None of your business

On TV’s “Blind Date”, Cilla Black famously asks her contestants “What’s your name and where do you come from?” Here, the first question I am asked by strangers is “How old are you?”, followed by “How many children do you have?” There is a great deal of surprise that I am not married (“Why not?”), and while this explains why there are no children, I am sometimes asked if I don’t have children because I am lazy! I am often asked about money (“How much do you earn? How much is your rent? How much do your clothes cost?”). As I walk past, people I have never seen before call out to me “Where are you going?” and “Where have you been?”

In the UK, the response to many of these personal questions would be “None of your business!”, but here everybody knows everybody’s business, and it would be rude not to give the information asked for. Now that I am used to being quizzed in this way, I don’t mind at all, and it’s refreshing for me to be able to ask local people the sort of questions that would be taboo back home. I can ask poor people about how much money they have, how much they’ve lost to money lenders or gambling and how they cope with the challenges of their lives. I can ask sick and disabled people (including those with HIV) how they got their illness or disability, how it has affected their lives, what sort of treatment they get and how much this costs. Many people are willing to talk about their experiences during the Pol Pot regime, and I have heard some desperately tragic stories. I can even ask women how often their husbands beat them. The people seem to be pleased that I am taking an interest in their personal affairs. It is such a privilege to learn so much about their lives and culture in this way.

What I can’t ask them about, though, is politics and corruption. People are afraid to openly speak out against the government, or to complain about the corruption that is ruining their lives. Printed copies of a recent UK report by Global Witness on the role of the “kleptocratic elite” controlling illegal logging are banned. The Cambodian language news media (TV and newspapers) is at the mercy of the government, so news is often skewed. On these issues, people tend to just accept what they're told and not ask questions.