East of Croydon

by Sue Perkins

  See? I look like an idiot. I quickly wipe the smile off my face and look horrified. She carries on talking. I tilt my head in listening pose, occasionally shaking it in disbelief, tutting and generally looking sad. This should cover all the bases of her tragic story. Finally, the next burst of translation is forthcoming.

  TRANSLATOR: Or at least that is what the West assumes. Actually, life here is fabulous, she says. She feels happy and blessed. She loves this life. She loves this life!!

  I quickly remove the pained expression from my face, and relax into a grin.

  In translation situations, you are always behind the beat, emotionally syncopated, your responses out of step and at odds with the content.

  If they are describing a traumatic attack by a mountain lion, you are roaring with laughter.

  If they are telling you about a transcendent spiritual experience, you are shaking your head in disbelief.

  You cannot ever win.

  The other problem with translation, of course, is that every translator is different. Some can perform the job almost simultaneously. Others take their time. Some are formal, others more colloquial. Some are even kind enough to spare my blushes, so I have absolutely no idea when I’m being slagged off. It’s only in the edit that I find out that the monk in rural Mondulkiri, with whom I’d thought I had an intense soul-connection, actually went on record to say he thought I was a monumental dickhead.

  In Kampong Phluk, Om, our Cambodian translator, showed no such kindness. Omfn1 had been a Buddhist monk in a previous lifefn2 and, as such, valued honesty above all else.

  I approached the women, who were still busy serving forehands into the dense netting, and asked them what they were doing.

  ME: Hi! Nice to see you! What are you up to?

  Om translated. There was a burst of laughter and much chit-chat. The response came back.

  OM: They say you are an idiot. What does it look like we are doing?

  ME: Well, you look like you’re bashing fish with a tennis racket.

  Back went my response. More laughter. I noticed even the translator was laughing with them now. He turns to me.

  OM: They say, ‘We are bashing fish with a tennis racket.’

  Further peals of laughter.

  ME: Great. Well, that’s that sorted, then.

  OM: The ladies want to ask you something …

  Things had moved on swiftly. Now I was being interviewed.

  The ladies didn’t wait for confirmation, they just went ahead and asked. It was the very first time this question was posed on my travels – but it went on to dog me throughout.

  OM: They want to know – are you married?

  ME: No. I’m not.

  Om stared at me with a mixture of disbelief and pity.

  ME: Om. You can tell them. No.

  He relayed the news. There was a collective gasp, followed by lots of fervent muttering.

  OM: They are asking, ‘Why not?’

  ME: Well …

  I racked my brains as to how to explain my situation.

  I obviously took too long, because Om decided to start answering on my behalf, embarking on a lengthy monologue that included mimicry of my glasses and lots of sad faces.

  There was more laughing and eye-rolling. They were now looking very intently at me. I thought about how on earth to get out of this. Some more muttering. I was on tenterhooks to see what insult might come my way next. All the while, on film, I’m still grinning that shit-eating grin.

  OM: This lady here, she is asking if there is something wrong with you.

  And …

  And I laugh. The thing is, I don’t feel offended. Not in the slightest. I feel exhilarated because we have stopped that one-sided formal interview and are now having a proper conversation.

  We talked and laughed all afternoon, swapping stories. Theirs had common threads: poverty, a love of family, hardship. There were tales of violent abuse at the hands of those tasked with protecting them, fathers, husbands, sons – all delivered casually, like gossip, like it was nothing.

  Throughout the afternoon, I tried helping them bat fish from the nets, but the angle of my racket was a little off. One misplaced backhand sent the catch back into the river. A rogue lob hurled it towards a lady’s face. At the end of the day, I even found a kilo of soggy fry in my left bra cup.

  This set the template for my stay. I was deemed an innocuous buffoon, a curiosity, and, as such, men and women would row up to the house to make our acquaintance. I started getting invites to community activities, the most prestigious being a chance to compete in their annual boat-race festival, Bon Om Touk. The offer of high-octane watersports? With super-fit strangers? I felt frightened. Anxious. So I said …

  Yes.

  We didn’t sleep that night. Not one of us.

  It transpired that one of the Cambodian crew, stationed in the back room, was an Olympic snorer. Every few minutes, he would let out a thick, gurgling rasp, and the house would vibrate to the sound of his rattling sinuses.

  All night, an animal whimpered, its cries carried across the silent water. I would pace the balcony every hour trying to work out which direction the sound was coming from, but as soon as I thought I’d located it, it would switch source and I’d have to search all over again. Every night, that noise would find me and up I’d get, until I was half asleep all day and half awake all night.

  The locals were up at first light, hawking their phlegm into the river and lighting the fires for breakfast. There was pho, rice and fried fish (Mekong Gravy optional).

  We got up just as the sun hit the rooftops and got our waterproofed equipment together. We rowed to the opposite bank in good time to take part in the main event.

  No one was there to meet us. The place was utterly deserted. Then, out of nowhere, a commotion. Things happen hard and fast out there; the fragile peace is shattered, and then, in a heartbeat, things fold back to silence once more. A boat emerged from the morning mist, with a dozen priests holding a man, as if he were their hostage. They dragged him from the boat, forced him to kneel in front of the temple and proceeded to slap and beat him with their hands and fists. Let me tell you, there is nothing more surreal than the sight of a group of monks in orange robes beating the shit out of a defenceless guy in a loincloth.

  Later, we were told that this was a familiar ritual. An old man in the village was very sick, and not expected to last the day. The man getting beaten was a soothsayer who had been in touch with the patient. He had offered himself as a proxy: he accepted the beatings on the dying man’s behalf so that the evil spirits could be driven away, clearing his ascent into heaven.

  What a thankless job, I thought. You spend your life getting walloped by a gang of Buddhists. Having said that, I’d still take it over telesales.

  The Dragon Boat Race was a write-off, so we filled the day with a fishing trip with the village elder, Mr Lee. This cheered Steve hugely, because he might finally get the chance to talk about the dismantling of foreign-owned industrial trawling corporations in the early 2000s.

  We headed out of Kampong Phluk towards the Tonle Sap – a freshwater lake and natural phenomenon. At the end of the wet season, something remarkable happens here. The volume of water flowing down the Mekong is so great that the entire delta turns into a giant floodplain. The Tonle Sap can’t then drain away, so for a short period, the river reverses its flow and the water floods back into the vast lake. It expands to four times its normal size and, in doing so, the flooded forests become one gigantic fish nursery. The billions of fish that spawn here provide Cambodia with three-quarters of its annual protein. That’s one hell of an important lake.

  At least, that’s what is supposed to happen. When we arrived in mid-November, the dry season hadn’t yet made an appearance. The waters were unnaturally high, and flash floods hit us most days. Here, by the riverbank, you could see how the slightest changes in global temperature would dramatically affect the livelihood of farmers and fishermen.

  Rather
than me tell you all the many wonderful things Mr Lee was, let me tell you the one thing he wasn’t: chatty. In fact, even when heavily prompted, it was hard to get more than a sentence or two out of him. Per hour.

  He sat, facing forward on the bow, staring directly at the sun and thus directly away from me. Essentially, he’d rather get solar retinopathy than look at my face. We puttered further into the tangle of the mangroves, where he dragged up one of his nets for inspection.

  And found nothing. Not one single fish – in the biggest inland fishery in the whole world.

  We had been filming for hours and had nothing usable in the can. We desperately needed a sequence here. We changed tack, opting to tell another story; snakes. Because of the over-fishing in the lake, the fishermen had started killing snakes. And now the snake population was declining.

  Mr Lee rowed out to the snake traps.

  And found nothing.

  That night, we had a team pow-wow. There was a feeling of gloom in the air – we were having an interesting time meeting the community, but none of the encounters were gelling into anything that could coherently tell the story of the place.

  But we hadn’t counted on Vicky.

  As dusk fell, I watched her put on her head torch, commandeer a boat and row across the lake. I lay on my mattress and watched the bugs dancing on the wall. My eyes closed. My breathing steadied. I started to drift. And then, on the breeze, that sound: an animal in distress.

  I have no idea what Vicky did that night, but it was certainly effective. As we left the next morning, I could see the opposite bank heaving with competitors.

  Approaching the monastery, it became clear that the men had really embraced the majesty of the occasion. Half of them were wearing dresses and sporting vivid scarlet lipstick, which, if I’m being entirely honest, was not a shade that worked for all of them. The women sat around in heavy woollens, rolling their eyes, as if to say, ‘Bloody show-offs’.

  There was lots of shouting and play-fighting, with a little spitting and cat-calling thrown in for good measure. I couldn’t help thinking the Oxford–Cambridge boat-race would benefit hugely from some of this drag-queen glamour.

  I wobbled onto our vessel, the tennis ladies laughing at me. A woman took her place to my right, others in front and behind. I was handed an oar, damp and suspiciously small, almost half the size of my fellow rowers’. The opposition’s boat manoeuvred alongside us in preparation for the start, and a boy in rather fetching fake lashes blew me a kiss.

  Steve and the crew, meanwhile, had boarded a separate boat, which would run in parallel to the action and get all the necessary shots. ‘We’ll use the first race as a rehearsal pass,’ he said, ‘just to get our bearings.’

  Great, I thought. We can take it easy, plod along just to give a sense of the course. Sadly, Steve forgot to tell the locals his plan. As far as they were concerned, this race was the real deal.

  There was no starter pistol, or referee’s whistle. Instead, without warning, the head monk gave a violent nod of his head and the two boats lurched forward. Suddenly the air was filled with the breathless shrieks and grunts of the competitors.

  ‘Moy!’ went the team, as the thick wooden oars hit the water

  ‘Moy!’ went the team as they brought them out again.

  I lost my stroke within seconds, my tiny oar scudding against the water’s surface and sending droplets splashing onto my face. This was my worst fear realized. The water. From the moment I’d arrived, I’d been terrified that even so much as an atom would make contact with my skin. It wasn’t so much the colour, foaming and brown, as having seen, over the last few days, every local void their bowels in its shallows.

  Within a few metres my teammate sitting behind was rhythmically twatting me on the back of the head with her massive oar. The pain was sharp, but at least this violent metronome helped me keep my stroke in time. We powered through, low in the water, the prow inching forward, falling back, inching forward again.

  ‘Moy!’ went the team, as we pulled in front. My heart was fit to burst with the strain. The camera boat picked up speed, racing towards us to get a shot of us in action. As it drew near, the wash built and the foul water started to spill over the right side of the boat, until my lap was soaked.

  ‘NOOOOO,’ I screamed, with the ardour of one who knows she is perilously close to typhus.

  Suddenly it was over. The race was done. We had won, by a whisker. I was panting with exhaustion, my eyes burning from where little spits of river water had hit my face. But it was worth it. My first ever win! My first ever sporting triumph! Screw you, mega-jocks of my youth – I just did sport!

  What I’d failed to realize was that this was just a trial run and that we needed another pass for the cameras. I had peaked too early. So Little Miss Shattered got back on her wet bench, tiny oar in hand and waited for the rhythmic concussion to begin again.

  I collared Steve as we made our way back to the start of the course.

  ME: Listen – please don’t come that close again. We were taking in water and I thought we were going to capsize back there.

  STEVE: I’m sorry, Sue.

  ME: Honestly, it was really, really close.

  STEVE: I know – I’m really sorry. We won’t do it again. I promise.

  ME: That’s OK, just be careful.

  My grump subsided. In truth, I can never be angry with a Welshie. They’re my weakness – along with Mary Berry and all batter-based foodstuffs.

  I was now exhausted, my pulse hammering in my ears. My fellow competitors, however, seemed to find the practice lap a mere cardiovascular amuse-bouche. I stared down at my groin. The splashes from the boat were now receding in the baking heat, leaving a yellowy watermark at the margins and a distinctly acidic whiff.

  I had survived my first Mekong spattering. I had briefed the camera boat. All good. What I hadn’t factored in was the competitive zeal of the rival boat in our second race. As soon as we were underway they drew next to us so that our oars were clashing. Their massive oars, my tiny one. They drew so close it felt like we were more sword fighting than rowing, as the wooden poles clicked and clacked against one another. A shout went up from behind, and I saw some of the kids try to push the boats apart. But it was too late. We started listing, taking in gallons of water that quickly filled the hollows of the boat. At that point, cheroot in gob and crinkly grin on face, the driver of the camera boat careered along the other side of us and I knew we were done for.

  ME: Steve! Steve!

  Steve had his head down, refusing to meet my gaze. We both knew I was doomed.

  With boats now flanking us, the water poured in from both sides, up to my knees, then up to my waist. My teammates began diving left and right, in perfect synchronicity, like something out of a Busby Berkeley movie. I, on the other hand, sat stunned and motionless, like a confused pudding in an explorer’s hat, unaware until the very last minute that we were going down. I’d like to say that my remaining on the boat till the last was a matter of honour – a captain refusing to leave her stricken vessel – but in truth I was in shock and desperate to postpone the inevitable.

  When the time came, I didn’t jump. I didn’t have the energy to jump. I simply leant to one side and capitulated to the foaming deep. I felt the water saturate my clothes and fill my shoes, whereupon I was surrounded by the womenfolk, who formed a protective circle around me, grabbing under my arms and attempting to bear me aloft.

  They think I can’t swim, I thought. I’m so weak, they think I can’t even swim.

  As I descend, I see Steve, head in hands. I see Vicky, failing to hide her delight that we finally have a sequence. And the last face I see is that of Olly, shaking his head ruefully as his entire collection of radio mics is submerged in the gloop.

  On a lone positive note, I can say that I’ve not only been on the Mekong but in it.

  The women surrounding me seemed very excited, shouting at me in a tone I felt was broadly encouraging. I shouted along with them,
but ended up swallowing about a litre of Cambodian poo-water mid roar.

  Later, having seen the footage translated, I understand that what they were actually saying, in deafening unison, was ‘Keep your mouth shut! Don’t open your mouth! Keep your mouth shut!’

  I was pulled back onto the boat again, alternately coughing and gipping. There was a thick brown tide-mark around my neck and an unmistakable stench of toilet overflow around my shoulders.

  It was then they broke the news: the villagers had requested it was the best of three.

  I don’t remember much of that final race. Perhaps the constant battering from my teammate’s massive oar had had an effect on my brain capacity. I don’t know. All I could think of was getting back to our little hut and washing the Mekong juice off my body.

  Once ashore, the real race began. The race to get clean. My eyes were on fire, and there was a pungent stink coming from my clothes as they started to weld to my skin in the scorching heat.

  I rushed to the back room, where we’d had the rudimentary plumbing rigged. There was a small toilet, next to which was an open grate with a plastic wand fixed above it for showering. I turned the tap on, to find the water pressure somewhere between non-existent and pensioner-with-prostate-issues. I peeled off my kit and stood on the grubby tiles as thick black rivulets of river muck ran down my leg. After a minute, the jet spluttered, then thinned, then stopped altogether. Oh, God. No. Not now. I waddled, butt-naked, into my room, grabbed two large bottles of water and some hand sanitizer, and returned. I began sluicing myself, rubbing the liquid alcohol against my skin to try to minimize the risk of infection.

  I’d laid out my clean clothes ready. Once dry, I popped my pants and combats on, then reached for my bra. As I did so, I discovered two cockroaches, one in each cup, whirling round the edge of the under-wiring in perfect synchronicity.

  Welcome to Asia.

  That night we ate packet noodles and drank some rather suspect whisky. Olly sat apart from the group, packing his sodden radio mics in dry rice, in an attempt to bring them back to life. I tried to join in with the general chat, but my internal, hypochondriac monologue drowned out everything else.