How My Street Developed

My Street: Toul Tom Pong
(Clockwise from top left, street, street, Neighbor Two, Neighbor  One, Neighbor Three)

Phnom Penh is developing.

When I arrived Halloween 2010, Phnom Penh was...a city...I guess... The vast majority of buildings averaged three or four stories. Everything worth getting to is within a five mile radius. There was only one completed "skyscraper" and two half-finished "skyscrapers." It all felt very backwater capital.

One day I woke up and noticed the cityscape from my third floor apartment balcony was different. Numerous aspiring 10 and 15 story building ascended into the muggy sky. The stalled skyscraper restarted construction, along with several other tall buildings. Everyone I know has a construction site on their street.

Including my street. I moved into my apartment February 2011. On my right, an apartment building was under construction, and at the time was three floors tall. As the months of sawing metal and banging concrete passed, the massive building tapered off at a mere six stories (the tallest on my street by far). The neighbor diagonally across the street noticed. Around August 2011, he tore down his shabby estate and decided he needed a villa (at least it looks like a villa, we're only on the third floor at the moment). This put a neighbor two doors down to shame, and in December 2011, this neighbor tore down his two floor home crammed between several similar buildings. For a window of time between January and February, all three neighbors polluted my beloved street with noise so deafening, so obnoxious, so utterly early in the morning...I considered moving.

Thankfully, neighbor-number-one's six story building is done and people moved in over the last week. Neighbor-Number-Two's villa continues, and Neighbor-Number-Three's future residence hasn't taken shape.

Development is a good thing. Hygiene, access to education, and reduced extreme poverty are unquestionably good things. But thanks to development, Phnom Penh's wooden houses, so full of character and history are torn own in favor of concrete blocks. It's the age of concrete, monstrous buildings on tiny lots, and air conditioners.