One of things that are easy to forget when you are staying in Cambodia, spending ridiculously high amounts of your tourist dollars, is that things are quite different for the people living there. Since I stayed at my hotel for nearly two weeks I was fortunate enough to be able to glimpse a bit of what it is like for the Cambodians working there.

As you probably know, wages are very low in Cambodia. A lot of Doctors will earn only as little was 30 dollars, a nurse or a policeman around 15 USD etc.. SO from that perspective the wage of the girls in the bar was quite high: 40 USD for the "Hostesses" and 60 for the waitresses. But then again, it is the capital and while Phnom Penh is not as expensive as Siam Reap it's more expensive then more remote places in Cambodia. So people earn a little more.

What really surprised me was that a lot of the girls will only keep as little as 10 USD of that money for themselves! They will give everything else to their families for food, the rent etc.. Personally, I simply can't imagine how anyone would be able to live on that money in Phnom Penh. And apparently it is not possible, either. One of the girls told me in a very matter-of-fact way that if she doesn't get tips then she can't eat that day. And I 'm positive that she didn't tell me that in hope of getting better tips from me. She was just mentinioning it rather off-handedly. Apparently she has six brothers and sisters and only two of them are working yet and have to support everyone else in the family. Which is more difficult then in a lot of ordinary Cambodian families because her parents want all children to go to school. Cambodia has a literacy rate of a bit more then 50 %, so that is far from ususal. The problem with this is of course that this way a 12 or 14 years old boy or girl who would normally earn money just sits in school and costs money. And so the brothers and sisters who already have left school have to support their family. And of course, it is considered to be perfectly normal here that you do it. It is simply your duty as a child, even if that means that you will have to postpone your own desires for a few years.

Take the girl I was talking to: She has even studied at the university for a few terms (her parents borrowed the money from friends, relatives and god knows whom), but now she can't go any longer since the tuition is 400 USD per year. Considering that she earns 60 USD per month and only keeps 10 USD for herself that is of course an enormous amount of money. I'd probably despair at the though of it. But she didn't seem to be too worried and simply said that some day she will haev the money to continue her course - maybe when her brothers and sisters are finished with school - and that she can simply wait until then.

Gives you a different perspective on the value of education and money, doesn't it?