian writer Andrew Nette , helps do the trick for Cambodia, the popular...

southwestern Cambodia In Paul Theroux's Dark Star Safari: Overland from Cairo to Cape Town , he describes the journal entry made by a 19th-century visitor to an Egyptian temple. In the entry we read that an Arab man is taking measurements of the temple. We also read that while this is happening "a yellow cow,...

Social enterprises have become a more popular way of developing impoverished villages. There is a compelling argument that building thriving businesses is more sustainable than donations and handouts. It also empowers locals to take more responsibility over how to develop their towns. Tourism is a natural fit, and also creates jobs at many levels of...

Granada, Nicaragua One morning in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, as I sipped coffee in the pleasant open-air environment of the Foreign Correspondents Club , I read this: "Yeay Mao was a strongly passionate, sexy woman who always needed a penis. So after she died her spirit still likes the penis, and people bring her offerings of...