PHNOM PENH -- In central Phnom Penh, at one end of a semiderelict building, is a tiny lean-to shack. Its walls are made of scavenged wood planks and its roof of corrugated iron. The ground around it is a swamp of sewage and mud due to the daily monsoon rains. To get to the shack, you have to hop along a desultory path of discarded bricks.
The one-room interior is surprisingly, and girlishly, tidy. Two wooden beds sit on either side of the small space. Clothes hang against the walls in neatly ordered lines. Makeup carefully tied into a plastic bag dangles from a nail in the wall. Underneath one of the beds is a single clue as to who the inhabitants are: a large tub of oranges.
This shack is home to three of Phnom Penh's infamous "kroukh chrorbakh," or "orange girls." Though their trade dates back to a time when innocent young women sold oranges to day-trippers in the city's once-lush parks, there is no longer anything idyllic about being an orange girl. A few decades ago, as economic times grew tough, orange girls began offering an extra service to attract customers --- with every orange, the chance to squeeze the girl's breasts for free. Today, the women wander the city's parks at night and will have sex for as little as 6,000 riel, or just under $2.
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