Reader Submission: Travel to Cambodia

For the travelers who absolutely want to enter Cambodia. For the normal course of events so far, I refer to my earlier travel report in February 2021, where the rule of the 2-week quarantine still applied at the time.

In the meantime it was time for me to go to Cambodia again from Belgium and luckily I had moved my planned trip from September 22 to October 22. The reason is that last week Prime Minister Hun Senh announced that he would relax immigration rules and that quarantine would be reduced from 2 weeks to 1 week. And in special cases that 3 days would be sufficient.

According to the current state of affairs, you can book a quarantine package yourself in 1 of the 4 designated luxury hotels for 2 weeks and if you don't, it will be a lottery ticket and you will be taken to a hotel by bus. That hotel can be very good or bad.

In my case during the previous trip I ended up in a new Chinese hotel Tianjin, with a beautiful large room and balcony, but with Chinese food (rice) 3 times a day.

So this time I thought of booking a hotel myself and so I learned about the new rule at the last minute and urged the 4 hotels to adjust their package prices to a stay of 3 or 7 days. Which they also did. The rule is also that the hotel must be booked a few days before departure and once booked and paid there is no refund!

According to the list in the appendix, “foreign investors” meet the conditions for a 3-day quarantine. So I booked a package for 3 days at her Raffles hotel (old colonial building).

To prove that I belong to the group “Foreign Investor” I brought along a copy of my business patent as well as an invitation letter from the company inviting me to stay in Phnom Penh.

I submit all necessary papers to the control desk: an original negative CPR test with lab result (both original documents, signed and stamped) / 2 colored printouts of my European vaccination pass, signed and stamped by the GP / a color printout of the mandatory Forte insurance/booking of the hotel/business patent and letter of invitation/my annual business visa still valid.Because I have a hotel booking I don't need to deposit 2000 usd in cash.

It's all okay and I can go through immigration (where they keep your passport), then pick up luggage and then a Covid rapid test (wait 15 minutes for result) and then I can use a luxury car that was parked on the tarmac. waiting to the hotel.

Once there, the check-in manager asks about my original CPR test/didn't I have more – held back at the airport for my file?

He then asks about my hotel booking where it should be stamped / yes, it has a day stamp on it, but it wasn't. Then the manager shows me from his smartphone my CPR certificate sent by the airport (ministry of health) with a stamp that I do have to be quarantined for 7 days !!

No redress possible and after research I have learned that business people will be quarantined for 7 days anyway / or not if they have been vaccinated 3x and have a work permit!

In the meantime I'm on day 5, ordered my food from a menu every day (tasty but served in cardboard trays) and kept myself busy with dabbling on a painting with numbers.

The lion with cub turned out better than expected, but the result of the girl with the pearls is not so good. Master Vermeer turned in his grave…!

Also note that on arrival a plane full of Chinese had arrived for us who were not in order with their papers, and that took forever!! So the 20 passengers from our plane coming from Singapore had to wait 45 minutes in a row in a warm corridor. The other 20 Chinese who were also on board with us and who sat at the back were probably led away through another corridor because I have not seen them again.

Rumors are that in the near future passengers arriving in Sianoukville will no longer have to do formalities and quarantine. Planes direct from China. The reason is that the Chinese are favored and that they come to work in Sianoukville and the surrounding area (gambling bussiness).

Submitted by Herman