Car Accident in Cambodia

One day into Cambodia and we ended up in an ambulance. No life long injuries or anything, just a 3 inch gash on my head and a hopefully once-in-a-lifetime experience. Definitely the scariest moment of our lives, here's the story:

We arrived late Siem Reap, Cambodia and went to bed early. We planned to get up before sunrise and hire a taxi to take us to Angkor Wat, one of the seven wonders of the world just a few kilometers north of the city. So we did exactly that, got up at 4:30am and were on the road to Angkor Wat by 5 in the pitch black.

Taxis in Cambodia are not cars like back home. They're not even called taxis, they're called tuk-tuks. Passengers of Cambodian tuk-tuks sit in seats on a small trailer that is pulled by a motorbike. The trailer has no surrounding walls or windshield or anything, but has a closed roof with metal bars that stretch across the top. See for yourself in the photos.

As our tuk-tuk driver went over a speedbump, the trailer dislodged and nose-dive crashed into the pavement. Chris was shot out headfirst through the front out onto the pavement upon which his head, arms and hip took the impact. I was shot headfirst into a metal beam across the roof that had plunged down in front of me in the crash. I was dazed and shocked after my head hit but lucky it didn't knock me unconscious. I was still in the tuk-tuk after the crash and I could see my brother still half in the trailer. For the moment, I wasn't sure if he was being crushed by the tuk-tuk at the waist or if he had any serious head or upper body injuries. I couldn't see above his waist from where I was, I didn't know if he was conscious. Scariest moment of my life #1.

I quickly climbed out of the tuk-tuk and by the time I was out he had crawled out too. He said he thought he was ok. I knew it was a good sign that we were both conscious, but we still weren't sure if we had any serious injuries or not. Adrenaline was high and we were pretty stunned so we had to check ourselves for major injuries on the side of the road. Feeling the pain in my head, I put my hand up there and felt the wetness in my hair, but it was still so dark that I couldn't tell if that wetness, now on my hand, was blood or not. It wasn't until I felt the warmth of the blood falling down my face that I realized there was a potentially serious injury on my head. The rate at which blood fell onto my hands was alarming and I knew I needed a hospital quickly. Scariest moment of my life #2.

The street we were on was not in the city, there were no buildings around. But lucky for us, there was a tiny tourist police kiosk thing in a dirt field across the street. About half a dozen officers rushed us across the street and sat us down on little plastic chairs in the dirt field. They shone flashlights in my face to look at the wound. At this point everyone could see it but me and none of them spoke english. I felt really helpless, I had to just watch their panic and hope for the best. Several hands were wiping my head and face with alcohol swabs, some to clean the blood out of my face and eyes while others put pressure on the gash.

Chris was hurt too, definitely hit his head hard, but he was lucky to have more minor injuries distributed along his body. I drew the short straw, having the entire impact of the crash in one spot (not a scratch elswhere!). He managed to get a look at my head gash and assured me that it would definitely need to be stitched right away, but that it should be fine.

Just when I thought the situation was improving, suddenly Chris's legs shot forward and his head went back. He lost consciousness out of nowhere and I could see the leg of his little plastic chair starting to buckle. I hurried out of my chair to grab him under the shoulders from behind while some of the officers, also realizing that Chris was about to hit the dirt, helped guide his body off the chair to the ground. This part was terrifying. Despite being unconscious, his eyes were wider than normal and he had a frighteningly blank stare that you could tell was actually looking at nothing. He was having a seizure. It wasn't a violent seizure, but it was nonetheless terrifying. I gently held his head straight while the officers were trying to wake him up. Scariest moment of my life #3. After about 10-15 seconds he snapped out of it. He got up and felt ok, relatively speaking. A couple of the officers stuck with Chris, some sat me back down and re-cleaned fresh blood off my face, and others called an ambulance.

An ambulance came after about 20 minutes. When I saw it roll up, my first thought (after relief) was that it looked like the scooby doo van, but covered in solid light green rather than hippie flowers. When I got into the ambulance shaggy and scoob were nowehere to be found, confirming that I was not in a cartoon. They had me climb into the back and lay on the stretcher by myself and no one checked for head and neck injuries! I might as well have got picked up in some soccer mom's fat honda with her back seats folded down. The Sunny D would have been refreshing too. But I should give them more credit, they brought me to a doctor after all. Still, I've learned first hand that emergency standards in 3rd world Cambodia are very different than back home. Cars don't all rush out of the way either, and the stretcher didn't have straps or seat belts of any kind. If that thing crashed I'd have been doubly-eff'd. But Chris put it well, lightning doesn't strike the same place twice.

They didn't take me to the international hospital though, they took me to a small emergency care clinic. It looked a bit sketchy to me at first, but it was well equipped. The doctor had local anesthetic (thank god) and sterilized, packaged equipment. I climbed on the operating table and from there could only guess at what they were doing up there. They couldn't speak any english beyond hello and thank you, and my Cambodian was no better. But I knew what was going on when he pulled out scissors and cut my hair to the scalp. For those of you who urged me to shave my head before this trip, you've got your wish. They froze it, stitched it and wrapped it. Good thing I bought that travel health insurance. Worth it! To the right is a picture of me in the clinic afterwards pretending to look comfortable.

Chris and I felt surprisingly good afterwards, just minor headaches for a day or two. No big concussions or anything. We consulted doctors back home too and all is well. I still have to wear a bandage around my head to prevent the cut from getting infected. I guess the thin metal bar scalped me a bit, you can imagine from the shape of the cut in the picture. Made for a definite scar, but at least its in the shape of a smile! This also unfortunately continues my annual head injury streak though. Fingers crossed this was the climax.


Our tuk-tuk driver was so upset at what he had done, so he invited us for dinner. It was really cool to meet his family and learn about their struggles. We learned about the plight of poor Cambodians and about the impact that their country's recent genocide had on him and his family. But that's a whole new post. I'll leave that for another time.