Cambodia is different

Corruption is not endemic in South East Asia. It is the norm. Paying a little something to smooth the path of business or settling a "fine" at the side of the road no receipts given is part of the fabric of life, so interwoven into daily routine as to be visible and invisible at the same time. It is this Eastern double think that Westerners find hard to cope with. We tend to take a very simplistic monotone view about it: it is corruption, it is wrong.

Siem Reap Airport

Yes, it is corruption, and yes, it is wrong, but in SE Asia it is the residue of a feudal society of patronage that Europe has mainly got rid of. I say mainly because a brief glance at the Irish political scene is evidence enough, with its political dynasties and the parish pump politics of the nod and the wink, that it stills clings on west of the Bosphorus. To get ahead in places like Thailand, you must pay your way. To pay your way you need extra cash. To get extra cash you must utilise all means available and bend the rules. You can clamber up the next step up on the ladder by persuading those above you to pull you up. How to persuade them? Well, let them share  your good fortune. But first those at the bottom of the pyramid have to do the leg work.

In Thailand, to be stopped on the road by the police and told you have been speeding/crossing an unbroken white line/driving while being a foreigner is simply an acknowledgement that the end of the month approaches and the lower orders must bring in the revenue that trickles up the chain of command like a reversed waterfall. You can of course dispute the ticket or pay the B1000 fine at the police station, but first you must hand over your licence and come to the station at at time that is most inconvenient for you, to hang around for a few hours while they forget you're there before eventually paying the fine  and picking up your licence. Sometimes, it is easier to "settle" the matter in a relaxed, jovial manner as the smiling policeman positions his clipboard in through your window, allowing a few hundred baht notes to magically affix themselves to sticky fingers. To Western eyes this is wrong. To Eastern, it is a cost of living.

On a recent trip to Cambodia, I was reminded of this as soon as I got off the plane at Siem Reap. Eschewing the pre-arranged eVisa, I decided I would do things old school and get my visa on arrival at the airport. I'd filled in my form and waited in line to pay the fee.  Of course I'd forgotten to bring a photo but I was assured by all that this was not a problem - for a small fee of $2 a photo could be taken at the visa desk.  So I paid my visa and photo fee, and tumbled down the approval line waiting for my photo to be taken.  I was practising which face I should use, morose and maudlin or droopy-eyed and depressed (portrait posing is not a strength of mine) when my name was called out. I was handed back my passport with Cambodia visa attached. No photo needed, it would seem. So what was the $2 dollars for? Well versed in Oriental ways, I didn't question this - this is the way things are.

The next obstacle was passport control.

Silly me. In my hurry to get out of the airport before any more of my money vanished, I neglected to write the number of my new photo-free visa on the arrival and departure card.  No problem. The immigration officer helpfully filled it in for me without asking.  The fact he do so while chanting the mantra "Tip Tip Tip" and rubbing his fingers together didn't really surprise me. After a rummage in my pocket for the $3 change for my invisible photo I finally got my passport back.

I was shocked though.

I shouldn't have been but I was.

I live in Thailand; I know not to use a certain road at a certain time of the day at a certain time of the month because that is when the police are there lying in wait ("Hey you, you speed. I have photo"). But if I do get stopped, there is always a subtle subterfuge about the way the process is handled. There a protocol, a perambulation of persuasion before the transaction. There is always a quick look over the shoulder by the policeman to make sure the coast is clear (the sight of a posse of policemen standing at car windows and flicking their heads back in unison knocks synchronised swimming into a cocked hat) and then the well oiled thrust of the clipboard into the open window. But this was different. This was taking place in the airport, in the sanctuary of the immigration booth, where the staccato thump of the stamps approving or disapproving should be sacrosanct.

Even in Thailand, I thought to myself, this would never happen. Not at immigration at the airport. Well, not out in the open at least. But Cambodia is different.