GETTING IT WRONG - Overbooked: The Exploding Business of Travel and Tourism - page 65

And on the surface the tourism industry is a huge success. Tourism proceeds account
for 20 percent of Cambodia's domestic product. Tourism is the second-largest employer in
the country, providing 350,000 jobs, just behind the garment industry. Roland Eng, who is
still a champion of his country's tourism industry, presciently warned a few years ago that
while tourism can bring wealth, alleviate poverty and conserve natural and cultural herit-
ages, it has to be regulated. “Left to itself, tourism development does not necessarily fulfill
those roles,” he wrote.
Now Cambodia is a model of tourism gone wrong. It is a far cry from the mythical
golden era remembered by Cambodians like Dith Pran and Sok Nguon who in the middle
of war found inspiration remembering the dignity and pleasure of showing foreigners the
glories of their country.
• • •
Siem Reap is the modern town in northwestern Cambodia that grew up near the ancient
city of Angkor. Once a sedate French colonial market center, it is now a loud tourist town
of hotels, restaurants and karaoke bars, with nearly three million visitors every year aug-
menting a permanent population of 173,000 people.
The highway into Siem Reap is one long strip of hotels—the Royal Angkor, the Apsara
Angkor, the Majestic Angkor, the Empress Angkor, etc. Few are top-flight. Many cater
to Koreans or Chinese or Vietnamese. They come in all sizes and quality, often with gi-
ant faux-Angkor statues guarding the front doors. There are blocks of massage parlors and
nightclubs like the Café Bar-Noir and the Zone One Club. At many of these nightspots
the young girls and boys introduced as waiters or hostesses are prostitutes, and as they say
on the blogs, they are “available.” Nightlife in Siem Reap is fast-paced for the foreign tour-
ists: live music, karaoke, massage parlors and bars and drugs everywhere set against a lush
tropical town with colored lights strung overhead.
The single-minded pursuit of high-volume tourism has nearly destroyed the charm of
the town. What remains can be found in the Old Quarter along the banks of the Siem
Reap River that flows through the town center. The old Grand Hotel with its gardens is an
axis for a neighborhood of classic wooden Cambodian homes and French colonial villas
where cafés still offer dining al fresco under shade trees. Further downtown, the covered
marketplace has been preserved with vendors and artists and a lively mix of locals.
The vast majority of tourists are Asian, with South Koreans and Vietnamese sharing
the number-one spot. They fly in directly from Seoul, Hanoi, or Ho Chi Minh City. Al-
most daily flights from Bangkok; Singapore; Vientiane, Laos; and Kuala Lumpur, Malay-
sia, bring in more neighbors. Europeans and Americans are now the distinct minority even
though they, too, arrive by the thousands, pushing tourism to Cambodia from 176,617 in