Monkey Jim and the kid with the coin

Getting from Bangkok to Phnom Penh, Cambodia was pretty interesting and, at times, a tad hairy. One (or two in our case) has the choice of taking a bus, which is guaranteed to be cheap and always late, or a chartering a taxi which is much faster and air conditioned. Not to mention that being long-boned and crammed into a bus is not much fun. So we decided to take a taxi to the border and were told the best place to find a one that will go to the border is at the bus terminal. So we went.

There were a few drivers leering about the parking lot and one of them got our attention.
We got right down to it, and while he was stubborn he remained all smiles while we were negotiating our fare. We finally convinced him to take us to Aranyaprathet (the border town on the Thailand side) for 2,000 baht (roughly $60 USD). It was about a five-hour leg to the border and we knew our price was more than reasonable. However, when we arrived in Aran, he refused to settle for the payment we agreed upon in Bangkok. He kept waving a yellow fare-card in our face and demanded the full 3,200B he initially tried to swindle us for in the bus terminal parking lot. After much complaining on his end we finally threw 2,500B at him and scurried through the markets toward the border.

On our way to the first visa checkpoint in Aran, a nicely dressed young man in a fedora started walking alongside us. He had a gold coin in his ear and leather messenger bag hung from his shoulder. He couldn’t have been more than 27 years old and I remember thinking that in an alternate universe he’d make a charming journalist—grinding it out for a local newspaper. He started chatting us up and was essentially escorting us from office to office while we got our visas and departure cards in order. As we were making small talk on our way into the Thailand departure office, we mentioned that we were headed to Phnom Penh in Cambodia. Unbeknownst to us (and certainly without our asking) he took it upon himself to arrange his friend’s taxi service from Poi Pet (the border town on the Cambodian side) to Phnom Penh without telling us.

Meanwhile, as we were getting our Cambodian entry stamps in order, we met an Australian man named Jim who invited us to share his taxi to Poi Pet so as to cut costs. Jim was probably nearing 50, short, and wore a pink floral shirt that loosely hung over his potbelly. He had dark eyes and a round nose that he would tidy up every time he took his handkerchief out to wipe the sweat from his brow. And now that I think back on this experience, he seemed to be the human impersonation of a koala bear. We happily accepted his offer and agreed to meet him outside after our papers were cleared. 

Jim, Reaksmey, and I were making our way down the large street that divides Poi Pet in two when our vigilante travel agent came running up behind us.
            “Taxi! I’ve got taxi!” he said. Reaksmey and I shook our heads and motioned towards Jim that we didn’t need a taxi.
            “No, no, no! I’ve got taxi!” He placed his hand on the back of my arm. Jim turned around and in his stiff Melbourne accent said, “Yeah, but we don’t need you!” and we kept walking. The young man ignored Jim and entreated us, “But you say Phnom Penh! I got you taxi!”
            “No.” I said earnestly, “We go with him.” I pointed at Jim.
            “Just ignore ’im,” said Jim, “come this way."

It was at this moment that I started to put the pieces together that this kid had been trying to scam us the entire time. It wasn’t until our charming escort started yelling at Jim for “stealing” us to share his taxi that I saw him for what he really was—a two-bit con artist with a gold coin lodged in his ear. He continued to follow us as we headed towards our ride, which was parked next to a small convenience store that was situated across the street from a few casinos. 

“I’m gonna grab a beer for the road,” Jim said, and we headed into the store. It was balmy inside and the fare was mainly composed of dirty bags of chips and whatever you needed from the cooler. I made a passing comment to Reaksmey about the casinos outside.

“The Thais love to gamble, but it’s illegal in Thailand,” Jim cracked a can of ABC Stout, “that’s why they come out here.” He made a wide gesture in reference to the sun-rotted border town of Poi Pet. They just hop the border from Aran for a day or two until they’re broke and go home.” We looked at the casinos from behind the dirty glass door of the convenience store. The dusty, stucco monoliths seemed to lumber into one another for support from the heat while large swaths of people limped to and from Cambodia on the only avenue in the town.

Jim paid for the beer he’d just cracked and walked back outside. I grabbed a few beers from the icebox for Reaksmey and I. The old woman in charge of the place smiled at me as her grandchild amused itself on top of the front counter. The kid reached for the beer I’d put down as I was paying and Grandma laughed. “Get your own,” I said smiling as we followed Jim outside.

Sure enough, our rogue travel agent was outside waiting for us, only now he had the company of a few of his friends. A few of them seemed pretty aloof and unsure as to what exactly was going on, but our little friend kept shouting at Jim and us nonetheless. Reaksmey and I piled into the back seat of the taxi with Jim’s friend, a quiet Cambodian woman who hadn’t met until this instant, and before we knew it that weasely little bastard had stuck his head in the window! He was demanding a cancellation fee for the charter we had never made and I had to give him 100 baht to shut him up and leave us alone. It was not enough for him to accept being “cheated” but it was all I was going to give him. He threatened Jim again, pointing a finger in his face and shouting “You! You!” He muttered something about “if I see you again, not your business, blah blah blah,” and stormed off cursing with his confused friends following behind him.

Once we were making our way and it was quiet again, Jim explained what was actually going on:

“Most people traveling through here don’t realize that these people aren’t trying to help them. If you’d of gone in that guy’s taxi he would have dumped you at a bus stop about five miles away from here while a van driver—the guy who’d actually be taking you Phnom Penh—waits around for a few hours for his buddies to find enough tourists to fill every seat. And you’d be paying a lot more money at that.”

Jim explained that he had lived in Thailand/Cambodia for 18+ years and had made this journey a hundred times. In his thick Melbourne accent he told us that there were nothing but thieves and crooks between Aranyaprathet and Poi Pet and that no one should be trusted. And that’s when he pulled a gun on us. 

Just kidding.

After a while we finally made our formal introductions and Jim told us that most people actually knew him as Monkey Jim. We asked him why and he said that he used to walk around everywhere with a monkey on his shoulder and that eventually the name just stuck with him even after the monkey was gone. Later, after we’d had a couple of beers, I asked him what happened to the monkey.

“Well the long and short of it is that he got too stoned, wandered off, and got lost,” he said in his Aussie way, “and I never saw him again after that… But that’s a story for another time.” We didn’t press him for any more details.

I should mention that the whole time we were talking to Monkey Jim and his friend our driver was on a suicide mission to get us to Phnom Penh in some sort of record time. He spent the majority of our trip in the opposite lane, literally playing chicken with every oncoming vehicle and laying on the horn every 10 seconds… for the entire six-hour car ride. Needless to say, it was awesome. But when we stopped again, we made sure to pick up a few more beers to take the edge off. You get used to it after a while.

But at last, around 10pm we arrived in Phnom Penh at a place vaguely arranged by Jim’s Cambodian friend and Rana, Reaksmey’s cousin. It was just starting to rain and the cabby was itching to kick us out of the car, when we finally saw them. Reaksmey’s entire family came out in two cars to pick us up. It has been over 15 years since she has been home and her aunt, uncle, and cousins were all so overwrought with joy at seeing her again that we all just laughed. Her uncle (an amazing man I’ll be sure to gush about later) hardly speaks any English, but he gave me a giant hug and whispered into my ear, “I am so happy.”