Word: coasted
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...Tours when the lights cut out. "No good," said the woman behind the desk, looking into the dark street. "Every day, two or three times." We conducted the rest of our transaction by candlelight. Mourn Sokun, who owns the travel agency, says Sihanoukville, the current hub of south-coast tourism, can't keep up with the rush of tourists. The number of foreign visitors to the city shot up by 50% between 2006 and 2007, and infrastructure, including electricity generation, is overtaxed. In 2007, the local airport reopened to shuttle tourists between Angkor Wat and the coast, only to close...
...Asia that year - and foreign investment shot up some 400% to nearly $4 billion. Thirteen foreign companies, including Chevron, have licenses to explore Cambodia's offshore blocks for oil and natural gas; the government says domestic oil production could begin within three years. The rush for Cambodia's gold coast is on, raising hopes that the economic torpor of this aid-supported nation will finally end. "This part of the country has been a revelation for me," says Steve Smith, a Londoner who finances his endless summer as a dive instructor in southeast Asia. "I didn't even know there...
...license fees to operate at the popular beaches, Mourn says raw sewage is being piped into the water and trash is being dumped onto the sand. "People pay their money, and the government closes their eyes," Mourn says. Government officials say they are aware of the growing problem. "The coast is not so good now because of the fast development," says Prak Visal, who heads the Sihanoukville branch of a regional coastal-management project. Solid-waste dumping, mangrove destruction, unsustainable fishing practices and illegal logging are a few of the challenges he says the area faces. But slowing things down...
...buffalo graze in rice paddies that stretch from horizon to horizon. Kids in white school uniforms pedal their bikes in the dirt, moving alongside traffic like birds riding on air currents. It's places like these - in other words, most of Cambodia - where the five-star visions of the coast begin to get a bit blurry. Neither tourism nor oil alone can drive the national economy in a meaningful way. There must also be investment in agriculture and other sectors that employ most Cambodians, says Arjun Goswami, country director for the Asian Development Bank. "If one of these days...
...Phnom Penh, I stop by the offices of Rory and Melita Hunter, an Australian couple whose real estate company was recently granted a 99-year lease to build a luxury boutique hotel on Song Saa, a tiny pair of islands off the coast. They show me elaborate renderings of the future 40-room complex, replete with a wine cellar, air-conditioned library and 15 over-water bungalows designed to reflect the architecture of a nearby fishing village. The Hunters paid relocation costs for the 15 or so families living on the islands. They hauled away tons of trash that...