O ne wonders if the new national park at Kirirom, reputed home to several

endangered species such as the barking deer, gaur and tiger, might be drawing

the wrong kind of crowds so soon after its official innauguration. Travelers on

Route 4 reported that the entrance to the road leading up to the park was

surrounded by hawkers stalls peddling 12 gutted deer strung up by their necks.

Phnom Penh may be in for some of Thailand's finest. Word is that Jack, a

pub owner on Soi Cowboy, has been in town and will be opening a place called the

Gazebo Restaurant which will have a bar, disco dancers and, in the back, a

"snake pit".

KR radio had this to say on June 19: "They (the DEA) talk

about preventing narcotics, but in fact they're expanding opium smuggling

because of links stretching from Phnom Penh to the provinces adjoining the Lao

border, southern Vietnam, Koh Kong and America." The female announcer added, "In

the next 10 to 20 years our Khmer people will be like opium-addicted

geckos."

Anyone who thinks the KR may be eating a few too many

opium-addicted geckos themselves, please raise your hand.

Participants at

the recently-held forum on Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos in New York City hopefully

weren't too disappointed with Ieng Mouly's presentation. He was listed as the

Director of the Cambodian Mime Action Center.

It appears a "hoaxer" in

Battambang called the ILO office and asked to speak to the director (who wasn't

there), said he knew an ILO staffer had been kidnapped and that if the ILO would

give him some money he could secure the release of the hostage. The guy who

answered the phone asked what the person's name was and got the reply "Bill

Fallon." Bill Fallon answered back: "I'm Bill Fallon." End of

hoax.

Stories are still trickling out about the UNTAC days. If anyone

knows the full story about the "Battambang B-B-Q" back in '93 with soldiers

dancing in their birthday suits and eating snakes, please pass it on to a

Gecko.

Generally, things have been quiet of late, especially with regard

to the number of items picked up that are suitable for this column. Which of

course brings to mind the oft repeated remark by Richard Brautigan, the famous

gringo sportsman and author of Trout Fishing in America, who once said: "I

always wanted to write a book that ended with the word mayonnaise."