Finding my way out of the labyrinthine Psar Thmei market is tough. Just when I think there can only possibly be one stall stacked high with marinated tarantulas, another appears. The scorching December sunshine turns the low, tarpaulin ceiling a radiant white but offers no clues as to which way to turn. My inner compass melts in the heat and I'm stranded in a claustrophobic world of fake jewellery, fake watches and all-too-real arachnids.
Getting lost in Phnom Penh's sweaty, bustling markets is easy; keeping one's wallet closed is more difficult. Emerging from the darkness, I am approached by one of the scores of roaming vendors selling an identical selection of cheap books.
'Hey, mister, where you from? Do you wanna buy a book? Very cheap for you, mister. Hey, mister.'
The speaker is an eight-year-old girl wearing tatty blue pyjamas and carrying her crippling load in a broken basket. The reading list, if anything, looks even more dismal. Guide books aside, they all relate in some way to the horrors of Pol Pot's murderous regime, under which approximately two million citizens died, from 1975 to 1979. Bad news clearly sells. The girl, however, is all smiles.
'Hey, mister, do you have a girlfriend?' she says with a grin. In a country ravaged by internal strife and foreign exploitation, an eight-year-old in blue pyjamas appears to be flirting with me in order to make a $20 sale.
The Kingdom of Cambodia has a history of disturbing the western mind in such ways. Inspired by - and often personally involved in - the colonial occupation, wars and years of genocide, a raft of writers and filmmakers have portrayed Cambodia as a baffling, beguiling land where normal rules simply don't apply. It's been presented as a hedonistic playground, a giant madhouse, a secret hideaway and, in the darkest years at least, hell on Earth.
Of course, not everyone has the stomach to spend their annual leave journeying to the fringes of lunacy, and the first piece of good news is that sanity has been partially restored to the troubled country. Modern hotel facilities, eloquent tour guides, improved security and efficient transport links have created a thriving tourist axis, comprising the capital, Phnom Penh, the beaches of Sihanoukville and the city of Siem Reap, gateway to the temples of Angkor.