I know, I know, I haven't posted in AGES. Mea culpa.
But the other day, somehow Donald Trump became the president-elect of the USA. And I've been working and playing in Japan for the past month and a half. And now I'm in Cambodia.HOW DO THESE THINGS HAPPEN?!?!
Well, that first one, I'm still scratching my head. (For now, I'm in the time-will-tell, hope-for-the-best, but start-becoming-seriously-politically-active camp.) The Japan thing, well, that is what has kept me out on the road with Kinky Boots for over a year; I heard a rumor we'd be going overseas, and I vowed to stay til it was legit. And it was. And the experience was wonderful and hard and 50 things. And I'm EXHAUSTED.
But we had a three-week period after our Japan shows where they were sending the set back to the States, so WAAAAYYYY back last spring, I was like -- TRAVEL TIME! And I booked a 2+wk tour of SE Asia; Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam.
Yesterday eve I left Japan and this morning I arrived in Cambodia. Tomorrow is when the tour actually begins, so today I simply wandered in a tight circle of the hotel's neighborhood, and got a mani/pedi and massage at the hotel spa. (The mani/pedi was not the best, but ALL THREE SERVICES -- INCLUDING TIP!! -- cost me less than $60. A three-hour spa day for sixty bucks. Crazy.)
But here's the craziest thing -- the thing I wish someone would have told me -- they use US dollars here, primarily. (There is a Cambodian Riel, but it's like 4,200 to the dollar. So forty bucks is over 100000 riels. ) And the icing on the cake of the cherry on the sundae is... they don't use US *coins*, so you get your "change" in riels.
Meaning, I went to the grocery store, got a bottle of Chilean Cab for $6.95, and received three US singles back, and two 100-riel notes, which together total a whopping FIVE CENTS.
Why is this so insane to me?!?!
Maybe because they're beautiful notes, and totally not worth the paper they're printed on?
Maybe because I just spent a month and a half in Japan where everything was MUY expensive?
Maybe because I'm a tiny bit ashamed that my country has a giant economic influence on another one?
Maybe because, for the first time I can remember, I am not 100% proud to be an American right at this moment?
It's probably nothing more than noticing a difference, but for now, it's hard to tell the difference. Anyway, point is, you're all getting 100 riel notes for Christmas. BEST SOUVENIR EVER.
See you Around the Edge...
