I fought the law and the law won.

I am going to kick your ass and get away with it

While enjoying a leisurely drive home after a good night with friends, I found myself skidding 15 meters across Mao Tse Toung Bld wondering what had just happened. Fairly obvious really, I had just become the latest edition to the ever increasing list of Barang moto casualties.

Now I am not here to bitch and moan, I understand that the roads here can be dangerous. That is part of life here, but in the wee hours of the morning when traffic is at its lowest, how do you manage to hit one of only two other bikes on the largest intersection in Phnom Penh? Alcohol? perhaps, however the events that were to unfold led me to the conclusion that some people in Cambodia just know they are above the law.

Got me thinking though how important and powerful must one be, to collide with another motorbike at 50 k/h then subsequently watch me tumble across the street and not even stop to offer an apology or even worse check you have not injured a complete stranger, because of your cavalier driving.

Somehow their bike didn't topple and as they drove off my Khmer/Australian friend who had witnessed the entire crash unfold drove after them. Now he is not pursuing them to instigate violence, nor to request fiscal compensation. Just to ask "what the fuck?". So my friend catches up with them and says "You know you just hit someone back there?" and in true "off the rails" fashion the passenger who incidentally is a uniformed policeman reaches behind him and pulls a pistol on my good Samaritan friend, saying "I think you should leave this alone".

Naturally that was the end of that and I was left licking my wounds thinking who do you need to be to potentially kill somebody and show no remorse? Is that one of the hidden rights to possessing a badge Phnom Penh? I truly hope not.

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