I have mentioned them in a few of my blog posts.

The other thing about your story that people might not realize is that Phnom Penh can be a fairly dangerous place with all these types you mention involved with each other. Be safe!

JB

Besides this, I think that the most important here for me, was to explore few cases, few lives, few experiences of a big chronic problem in almost all the Southeast Asia which is, as you mention, the big mafias of prostitution… In fact I was getting information and interviews of several Ngos based in Phnom Penh like Licadhos about Human Trafficking…
I met raped girls, (even of 6, 7 years old…) they are many in the countryside, childs which have been forced to work in ships far away from the coast, and collected testimonies of young women which travelled abroad to work as domestic cleaning and end up being the house prostitute for an asian family…
The general rule was that weak laws or even corrupt staff of the government in the armee, policemen.. allow, help or just use to take part or profit to some extent.. of it… the matter is structural and big as it is linked with international nets which bring people to be forced in several ways to work (not only prostitution…) and, as you say, it is not the tourists but mostly high standing Asian people their clients.
A big drama which contrasts with the happy attitude with most of common people I met… specially in rural areas.

I give few web to get more info:
http://www.humantrafficking.org/countries/cambodia

http://www.licadho-cambodia.org/

But I am sure you already know all of this, ( I saw your good work here)… but I include this info to extent a little the text of the feature…

Cheer form here

I also think that the “trade” is much bigger than people realize at the LOCAL level. Foreign bars and tourist are seemingly blamed in main stream media for the proliferation of the trade, but local patronage is HUGE according to people I know in the transportation industry. For example, a block long modern building was built in central Cambodia which houses bars catering almost exclusively to wealthy Cambodians. The parking lot is filled with SUV’s.

This aspect of the trade is hard to portray since many of the patrons are wealthy connected local people. I am not moralizing or judging behavior in any way, just trying to maintain a balance of reality as I observe it. Your report is honest and fair in that your time was limited.

Cheers!

JB

I get confused, there, in Phnom Penh every one calls this building the White Building or just The Building…besides this, there are information in the web which repeats that this is the White Building:

http://cambodia.ka-set.info/culture-and-society/news-building-phnom-penh-urbanism-architecture-080530.html

http://carpediemilia.over-blog.com/article-20914544.html

Please, could you give me your sources and I ll change the text if I am wrong…

Anyway thanks for your interest and… by the way, for your inspiring carrier too!. Years ago I was working for the Magnum agency in Spain as editor.
king regards

Vic

You are right, in fact I think every country or culture should look for their own way, I mean, in terms of economy, culture, environment… otherway, among many things… we loose diversity, and every country end up becoming the same thing… I am now in Peru, and it is shocking how fast is this country running to be similar to the big rest… tv shows and papers in rupert murdoch’s style, urban big deals over small comunities, (related to petrol and minerals companies…) and in the meanwhile, rural areas remain forgetted and vulnerable (Loreto, Apurimac, Ayacucho…)

Anyway thanks for your interest

regards

vic