Michael Batson

I’ve been to Kampot in southern Cambodia a few times over the years but this was my first trip back there since the pandemic. I was interested to see what had changed and more to the point what had not, because Kampot has historical charm that you wouldn’t want to see gone. What you would want is that charm maintained and hopefully restored in keeping with the character because Kampot has appeal and you would want that appeal to continue. It’s quiet and it’s quaint, and there’s nothing wrong with either of those. Less a city more a town really albeit with a village feel.

Kampot is 150kms southwest of Phnom Penh on National Route 3. These days the rehabilitated train service will drop you there en route to Sihanoukville. The road from Phnom Penh is now much improved as are many in the country. In my time visiting Cambodia, the country’s national roads have gone from being; under construction, unsealed, sealed, dilapidated, resealed, widened, and others newly constructed. For about 100kms route 3 is a dual carriageway complete with a median strip and two lanes each side. For the last part it’s a single lane in each direction on a good surface of mainly straight road with little traffic. If you’re not going in your own vehicle, there are two services daily with large buses or nine in minivans. You can also splash out and hire a private car with a local driver if you’re flush. Once upon a time it was 4-5 hours by bus or more depending if the driver went first to Kep along the coast, which added about 30 minutes to the journey. These days the journey time by road is down to about three hours on a good day or 5-6 hours by rail.

There’s nothing new about Kampot attracting foreign visitors in numbers. It’s been going on for over a century since the colonial era when the French began developing a pepper growing industry and sought the cooler climes at nearby Bokor Mountain. During colonial rule it served as the country’s only sea port. The original colonial town was laid out in a Beaux-Arts grid plan, centered on a large market building, once defunct now converted into shops, and a linear park these days lined with market stalls. People who’ve been to both say Kampot shares similarities with Port-au-Prince in particular; the ground floor of the buildings arches over the sidewalk to form a shaded arcade and note with curiosity the similar French imprint on urban planning and architecture in such disparate places as Cambodia and Haiti, though Kampot isn’t in a failed state plagued with armed gangs.

With nearby Kep, east along the coast towards Vietnam, this area during French rule was known as the “Saint Tropez of South-East Asia” or the “Cambodian Riviera” with beachside mansions built for colonial officials to take in the sea air, escape Phnom Penh’s heat in the hot season, and to be seen. During the 1960s the Riviera continued to flourish attracting a who’s who from around the world including monarchs, heads of state, and glamorous icons such as Jackie Kennedy taking in the sights. Today Kep is part dilapidated, part contemporary nouveau riche, but mostly it’s just quiet.

Above Kampot is Bokor Mountain looming like a great jungle covered mass. From the heights on the far side away from Kampot, you can see Phú Quốc, a Vietnamese island in the Gulf of Thailand. Known to Cambodia as Koh Tral and claimed by them, it was Khmer Rouge incursions there that partly triggered Vietnam’s decision to invade Cambodia. The French built a casino on top, a post office and a church, but abandoned Bokor in late 1940s, during their Indochina War largely because of local insurrections led by the Khmer Issarak, the anti-French Khmer nationalists, and then for good in 1972, as the Khmer Rouge took control of the area. Following the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia in 1979, the Khmer Rouge entrenched themselves and held on doggedly for months. In the early 1990s Bokor was still one of the last strongholds of the Khmer Rouge and one of their artillery emplacements can still be seen, pointed as it is straight at Phú Quốc.

Kampot has become increasingly popular in recent times with expats. There are a variety of reasons for this: business opportunities, lifestyle choices, exotic location, historical setting, physical geography, tropical climate, proximity to the sea in a largely landlocked country, and the cheaper cost of living even when compared to other parts of Cambodia. Lately, there’s been another reason for this influx, the Chinese-led development of Sihanoukville into a gambling den with all its associated nefarious activities, which has pushed out many of the long-termers living there as they lost their haunts and cheap accommodation. So, they moved the hundred kilometres along the coast to Kampot bringing their lifestyle with them – sedentary and quietly alcoholic - and the entertainment they frequented there which, depending on your vintage and origin, are hostess bars to some and “girlie” bars to others.

Expats in Kampot tend to fall into different categories from what I could see. There are the retirees which in most OECD countries is 65 years plus but that’s not the case in Cambodia where a retirement visa can be had from age just 50. These tend to be men often single, but not always. There are single women retirees in Kampot and some of both genders are in relationships with other expats or with locals. In keeping with the place itself, some of these expats look rather genteel. One or two reminded me of retired university professors; bookish, smartly but casually dressed for the tropics, quietly spoken, thoughtful. Moderate drinkers or teetotal, usually solitary and happy to be so but willing to engage in informed conversation. There are others of retirement age but are engaged in business. These are usually hospitality; they run guesthouses or have restaurants. At least one is a baker their product sold on riverside fromearly each morning from the back of motorised trailer. The pastries and loaves are popular with expats, tourists and especially the locals and are usually sold out by lunchtime. There is some adventure tourism, and agri-businesses, NGO work, teaching opportunities, and health and lifestyle ventures like yoga and homeopathy.

Other expats however look to be in poor physical shape. Many smoke, and years of the habit have caught up with them; their skin leathery, teeth poor, frail limbed, and hacking persistent coughing. The characteristics of a lifetime subscription to tobacco. Some are thin and others pot-bellied. Some look to be on death’s door. There is an array of tattoos on show some of which appear military in origin while others seem randomly collected over time without theme or thought, and some ink has the look of incarceration. There are one or two of what someone referred to as the “jailbreak crew”. These are men younger than retirement age, usually in small groups or pairs often tattooed, invariably dressed in shorts and sleeveless tops, seemingly poorly educated, culturally inappropriate, sexist and chauvinistic, alcohol-focused libertines. Those in Kampot may have come “for a look” to Cambodia while on a visa run but most stay across the border in Thailand congregating in locales like Pattaya and Phuket.

Then there’s a younger crowd. Some are working in bars, some maybe teaching English, into adventure sports (rock climbing was one venture) or with NGOs. Then there’s others I’d describe as dossing about long term with nothing particular to do. Some look like hippies, others were thin, also tattooed and one or two looked stoned. A couple of blokes sitting behind me one day at the Milano restaurant sounded like they were from somewhere like Essex, finishing each sentence with “know what I mean”. Not so much a question as a statement. One or two others of the younger expats had children with them (their own as opposed to locals they’d “picked up”). Languages I heard were Spanish, Portuguese, German, French, and English. There were a fair share of backpackers and greypackers about as well. Not quite a steady stream but more than a trickle. Kampot seemingly having recovered from Covid better than say Battambang, but all of Cambodia seems not to have returned to pre-pandemic levels of activity for many businesses.

Some expats have bought tuk-tuks though I assume these are not for hire but for personal transport being bigger than a motorbike and cheaper than a car. Kampot has retained the traditional Cambodian tuk-tuk – a motorbike towing a trailer in which the passengers sit – as opposed to the imported version from India now mostly seen in Phnom Penh, which are cramped by comparison and noisy. Other transport for expats seen are bicycles (very practical), the ubiquitous step through motorbikes, and in keeping with the demographic, mobility scooters. Motorbikes and bicycles can be rented and also there are a number of quad bikes. Quad bikes are designed primarily as work vehicles used on farms so why they’re around on the streets of Kampot is unclear. Perhaps they're just the latest fad, or someone got a shipment of used vehicles for a song, who knows? Walking of course is always an option for getting about, especially in Kampot.

The other change of note is that Covid has had a huge impact on Cambodia as it has elsewhere but Cambodia has been slow to recover. Many restaurants and guesthouses didn’t survive the pandemic which, without the customers they need to thrive and with little assistance from the government during lockdowns, they were destined to struggle. While Kampot is slowly bouncing back, more so than other Cambodian towns, it’s slow going. Perhaps that’s why the new bars are welcomed. Most of the “hostess bars” (call them what you will) are gathered around the old night market near the river. The bar seen which has moved in since the redevelopment, or ruination, take your pick, of Sihanoukville, though there were other types of bars in Kampot before then it must be said, has been an obvious change. So it appears that many expats who once called “Snooky” home have moved to Kampot bringing their lifestyle and particular bars with them. Most of these don’t open until about 5pm or so and many stay empty while a few have a crowd. Some open earlier. The Firefly seems a favourite with Francophones and is full mid-afternoon.

After dark a large hideous bunker type structure opens pumping out bass-heavy music until late but attracts few customers. Another evening sound is that of hundreds of birds. They seem to congregate atop the ABA bank building but then I noticed other buildings attracted them as well and during the day too, until it was pointed out to me it’s not the birds but recordings of birds, swallows actually. The endless cycle of bird call is to attract birds which are then exploited for their saliva to make bird’s nest soup, and bird’s nest, a traditional Chinese medicine sold to supposedly enhance energy and metabolism, among other claims. Produced locally, the spirited saliva white-nest swiftlet (Aerodramus fuciphagus) can fetch over USD2,000 per kg in overseas markets.

The closing of many businesses with boarded up shopfronts and empty buildings has made Kampot ripe for developers who have bought up business and sometimes whole blocks. Across the river you can see three high rises that have been started and not finished, their concrete frames towering over the low-rise cityscape. Across on the far side of the river, away from the old town there are less historic buildings, so over there they may not be as bad a thing; if you have to have them, put them out of the way. These are not as much of an eyesore as the monstrosity near the old market opposite Entanou Bridge (the old bridge) where an entire block of historic buildings has made way for a giant development left unfinished. It’s like a giant concrete cold sore on the landscape the size of which is totally inappropriate for a place like Kampot, and is in no way keeping with the colonial architecture and flavour of the area. If you were wanting UNESCO World Heritage status for Kampot, and there’s been much talk of this over the years, you wouldn’t permit such a monstrosity in the area. The development is by Thai Boon Roong who coincidentally are a cement company and plenty of their product is on display and sadly in its unfinished state is likely to remain so. Fitting then, that when I looked the company up the advertising that popped up was for syphilis. With planning permission allowed for these monstrosities without regard to their impact, Kampot is unlikely to ever be joining the country’s existing four World Heritage sites.

Another change is that coffee franchises have moved in. Regardless of what you think of these, I usually avoid them but did venture into one, this would appear a vote of confidence in Kampot, otherwise why would they bother? Brown Coffee has moved into the former premises of the Bokor Mountain Lodge on the corner of streets 726 and 735 (the riverside road), once owned by Kiwi Eric Karatau now deceased, and have spent money renovating it. Despite the money expended on renovation (very nice) though this hasn’t improved their service (slow). The Rusty Nail, once famed for having the best barbecued pork ribs in Cambodia (their claim) has also been renovated and is now home to the rather sterile Tube Coffee. Its logo is a copy of the more famous London underground but with a yellow ring not a red one, which itself has been copied, at least in Phnom Penh, by Monin Coffee, which hasn’t even bothered to come up with colours of their own, and just use the ones from the Tube. Never wanting to miss out Starbucks has arrived occupying the former fish market, once home to a rundown nightclub called The Arctic (in the tropics!). To be fair they’ve done a good job on the renovations. The building had once featured in the Hollywood film ‘City of Ghosts’ directed by Matt Dillon playing itself, a seedy nightclub, before American coffee moved in. I didn’t see many customers there each time I walked past. The adjoining outdoor area under the trees next to the river being used by single white men for drinking cans of beer purchased one at a time from the convenience store across the street, and consumed in the midday heat. Tube and Brown seem to do fairly well. Tube is patronised by young Khmers in groups and Brown by well-to-do Khmers with young families or business types. The occasional expat can be seen glued to their laptop.

Down the coast is Kep, once just a town now also a province. Kep is small; the whole province is barely 336 km2 with a population of less than 50,000 making it the smallest province in Cambodia by both size and population. Kep only came into being as a province in 2008 when it was carved out of Kampot, the same year the government created another small province Pailin, out of Battambang. Kep town is equidistance with Kampot from Phnom Penh and twenty kilometres from Vietnam. It faces the Gulf of Thailand and the 13 islands making up the eponymous archipelago. The town the French called “Kep-sur-Mer” came into being in 1908. Kep garnered quite a name over the years. According to the faculty of architecture at the Royal University of Phnom Penh, 157 villas were built between 1953 and 1975, before being gradually abandoned from 1968 onward with the US bombings of neighbouring Vietnam and even more so after the 1970 coup that toppled Prince Sihanouk and the coming to power of the Khmer Rouge.

To get to Kep from Kampot is a drive along Route 33 heading towards Vietnam the road quite busy with local traffic. Outside Kampot they’re slowly replacing the old bridge so there’s a small detour over a bumpy unsealed section which reminded me of the old road. After that you head straight on until you get to the white horse roundabout (it’s got a big white horse in the middle) where the road splits into two. To the right as you come from Kampot will take you along the beach road on Route 33A and to the left Route 33 carries on to the border crossing with Vietnam at Hà Tiên in the Mekong Delta.

Route 33A eventually meets up with the main road again at an intersection in a sort of a loop, so it doesn’t matter which way you go. The problem is there’s no signs to tell you that; road signs in Cambodia not being the best. You tend to get one, so if you miss that there’s nothing further for miles. Where they do exist though, they are also in English which is helpful, as most foreign visitors don’t read Khmer. Wide avenues used by few vehicles passing few buildings with hardly any people, is how I’d describe the road along the beachside to Kep. After a few kilometres there’s a sign at another roundabout to the Kep crab market, a hive of activity, and the beach. Last time I was here it rained and I was sitting under the tents with all the vendors trying to stay dry. The beach extends a way but is unspectacular and the few tourists stumbling off their tour bus into the sun and heat looked a little bewhildered.

You pass the former seaside palace of Prince Sihanouk though the mansion was never completed and Sihanouk never stayed there. You can wander in there as the gate is not usually locked. The building is right on the promontory bisecting the town though hidden these days by trees. The road then takes you into seaside Kep itself rejoining the road from the roundabout near the crab market. Further along the main route before to the town itself are old mansions from the colonial era some to be found back up into the side streets. On the main road itself is the former residence of Queen Sisowath Kossomak (Prince Sihanouk’s mother and queen as the wife of King Norodom Suramarit from 1955 until his death in 1960, and then until the abolition of the monarchy in 1970) built in the 1930s and now a museum but was closed the day I was there, so I got as far as the green gates at the front.

There’s the white lady statue on the beach and further along is the Kep crab statue. At Kep Beach there are rows of recently built amenities with tiled rooves and reclining chairs for crowds that aren’t there. One or two very grand looking contemporary mansions overlook the water, opulent signs of the nouveau riche. Then you’re into Kep "City" itself, much of which is laid out on streets back away from the main road and hard to see. There are a few shops, some administrative buildings, and some hotels. Nothing very grand. I came by a barber so stopped. I was ushered in by the young woman working there and after I was seated the barber emerged, an elegant looking Khmer woman. She seemed surprised to see me and asked how I knew about her shop as most come recommended or are brought by local tuk-tuk drivers. I said no, just riding past. She knew her trade and finished by giving me the most delicate shave outside and inside my ears with a cutthroat razor I’d ever experienced. She charged me USD2.50.

I had wanted to find a house I’d seen on my last visit made of bamboo built in the middle of a rice field. It was owned by Khmers who lived in France and visited once or twice a year. They kept their car in a garage also made of bamboo which was in the next rice field. When I was last there and saw it the caretaker, who lived next door, let me in for a viewing. The house was one large room surrounded on all sides by a wide veranda. Much building has gone on since that visit and I was unable to see it again but I’m sure it was out there between the rice and the salt fields and the road somewhere, so I went on until I hit Route 33 again.

One day back in Kampot, I went to Koh Trey or “Fish Island” which I’d not explored before. The island is across the river from town and is surrounded by the Kampot River (Praek Tuek Chhu) on two sides (the river splits in two in the town) and the ocean. Most of the island is barely above sea level. At its extremes, the island is about 6kms wide and the same again long roughly in the shape of a triangle. It’s reached by Fish Island Road over the old bridge from Kampot and second on the left, and then you just keep going. The island is sparsely populated and mainly used for rice fields, salt fields, and living. It has a sizable Cham population. There are a number of boutique bungalow businesses there usually called resorts. In fact, Kampot has lots of hotels called resorts. Being fairly rural there are a lot of dogs wandering about which people often find threatening as they can be very territorial, but generally I don’t find dogs in Cambodia nearly as troublesome as those in Thailand, though I still wouldn’t want to be bitten by one. To get around the island can take about 30 minutes by motorbike. Roughly triangular there is a sort of perimeter road around most of the island. At the southern end, where there are a lot of mangrove swamps, you can see Phú Quốc the largest island in Vietnam, a mere 15kms or so away across the Gulf of Thailand. There’s also a small heart shaped island off the southern western tip of Fish Island created like the larger island, by the endless cycle of erosion and deposition from the river.

Mixed with the other farms are salt farms with their evaporation ponds. Around 4700 hectares in Kampot and Kep are given over to salt production. Salt production has a long history in the region, but the industry grew rapidly in the 1940s and 1950s. After the Khmer Rouge, a group of Kampot residents were granted 50 hectares of land by the state and given permission to start salt production as private entrepreneurs. On average Kampot produces about 140,000 tonnes of salt a year. Of that the highest quality Kampot sea salt is Kampot Flower of Salt (Fleur de sel de Kampot) harvested only in very small quantities and only in very favourable conditions with little or no wind during April and May. Because of iodine deficiency in Cambodia (you see people often older women especially with goiter, usually the first sign of iodine deficiency), the government has banned the sale of non-iodised salt. However, changing weather patterns and rising sea levels are beginning to negatively affect salt farmers and in more recent years salt harvests in Kampot have fallen dramatically.

Pepper is what Kampot is famous for. Kampot pepper (mrech Kampot in Khmer) is a cultivar of black pepper originally from the Malabar Coast of India. Kampot’s climate and the soil quartz content offers perfect growing conditions for the cultivation of pepper. Pepper has been grown in Kampot for over 700 years since the Angkorian era with knowledge of its production handed down through the generations, but intensive production began during French colonial rule. Its modern name is derived from the area where its grown but during colonialisation was known by the French term for Southeast Asia, poivre d'Indochine (mrech Indauchen) or poivre de Kampot. Today 'Kampot Pepper' has a World Trade Organization Geographical Indication, like for intellectual property (as in Champagne).

Pepper grows on leafy vines attached to poles that sit about three metres high. Processed peppercorns come in a variety of colours: black, white, pink, and red, all from the same plant. Black pepper is produced from the still-green, unripe drupe (a stone fruit) of the pepper plant. White pepper consists solely of the seed of the ripe fruit of the plant, with the thin darker-coloured skin (flesh) of the fruit removed Green pepper, like black pepper, is made from unripe drupes. Dried green peppercorns are treated in a way that retains the green colour. Red peppercorns usually consist of ripe peppercorn drupes preserved in brine and vinegar. Pepper can also come in a pink variety also but I havne't seen that in Cambodia.

My first taste of Kampot pepper was at the Rusty Nail near the old market. I had ordered prawns with fried vegetables and fresh pepper. I’d never seen unprocessed pepper before which came on a short stem with the pepper seeds. I was surprised when I discovered that you could just eat the whole thing. Though the Rusty Nail has now gone, the building renovated and now home to Tube Coffee, I miss the atmosphere and the food. The restaurant was owned and run by a Mancunian and his Khmer wife. There was a tip jar on the front counter for staff. A signed stated that the management got nothing though it noted that tipping was not mandatory in Cambodia which is interesting because almost everyone does it and I’ve always had the impression its expected. They had a golden labrador dog which customers were asked not to feed as “it’s fat enough”.

Intensive pepper production began under French rule in the 1870s. at the beginning of the 20th century Kampot produced about 8,000 tonnes of pepper. Back in the 1960s there were one million pepper poles in Kampot producing less than half that total. Pepper production was severely impacted by the country’s civil war and subsequent instability(1968-1997, depending how you measure it). By the end of the 1990s, production was down to just four tonnes a year but picked up again in the early 2000s. Today, Cambodia produces several thousand tonnes of pepper every year. Most of this actually is produced in Tboung Khmum Province, about one hundred kilometres away to the north on the border with Vietnam (which is the world’s largest pepper producer), but the most famous pepper is that which comes from Kampot. International demand for Kampot pepper has risen sharply in the last 15 years though export volumes remain relatively small. You can buy Kampot pepper locally or in Phnom Penh markets, though it pays to be wary as what some vendors claim is Kampot pepper, and charge for accordingly, is actually from elsewhere.

Kampot pepper is also used to make rum (Kampot Pepper Rum from La Plantation) and chocolate by an Ecuador’s To'ak Chocolate's Heirloom Nacional cacao bar dubbed “the world’s most expensive chocolate bar”. La Plantation is a Cambodia-based company founded in 2013 by a French-Belgian couple. As well as producing high-quality organic Kampot Pepper used for flavouring rum, they have a wide range of original spices blends being added to every year, and all processed on-premises locally exported around world to over 40 countries. They have a shop in Kampot.

Wandering the streets of Kampot I came across the Old Cinema Hotel. I’d been past this building many times on earlier trips and was pleased to see it transformed. Built in the 1930s in Art Deco style, the ochre-coloured building had blackened with humidity and neglect. One of Kampot’s four original cinemas it began life as a Chinese theatre called Maison de theatre le grandeur. During its golden years they put on live theatre performances from a grand stage and later specialised in screenings of martial arts movies (known as “Gong”, a Chinese cinema that showcased kung-fu movies). After the fall of the Khmer Rouge it was known as the Makara 7 (‘7 January’ Cinema, named after Cambodia’s Victory Over Genocide Day). In 2016 a three-year renovation project began and turned the building into an eight-room boutique hotel complete with a pool, a bar and restaurant, and a garden open to the sky. It’s brilliant. It’s owned and run by an expat couple; Pauline is French and Bas is Dutch. I wanted to have a meal there, but being a Wednesday the chef had the night off so there’s no food, so I ordered a Long Island Ice Tea. The barang woman behind the bar said she could make one, but then I noticed her looking it up on the internet. It duly arrived though rather sharper in flavour, the cocktail maker admitting she’d overlooked the coke, never mind. Just around the corner is the novel Jenga House made of a collection of old shipping containers stacked four levels high. Modern doesn’t have to be new; it can just be renovation and recycling. Here in Cambodia, most spending on “development” interprets modern as new, and they’re throwing out the old, which is a shame as they seem to be making the same mistakes as many other places. Another old Kampot cinema was the Royal Cinema – a colonial-era movie house that had been turned into a community arts space and a vintage shop called Kampothead. I compared the renovation of the Old Cinema Hotel with the plight of another classic art deco cinema in Phnom Penh on Street 19, which was for years abandoned and surrounded by a blue corrugated iron fence. Then when back on a visit I noticed that they’d demolished it, and left a hole in the ground. Pity.

There are large infrastructural changes afoot in Kampot which may have detrimental impacts on the look and feel of the place. There’s the International Tourism Port opened for a trial period of three months this month. Built at a cost of USD10 million with a loan from the Asian Development Bank, the port will allow cruise ships from Thailand and Vietnam to dock near Kampot. The port is located at the mouth of the Praek Tuek Chhu (Kampot River). I would say generally that cruise ships can be a curse not a blessing. A canal linking Kep with Phnom Penh is also promised though when remains unclear. The Funan Techo Canal, officially known as the Tonle Bassac Navigation Road and Logistics System Project is a 180km long canal to link Phnom Penh Autonomous Port with Kep and the Gulf of Thailand, bypassing the need for ships and their containers to navigate the Mekong River and Vietnamese waters, something the Vietnamese are wary of. What this means for locals is also unclear but judging by the skyscrapers on the advertising around town it would seem to introduce more changes not in keeping with the character of either Kampot or Kep.

Kampot is also getting a floral clock at a traffic roundabout. All Cambodian towns have their feature roundabouts, and in Kampot it’s the fabled Durian larger than life and in rustic red. The durian is infamous for its smell, emitting an odour so potent it’s banned from hotel rooms across Southeast Asia though I'm informed that the taste is rather refreshing. Where the clock will go, I’m not sure. There’s already a clock across the river illuminated at night, usually in purple, with digital chimes and a single loud “dong” on the hour. It sounds better than it looks. Another change since my last visit is the creation it looks like, of a beach on the river, or maybe it’s an attempt to widen the promenade, not sure. Another thing I noticed that wouldn’t have changed either is the number of houses that aren’t perpendicular to the street, instead running off at acute angles their walls built seemingly to accommodate an alleyway. So Kampot still has gird like streets in the old quarter and some crooked houses.

All up some things in town have changed and others have not. I’m pleased it’s coming back after the pandemic, that things seem optimistic and that people are spending on preserving the past not flattening it, but sadly not all. And while Kampot might have a rosy future for some things there are other things to be wary of, whether they go to plan or not.