Floating Village - Krakor
One week-end, we decided with the other volunteers to visit one of the floating village of the Tonle Sap Lake. There is one close to Siemp Reap but it’s known as a touristic place. The one we went was smaller and more traditionnal. We arrived by touk-touk to a place similar as a slum. Because of the dry season, the site was covered of waste and children played on this large square muddy and empty residential. Of course all the houses were on the water ! We jumped on a taxi-boat to go to the only guesthouse...in the middle of the Lake !
It was impressive to see the organization of the life on this floating village. School, temple, shops, hairdressers, petrol station, post-office...every thing was on boat, mooving with the current. It’s a kind of big maze because there is no street but just some kind of ways created by the ranks of boat-houses. As they move their house as they want, it’s never the same city ! Imagine, one day the school is close to your house and an other day you need 15 minutes of boat ! It’s great when you don’t like your neighbourgs...and like changement !
When we arrived at the guesthouse, I quickly realized that it’s like a mountain refuge...you are stocked at this place for many hours ! So we played cards, drank beers and tried all the dishes of the restaurant. If you want to move, you need a boat. Here the teenagers don’t have a scooter to join their friends to drink a beer or to play pool...they have a boat !
How do they do without basic sanitation and how do they get clean water ? We saw that they flush the toilets on the lake and then...wash clothing in, eat fish from, swim in, drink it...how do they keep from getting sick ??? The owner of the guesthouse answered that many NGO’s are helping to get at least drinkable water, but after it’s a matter of adaptation of the body...
In Perou, I will always remember what the guide told us about the floating village : “we need to create pieces of land on the lake in order to learn our children to walk and run !” It’s an other life but they seem to enjoy it !
Why did they choose to live like this ? Apparently, they took this way of living from the vietnamese culture. They are fishermen from generations and want to stay as close as possible to the lake... to go fishing easier.
Have they also been victims of the dictatorship ? Or spared ? There is not a part of Cambodia that has been forgotten by the terrible Pol Pot regime. Fishermen from the lake were particulary victims because this way of life has been influenced by the Vietnamese.
After a night of trying to sleep with the waves and the engine sound, we went, with the girls, to the beauty center next door. We jumped on the boat and offered each other a facial massage ! 10 different creams and massage of the head...divine !