Crowds hit the road to mark Cambodia’s New Year holiday

Thousands of people crammed onto buses and cars, some clinging to roofs and spilling out of doors, as they headed out of Phnom Penh yesterday for the Buddhist New Year holiday.

The three-day holiday — also celebrated in Thailand, Myanmar and Laos — gives thousands of Cambodia’s transient workers a rare chance to spend time with family, leaving the normally busy capital unusually empty.

“This is the only chance I have to visit my parents, and I am so excited,” said 22-year-old Sun Srey Pov, who left her hometown in the east to work in a Phnom Penh garment factory.

“It is a pleasurable time, although it is hard to travel,” she said while trying to elbow some room in a 12-seat minibus, which was packed with 20 people inside and five hanging off the roof.

In Phnom Penh, elderly women dressed in traditional costume carried food to give to monks at pagodas. The younger generation pursued different traditions — spraying each other with talcum powder, playing street games and dancing to loud music.

But the practice of throwing water and talcum powder on passing motorists has been discouraged by the government.

A truck with a megaphone patrolled the streets, warning that the practice could cause traffic accidents.