Dozens of Indonesians held in Cambodia betting raid

Monday, 10 September 2012
AFP (Agence France-Presse)

PHNOM PENH: Cambodian authorities on Monday said they had arrested 114 Indonesian nationals in a raid on a suspected online football gambling ring in the capital Phnom Penh.

The group of 90 men and 24 women were picked up at two residential houses in the city, according to Chhay Sinarith, of the Cambodian interior ministry.

"They were arrested for running illegal online gambling. They were involved in football betting," he told AFP.

Gambling a losing game

NagaWorld Casino in the middle of Phnom Penh

Friday, 17 August 2012
Princes Soma Norodom
The Phnom Penh Post

Gambling should not be considered a way to make money. Whether you play the slot machines, blackjack or roulette, casino games are based on random outcomes. And the house always wins – just like our government.

I can walk into a casino and gamble in Cambodia, as long as I show my US passport to the casino staff. But it’s illegal for Cambodian citizens to gamble, and those who are near a casino and are caught gambling, will be prosecuted.

The prime minister has stated that if any casinos, or the authorities monitoring them, allow Khmer citizens to enter, those casinos would be shut down and the police officials involved will be punished. That has not been the case with several casinos, however.

In 2011, Cambodian casinos generated $20 million in tax revenue, a 25 per cent increase from the previous year.

The government has supported the development of more casinos because of the tax revenue they generate. This revenue is used to help develop the Kingdom’s health and education systems.

The prime minister also said last week that building casinos along the nation’s borders would prevent Thailand and Vietnam encroaching on Cambodian territory.

Place Your Bets

Casinos are flourishing across Southeast Asia and big investors are keen to build more.

23/07/2012

By Steve Finch

Bangkok Post

POIPET: Circling Bangkok’s Lumpini Park looking for passengers, the double-decker bus operated by Cherd Chai Tour company is one of dozens that leave the centre of Thailand’s capital for the Cambodian border every morning.

Casinos are illegal in Thailand but every day hundreds of gamblers make the three-hour journey by express bus to Aranyaprathet on the Thai side of the border to gamble legally at casinos in Poipet, just across the frontier in Cambodia.

Crown Casino, like many others in Poipet, has since June 2010 reimbursed bus fares for Thais who make the trip and offers 100 baht in bonus chips for every customer that cashes in 4,000 baht.

It’s a similar scenario on the other side of Cambodia on the border with Vietnam at Bavet. In the first five months of this year, Cambodia recorded a 32% rise in land crossings by Thai and Vietnamese visitors to just under 720,000, many of them thought to be day-tripping gamblers.

In Cambodia, Gambling on the Rain

Rain clouds pile up over the clock tower of Battambang's colonial-era Art Deco market.

A group of veteran rain bettors crowds along the edge of a rice paddy in Battambang just after dawn, watching the clouds. They are likely to remain there until late afternoon.

A homemade device used by Vandara's rain gambling house to measure rainfall. When water spills up from the 60-ml test tube and into the metal dish, it is usually considered to have rained. Vandara and his wife use the receptacle to approximate the amount of rain that would soak through 13 sheets of tissue paper.

By Julia Wallace
The Atlantic

Betters deploy superstition, amateur meteorology, and networks of sources to win big on the weather

BATTAMBANG, Cambodia - There is a tribe of men here who stare at the sky. They do it patiently, devotedly, obsessively, for much of Cambodia's six-month monsoon season, standing in rice paddies or perched on rooftops, scrutinizing the shifting clouds from daybreak to sunset, waiting hours for the moment when they burst.

Although gambling on rainfall is a casual pastime in other parts of Cambodia, Battambang, a city of crumbling French colonial buildings that snake along the sleepy Sangke River, elevates the hobby to serious business. It boasts the largest and most sophisticated rain betting market in the country, complete with bookies, near-professional gamblers, and thousands of participants. As the clouds shift, networks of dedicated sky-watchers call in information from as far as Pailin, a remote frontier town on the Thai border.

The rain-betting day is divided into three segments: 6 am to noon, noon to 2 pm, and 2 pm to 6 pm. A bet, starting at $2, yields a pay-out if it rains during the chosen time period. Betting on rain during the typically dry mornings is riskier, but offers a massive payoff. But it's relatively safe to assume that it will rain before 6 pm at the height of the wet season, so winning bets on the third segment of the day bring in paltry returns.

NagaCorp Reports 73% Increase in Net Profit [-How much tax does it pay to Cambodia? Anybody know?]

Tuesday, 15 February 2011
AsiaTravelTipes.com

...the win rate [at NagaCorp.] stood at 2.3%

NagaCorp, one of the largest leisure and entertainment gaming companies in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, has reported a net profit increase of 73% for the year ending 31 December 2010.

Net profit for the fiscal year 2010 rose by 73% to approximately US$44.1 million, compared to US$25.5 million in 2009. Gross profit margin rose to 71% from 60%; while net profit margin improved to 29%, from 22% for 2009. During the period, 64% of the group’s total revenues were derived from its non-junket business, compared to 55% in 2009.

The Board has resolved to declare a final dividend of US cents 0.77 per share (or equivalent to HK cents 6.00 per share).The proposed final dividend, together with the interim dividend paid is US cents 1.48 per share (or equivalent to HK cents 11.5 per share), representing a dividend payout ratio of 70% for the year ended 31 December, 2010. The total dividends of US cents 1.48 per share for 2010 represents an increase of 103% compared to 2009 dividends of US cents 0.73. Earnings per share for the year 2010 were up 72% to US cents 2.12 (or equivalent to HK cents 16.5 per share).

Bavet casinos: One down ... more to come

All bets are off at VIP casino

Wednesday, 01 December 2010
Soeun Say
The Phnom Penh Post

I have also got unofficial reports that other casinos will declare bankruptcy soon. The situation is not better

A NOTHER casino in the border town of Bavet has closed, sparking protest from 300 dissatisfied employees, as top officials warned there were more bankruptcies to come.

Chief of Casino Management at the Ministry of Economy and Finance Chrun Theravath confirmed yesterday that he had been informed of the closure of VIP Casino in Bavet City, Svay Rieng province.

“We know the casino is bankrupt, but we will go down to check [for details],” he said.

“I have also got unofficial reports that other casinos will declare bankruptcy soon. At this time, the economic situation is not better and it has resulted in a drop in customers,” he added.

Gambling in Cambodia is restricted to holders of foreign passports.

News of the closure follows protests from employees at the site.

On Monday, more than 300 workers gathered outside VIP to complain about missed salary payments.

Yesterday, Svay Rieng provincial Police Chief Prach Rim said the situation had simmered down.

“[The company] agreed to pay salaries back to the workers.

So now, the situation is quiet,” he said.

The police chief observed that the town – where up to 14 casinos operate – had seen a drop in custom since the economic crisis.

“It is hard to operate in the casino business. They must to have enough of funds, good management and services. If not, it will [result in] bankruptcy,” he said.

VIP is not the first to close its doors. In September, Bavet’s Winn Casino closed its doors, leaving an estimated 300 workers jobless.

Prach Rim added that local authorities welcomed VIP’s closure, as it would cut down on security concerns, but said he hoped that new management would reopen the site. He added it had seen three different owners since its opening.

Kim Heang, director of Khmer Real Estate Co, also said that the casino had seen many owners and had “many shareholders”. He has been charged with selling Winn Casino, along with two more in Bavet worth between US$3 million to $15 million each.

The Post could not contact VIP Casino officials for comment yesterday.

The bankrupt casino is believed to be Vietnamese-owned.

According to the Ministry of Economy and Finance, revenue derived from Cambodia’s 27 casinos decreased between 7 to 8 percent to approximately $17.5 million in 2009, when compared to 2008 revenues.

Despite Bavet’s experience, casino owners in other parts of the country are launching new ventures.

The owners of a half-built $3.5 million Try Pheap Mittapheap casino in Ratanakkiri province opened a temporary gambling centre in order to "test the market" last week.

The operation is located along the border with Vietnam. However, media reports have suggested that as yet the venue is only operating as a cock-fighting arena in the northern province.

To see Angkor and ... gamble at Harrah's Angkor Casino? If only King Suryavarman II knew about this aberration

Big Las Vegas Developers Sought For New Cambodia Casino

July 29, 2010
Posted By April Gardner
Staff Editor, CasinoGamblingWeb.com

To build a successful casino that can compete with the top casinos in Asia, name recognition is needed. For a South Korean developer, that means going after some of the biggest gaming operators based in Las Vegas.

Intercity Group has plans of building a $400 million casino in Cambodia, and the company is looking for potential investors. Two of those investors are MGM Resorts International and Harrah's Entertainment, two gaming giants.

MGM has plenty of experience in Asia with casino properties in the biggest gaming destination in the world, Macau. Harrah's has no presence in Asia, and a casino in Cambodia would give the company a way to compete with Macau casinos.

Intercity is pinning their hopes of success on the cheaper area of Cambodia. The company's Vice-President, James Cho, believes that some gamblers will want to stay away from the big lights of the casinos in Macau and Singapore. The casino plan for Cambodia, if carried out, would make the property the biggest casino outside of Macau and Singapore.

The casino project will be massive, with three hotels, a water park, and three golf courses planned. While Cambodia may be cheaper than the other Asian areas, there will be nothing cheap about visiting the Bellus Angkor Resort & City. World class golf course developer David McLay Kidd will develop the courses.

The credit market has still not fully recovered from the global economic recession. Finding funding for the project may prove to be difficult for the Intercity Group. Currently, the company has not revealed how much of the $400 million they have already secured.

Man sentenced to life for murder over gambling loss

Franco Neftali booking photo (COURTESY ORANGE COUNTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY)

July 16, 2010
By LARRY WELBORN
THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER (California, USA)

Story Highlights

Ex-apartment manager gets 50 years to life in prison for shooting a man between the eyes after losing hundreds of dollars in a dice game.

SANTA ANA – A former Santa Ana apartment manager was sentenced to 50-years to life in prison Friday for shooting a man between the eyes after he lost hundreds of dollars in a Cambodian dice game.

Franco Edgar Neftali, 44, was convicted of first degree murder plus use of a gun in March for gunning down Son Neou, 67, on Jan. 11, 2007, in the Bishop Manor apartment complex about 15 minutes after he lost his stash in the illegal dice game.

Neou was one of the organizers of the dice game and was in charge of collecting the money, according to witnesses.

Deputy District Attorney Scott Simmons said Neftali was unhappy about losing his bets and came back with a gun and shot Neou once between the eyes out of revenge, then fled from the scene.

Witnesses testified they saw Neftali with a gun beforehand, but no one claimed they saw the actual shooting, Simmons said.

Neftali, who contends that he was not the gunman, did not comment before was sentenced by Superior Court Judge M. Marc Kelly.

Sam Son, an Iraq war veteran and the son of the victim, said he tried to forgive Neftali for murdering his father, but could not do so after seeing his demeanor in court.

He also read a victim-impact statement from his sister, who could not be present for the sentencing.

"The most heartbreaking part of losing my father was the pain my mother had to undergo losing her husband in such a tragic way," Jane Son wrote. "It opened a much deeper wound inside her than anything I could comprehend."

Contact the writer: lwelborn@ocregister.com or 714-834-3784

The dragon's gambling den

Gambling markets don’t come bigger

Macau is only the start: all Asia is coming out to play

Jul 8th 2010
The Economist

In Bavet, Cambodia, south-east of Phnom Penh, the $100m Titan King Casino opened in February this year. It joins a number of other Cambodian casinos near the country’s borders with Vietnam and Thailand.

LIKE its sister property in Las Vegas but twice as large, the Venetian Macao is built for MICE—meetings, incentives, conventions (or conferences) and exhibitions. It has 3,000 hotel suites, a 15,000-seat arena that has hosted concerts by Lady Gaga and the Police, expensive shops and restaurants and a warren of immense gaming rooms. Next door is the Plaza Macao, featuring yet more gaming, shops and spas, as well as a Four Seasons hotel and the grand residential Plaza Mansions.

Mr Adelson, the owner of the complex, rejects the traditional “hub and spokes” casino-hotel design that forces guests to pass through the gaming floor to do anything outside their hotel room, just in case they feel a sudden urge to chuck some money into a slot machine. His Plaza Macao has a separate entrance to the Mansions and Four Seasons, a long way from the gaming floor. This is for the benefit of Chinese government officials, who may not be photographed in a gambling environment.

Macau is the world’s biggest gambling market, and until 2001 it was entirely controlled by one company, Sociedade de Turismo e Diversões de Macau (STDM), headed by Stanley Ho. Mr Ho’s garish pair of casinos, the flagship Casino Lisboa and the newer Grand Lisboa, remain the most prominent gambling establishment in central Macau, but he now faces stiff competition from a pair of seasoned Las Vegas companies, Wynn Resorts and Sands China, a subsidiary of Las Vegas Sands, as well as China’s Galaxy Entertainment Group.

The contrast between Mr Ho’s flagships illustrates the way that Macau’s gambling market has evolved. Casino Lisboa is small, tightly packed, loud and smoky. Nearly all of the gaming floor is taken up by tables offering Macau’s two most popular games: baccarat—in which punters bet on the turn of a card—and sic bo, in which they bet on the value of three rolled dice. Both involve about as much skill as betting on coin flips. The Grand Lisboa, by contrast, has craps and blackjack tables, a poker room, a sports book, a number of restaurants ranging from the upmarket to an excellent noodle shop, and hundreds of slot machines. However, on a recent visit the sportsbook stood empty and unattended; a single poker table was occupied; blackjack action was scant; four employees stood around a craps table enticing passers-by to try their luck. By contrast baccarat and sic bo were going at full tilt. Old gambling habits die hard.

The competition from Messrs Adelson and Wynn ended Mr Ho’s monopoly (though his company still accounts for about one-third of the territory’s gambling market) and boosted Macau’s overall revenue. Last year the island’s 30-odd casinos generated income of around $15 billion. According to GBGC, a consultancy that specialises in the gambling industry, its overall gambling revenue in that year rose by nearly 10%, whereas North America’s fell by 7% and Europe’s by 12%. And Macau is going from strength to strength: in the first quarter of 2010 its gambling revenues were 57% up on a year earlier.

Mainlanders’ playground

The Chinese are known as passionate gamblers, and Macau is where they come to play. Steve Jacobs, the head of Sands China, reckons that four-fifths of his visitors hail from the mainland and the rest mainly from other Asian countries, notably Taiwan, South Korea, Vietnam and India. Most of the Venetian Macao’s revenue comes from wealthy guests, many of whom are on junkets organised by businesses in China that market them to visitors, plan the travel and extend credit to gamblers. The casinos provide the gaming and generally split the proceeds with the junket operators.

Chinese visiting rights, however, are tightly controlled by the government. Mainlanders need a visa to go to Macau, and the authorities are apt to change the frequency and duration of permitted visits on a whim. Last year, after a number of embarrassing stories about government officials using public funds to bet in Macau, mainlanders were limited to one visit every three months. Even so, Mr Jacobs said that visa restrictions are “one of the things I think least about”: the Chinese government is clearly happy maintaining Macau as a source of steady gambling revenue, close to but politically separate from the mainland. And with a population of over 1 billion, mainland China has enough people to keep the visitors coming despite the restrictions.

In fact, Macau draws so many punters that casinos are literally rising from the sea: the Venetian and the Plaza anchor a development known as the Cotai Strip, built on a five-kilometre piece of reclaimed land that links the two Macanese islands of Coloane and Taipa. The “Cotai” part of the new plot’s name comes from the first syllables of the two islands; the Strip part of it is clearly meant to evoke Las Vegas. Galaxy opened the Grand Waldo, the first resort there, in 2006; the Venetian and Plaza followed soon after and will be joined by two more Sands developments. There will also be new hotels from Raffles, Conrad, Hilton, Sheraton, Swissotel and St Regis.

Busting out all over

The Cotai Strip may be the most high-profile gambling development in Asia, but there are plenty of others. In the past few months Singapore has seen the opening of two large integrated resorts, Resorts World Sentosa and Marina Bay Sands, which cost about $10 billion. The Philippines Amusement and Gaming Corporation (PAGCOR) has launched a hotel-and-casino complex on a large chunk of reclaimed land in Manila Bay. According to PAGCOR, its partners in the venture—Australia’s Bloomsbury Investments, Malaysia’s Genting Group and Aruze, a Japanese company known mainly for its pachinko and slot machines—each stand ready to invest $2 billion-3 billion in the venture.

In 2008 the government of Vietnam granted Asian Coast Development, a Canadian company, the right to construct five integrated resorts on 169 hectares of beachfront land near Ho Chi Minh City. The first of them, the MGM Grand Ho Tram, is scheduled to open in 2013. In Bavet, Cambodia, south-east of Phnom Penh, the $100m Titan King Casino opened in February this year. It joins a number of other Cambodian casinos near the country’s borders with Vietnam and Thailand. In Japan the only legal forms of gambling at the moment are pachinko, the lottery and horseracing, but that could soon change. Mr Jacobs predicts that if the Japanese market were to open up, it would be five to ten times the size of Macau’s.

Yet many Asian governments, for all their eagerness to get their hands on more tax revenue, still remain ambivalent about gambling. Singapore charges its own citizens S$100 ($72) to enter its casinos but foreigners pay nothing. Only one of South Korea’s 14 casinos is open to the locals. Egyptian and North Korean casinos too will happily take foreigners’ money yet bar their own citizens. China rations mainlanders’ access to Macau. On the Chinese mainland the only legal form of gambling is a thriving lottery.

Nine Cambodians arrested for gambling on World Cup

How about this gambler of Cambodia's territorial integrity?

Tue, 15 Jun 2010
DPA

Phnom Penh - Police arrested nine people for illegal gambling on the World Cup, local media reported Tuesday.

Eight men and one woman were held for 24 hours but released Monday without charge, the Cambodia Daily newspaper reported, because the arrests had come early in the tournament.

"But if they commit illegal betting again, the court will charge them," said Kao Ratana, the deputy police chief of Preah Sihanouk province in southern Cambodia.

Kao Ratana said police had seized notebooks listing wagers of up to 30 dollars at a time.

Earlier this month, Prime Minister Hun Sen reiterated a ban on all forms of gambling that was introduced last year, and specifically warned people against betting on the football World Cup.

Residents of Phnom Penh told the newspaper they have set up online betting accounts in order to circumvent the ban.

Travel firms told to keep Vietnamese tourists away from [Cambodian] casinos

A casino in Cambodia

16/03/2010

VietNamNet Bridge – The National Administration of Tourism (VNAT) has instructed travel firms to follow the nation’s laws and regulations strictly when they send Vietnamese tourists overseas. The travel firms may not design tours that include visits to casinos.

The VNAT advisory reported in Thoi Bao Kinh Te Saigon (Saigon Economic News) is evidently prompted in part by the proliferation of casinos in nearby destinations, including a number established just over the border in Cambodia.

In the official letter to travel agencies, VNAT General Director Nguyen Van Tuan told them to avoid bringing Vietnamese tourists to unsafe places. The firms were told to report to the authority immediately as soon as troubles occur.

VNAT also ordered province and city tourism departments to examine the outbound tourism operations of travel firms.

VNAT says that some travel firms have been found to provide substandard service when taking Vietnamese tourists abroad, and there have been incidents relating to tourists’ safety.

(In February 2010, a party of 22 Vietnamese tourists met an accident on the way from Pattaya to Bangkok which killed one and injured six.)

Responding to the VNAT directive, travel firms commented that tourists who want to will still find their way to casinos, whether or not gambling stops are programmed into a tour. They always have free time in the evening to go whatever they want.

Nguyen Minh Quyen, Deputy Director of Ben Thanh Tourist, said that few travel firms include a casino visit in their tour programmes. It is the tourists who decide whether to go to a casino or not, he added.

The head of a Hanoi travel firm agreed. Despite the ban, he said, tourists will have no trouble finding a casino to gamble if they want. They can catch a taxi to one and pay all other expenses themselves, while no one can control their time.

However, Nguyen Minh Man, a senior executive at Vietravel, said that his company will work directly with foreign partners to remove casinos from tour destinations after studying the VNAT directive. Man said that Vietravel and its partners will identify alternative sites for Vietnamese tourists to visit.

Quyen of Ben Thanh Tourist said that he supports the decision by VNAT to discourage Vietnamese people from patronizing casinos during their trips abroad. “It is a kind of waste of foreign currencies,” he explained, “unreasonable when Vietnam every year has to spend billions dong to advertise Vietnam as a vacation destination.”

China last year issued a similar directive, forbidding travel agents from taking Chinese citizens to Vietnam to gamble.

Analysts here comment that the ban on leading Vietnamese tourists to casinos is just a halfway measure. They point to ads for trips to destinations like Las Vegas (US), Malaysia’s Genting Highlands and Macau on the websites of some big travel firms that include text that promises attractive nights at casinos.

For example, one ad notes the ‘chance to enter the night world of Las Vegas City’, or the ‘chance to discover the biggest casino in South East Asia’ or ‘seek good luck in casinos.’

The 24 hour casinos that have opened on the Cambodian border and in Phnom Penh and the big casinos in Malaysia and Macau have proven to be very seductive to Vietnamese tourists.

Man convicted of Cambodian-American man's murder

Man convicted of murder over gambling loss

March 9, 2010
By LARRY WELBORN
THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER (California, USA)

SANTA ANA – A former Santa Ana apartment manager was convicted of first-degree murder Tuesday for shooting a man to death after he allegedly lost hundreds of dollars in a Cambodian dice game.

Franco Edgar Neftali, 44, showed no reaction when his seven-woman, five-man jury also found that he used a gun to commit murder, a penalty enhancement that qualifies him for 50 years to life in prison at his sentencing on May 7 by Superior Court Judge M. Marc Kelly.

He was convicted of gunning down Son Neou, 67, on Jan. 11, 2007, in the Bishop Manor apartment complex about 15 minutes after he lost his stash in the illegal dice game.

Neou was one of the organizers of the dice game and was in charge of collecting the money, according to witnesses.

Deputy District Attorney Scott Simmons said Neftali was unhappy about losing his bets and came back with a gun and shot Neou once between the eyes out of revenge, and then fled from the scene.

Witnesses testified they saw Neftali with a gun beforehand, but no one claimed they saw the actual shooting, Simmons said.

Deputy Alternate Defender Heather Moorehead argued that an unidentified man showed up at the game and fired the fatal shot.

Titan King Casino To Open In Cambodia On February 26th

February 17, 2010
By Terry Goodwin
Staff Editor, CasinoGamblingWeb.com

There is no part of the world that is being left without casino gambling in the latest effort to create a global industry. The latest country to receive a new casino will be Cambodia, where the Titan King Casino will open at the end of the month.

The casino will be located in Bavet on February 26th. The casino will employee over 6,000 workers, and will be located near the border of Vietnam. It is expected to draw thousands of tourists to Cambodia.

"Most gamblers will be Vietnamese but my goal is also to attract people from other countries," said Kith Thieng, the owner of the new facility, to Reuters, "I want to promote the fact that Cambodia has enough places for entertainment."

Cambodia is just the latest of many countries that is expanding their casino industries. Singapore had their first casino open last weekend when Resorts World Sentosa was opened by the Genting Group. The Group is based out of Malaysia, and has expressed interest in buying casinos in the US.

Macau has become the biggest gambling destination in the world in a period of less than a decade. They opened up the industry from a monopoly that Stanley Ho held, and have brought some of the top developers from the US. Wynn Resorts, Las Vegas Sands, and MGM Mirage all have properties in Macau.

In the US, the casino industry is growing, but its most storied gambling destinations are struggling. Las Vegas and Atlantic City have both been hurt by increased competition and a struggling economy.

From Cambodia’s Killing Fields to $125,000 win in Las Vegas

Kimbo Ung celebrates his victory in the Heartland Poker Tour at Red Rock Resort. (Photo: Red Rock Resort)

Thursday, Jan. 28, 2010
By Robin Leach
Las Vegas Sun (Nevada, USA)

It was a long and difficult journey from “The Killing Fields” of Cambodia for refugee Kimbo Ung, who has now settled in Las Vegas and become a full-time poker player. Kimbo recently defeated World Series of Poker bracelet winners and a Hollywood actor in the Heartland Poker Tour at Red Rock Casino to win the $125,000 pot.

Antonio “The Magician” Esfandiari was there. Layne Flack was there. Lou Diamond Phillips and yours truly were there when 300 players from the Midwest invaded Las Vegas for the celebrity event. But the biggest star was a 42-year-old unknown who spent the past three years on the bubble.

Kimbo, the winner of $125,901, nearly busted out multiple times. He sat at the Final Table as the short stack, and at one point had 80,000 chips when his opponents had millions. But Kimbo is no stranger to starting over, having spent a lifetime overcoming horrifying and unbelievable odds as The Comeback Kid.

Kimbo relates his childhood to the Oscar-winning film The Killing Fields. He explained: “The movie didn’t even do justice to the horror we faced before we reached the United States as refugees.”

One of seven children, he learned English and graduated from high school on the East Coast. Without a college degree, Kimbo worked as a graphic designer in New York City. The daily grind of 14-hour days and traveling by train from Connecticut became too much, so he and his wife, Sokhim, moved to Texas to start over.

Kimbo and Sokhim, also from Cambodia, invested in the dream of owning their own business. Two years after opening a seafood restaurant, the couple realized the hard truths of the service industry and decided, having run out of money, to start over yet again. They packed their belongings in their truck and made the trek to Las Vegas.

During their drive three years ago, they had to stop to fill jugs of water for their overheating truck. Pulling up at Palace Station, the truck died for good. Kimbo and Sokhim started over a third time just as the economic recession began.

Unable to find a job, Kimbo made a living playing poker. “I never considered myself a pro, but I supported myself through poker,” he said. After 18 months of bad beats and missing the money, Kimbo gave up tournaments and played only two to five no-limit games.

On a day off from her job at a Strip casino, Sokhim and her husband were at the movies at Red Rock when she noticed a qualifier round of the Heartland Poker Tour about to start. She urged Kimbo to invest $250 of their last savings in the qualifier. Sokhim had no way of getting home 20 miles away while Kimbo played, and he didn’t want her hovering over the table. So she watched three more movies while he looked for the winning hands.

Kimbo played the qualifier and won his way into the sellout Main Event, returning to battle accomplished poker players such as Theo Tran, Mary Jo Belcore-Zogman and David Singer. Low on chips throughout, a turning point came when he beat Theo. “I reminded myself to never give up,” said Kimbo, who made it to the Final Table.

Heartland Poker Tour producers weren’t surprised when they learned of Kimbo’s honesty shortly after the set was dismantled and shipped back to the Midwest.

“Our players are good people,” HPT President Todd Anderson said. “If a stereotype exists of today’s poker players, Kimbo seems to fit it at first glance. With dark glasses and an Ed Hardy hoodie, he appears emotionless, focused, confident and aggressive.

“At one point he was dangerously low on chips and had to ask another player to make change. Kimbo was given too much and really needed the chips, but said he’d never feel good about stealing from an older man. So he returned the overpay chips, and his luck turned, and he went on to win.”

After the shock of his win started to wear off, Kimbo revealed that he doesn’t normally wear glasses or conceal his face when he plays.

“I didn’t want to embarrass myself by becoming the first player to cry at the Final Table,” he said, crying as he hugged his wife, becoming the first champion of the televised Heartland Poker Tour’s Season 6.

Dom Joly: Cambodia in grip of grim games

Cambodia's penchant for violence extends to their sports (GETTY IMAGES)

Weird World of Sport: Cock-fighting is weird. Why have cocks been chosen as opposed to ducks or swans?

Monday, 27 April 2009
Dom Joly
The Independent (UK)

I am in Cambodia doing "research" for a book I'm writing about my passion for travel to dodgy places. I'm visiting "The Killing Fields" tomorrow and today, I'm bizarrely off to see a man who is selling Pol Pot's shoes and loo. I've had my fill of dark depressing subjects in the last week or so and I decided to have a little look at the world of Cambodian sport.

The truth is it's a pretty minimalist area. They do play football here but they are spectacularly bad - so bad that most people support foreign teams. Their national football team was supposed to go to the Beijing Olympics but, according to rumours, the powers that be used the tickets to send their families there on a jolly.

The only real sport of any consequence here is kick-boxing. I know this sport as Thai kick-boxing but call it that here only if you want to lose your teeth. Here it's Cambodian kic-boxing, but it is exactly the same. Bouts are shown regularly on TV and the gambling is intense.

It's weird that in a country that has seen so much terrible violence in the last 50 years something violent like kick-boxing would be of such mass appeal. Violence, however, seems to be something that goes deep into the national psyche. The legendary French explorer of Indochina, Henri Mouhot wrote: "Cambodians appear only to have known how to destroy, never to reconstruct." He was obviously referring to their military history but it seems to apply to their sports as well.

While I was visiting one of the extraordinary temples that dot the countryside around the town of Siem Reap, I came across some amazing bas-reliefs on one temple called The Bayon. These bas-reliefs showed in some detail what Khmers, some 800 years ago, got up to for fun. Among others there was wrestling, hunting and elephant- and cock-fighting.

Wrestling, despite it's innate campness (something I've already written about having seen Greco-Roman wrestling at the Olympics and then received much hate mail from big strong wrestlers so we won't go there again) is a fairly standard historical practice and you see it in all parts of the world on ancient illustrations. There's no beating about the jungle, it seems that a lot of men, when given the opportunity, love to strip naked and roll around on the floor scrapping – and fair play to them.

It's a moot point as to whether hunting is nowadays seen as a sport but way back then, it most definitely was. Elephant-fighting is understandable but cock-fighting, however, is a weird one. Why have cocks been chosen to fight through history as opposed to, for instance, ducks or geese or swans? It's always the poor cockerels who get blades attached to their legs and have to step into the ring. Rather embarrassingly I speak about this from some experience as, very unwillingly, I attended a cock-fight in Mexico once, where it is legal. It was while I was filming Happy Hour and the director thought it would add local "colour".

It was a deeply depressing experience. We entered through these doors that looked like they were to a dungeon and came out in a fully seated "cock-pit" complete with commentator on the PA and barely dressed conchitas serving Coronas. Hundreds of Mexican men (it was all men) were off their seats and throwing money about at a table where, what I took to be the bookies, were seated. Then a fight would start and two cocks would be brought in and rubbed up against each other while being held by their "trainers". They were then let loose and would fight rather pathetically on the dusty floor until one would go down and the winning cock would jump on him.

All the time the commentator was keeping a really monotone description going that I couldn't understand but probably went something like "And cock number one has jumped on cock number two, now cock number two has jumped on cock number one, now, great excitement as cock number one has jumped back on cock number two ... holy Pedro, is this a cock jumping and a half...."

It was depressing and left me feeling a little hollow. We didn't stay long. I've just been offered the opportunity to try another great Cambodian sport: blowing up a cow with an RPG. I gave this offer a miss but there are plenty of takers in the backpacking hostels around town.

CamboSix gone, when will Naga and other casinos go next?

One gone: CamboSix outlet in Phnom Penh
Who's next: Naga casino?

Sole football-gambling agency of Cambodia closes operation countrywide

February 26, 2009
Source: Xinhua

Cambosix, the sole football-gambling agency of Cambodia, had closed all its outlets on Wednesday in accordance with an order issued by Prime Minister Hun Sen on Tuesday, national media said on Thursday.

"The police are forcing us to close," Nancy Chau, manager of the Cambosix's head office in Phnom Penh, was quoted by English-language newspaper the Phnom Penh Post as saying.

Minister of Economy and Finance said that the government would sign a license termination agreement with the company, which would stipulate that it would not receive any compensation.

The betting chain had 20 outlets across the country and its current operation license was due to expire in 2011.

On Tuesday, the premier gave the order to close Cambosix during a student graduation ceremony of a university in Phnom Penh, citing that the government didn't get much tax incomes from Cambosix, but instead its operation caused the country social disorder, domestic violence, family divorce and robbery.

Cambosix, the only legitimate bookmaker in Cambodia, won the license from the government for the first time in 2001 and managed to renew it in Feb. 2007.

Hun Sen declares war on gambling: Cambo-Six may be gone soon … but only time will tell?

24 Feb 2009
By Ky Soklim
Cambodge Soir Hebdo
Translated from French by Luc Sâr
Click here to read the article in French

On Tuesday 24 Feb, during a ceremony to distribute diplomas, PM Hun Sen asked Keat Chhon, the minister of Economy and Finance, to review the contract linking Cambo-Six (sport betting company) to the Cambodian state.

“The minister of Economy must negotiate with Cambo-Six. If possible, let’s shut it down now, but we must first look into the contract,” Hun Sen bluntly said.

For several years now, gambling and betting parlors are growing like mushrooms in Phnom Penh: lottery, slot machines, casinos, sport betting, etc… Everybody gamble, from all social classes and this situation alarms civil society representatives.

Children are spending more on games than on their study, husbands would abandon their wives so that they can go bet on soccer matches, some youths would even commit theft so they can go to casinos! This is a golden moment for the opposition which, on several occasions, asked the government to prohibit gambling … but it fell on deaf ears.

Nevertheless, Hun Sen reacted today. “Cambo-Six mission must come to term. I don’t want to have a headache with gambling,” Hun Sen said while promising to buy back equipments from concession companies. “I think that the president of Cambo-Six understands the situation…” Hun Sen claimed.

Hun Sen is not only attacking Cambo-Six but, he also sent his message to all slot machine operators. Rong Chhun, President of the Cambodia Independent Teachers’ Association (CITA) is rejoicing by the announce made by Hun Sen, but he would still wait to see the outcome of this ban.

In fact, a secretary of state from the ministry of Economy and Finance, indicated that gambling brought in $20 million to the state coffer in 2008.

CAMBODIA: Gambling fuels poverty

Many men have lost their sources of livelihood to gambling (Photo: David Swanson/IRIN)

Bustling with casinos, Poi Pet attracts a large number of visitors from Thailand, as well as locals. For some games, casinos require low wagers at US$0.25 or less to attract poorer, more vulnerable gamblers (Photo: Geoffrey Cain/IRIN)

POI PET, 2 September 2008 (IRIN) - In a dimly lit room in a frontier town along the Thai-Cambodian border, a man slaps down a card on the table, having bet all his daily earnings as a motorbike taxi driver.

He loses the US$4 he earned that day. To quell his anger, he sniffs a bowl of glue - a daily habit to boost his stamina to work through the oppressive heat.

"How am I going to pay off the police tomorrow?!" he exclaims in a flurry of curses, referring to the daily cuts demanded by the border officers.

Gambling addiction poses a huge problem in Southeast Asia's second-poorest nation, and those afflicted can rarely find help. In a country where 33 percent of the population live on 50 cents a day, according to Cambodian government statistics, gambling is only worsening the poverty cycle.

However, the Ministry of Interior, whose mandate includes overseeing Cambodia's largely unregulated gaming industry, does not even recognise gambling addiction as a problem.

"It [gambling addiction and gambling-related crime] doesn't happen here," said one police commander at the Ministry of Interior in Poi Pet, who refused to give his name. "Maybe in countries around Cambodia, but definitely not here." Poi Pet is a small town along the Cambodian-Thai border known for its casinos.

"If people want to gamble legally, it's their choice," he said. But there are no counselling or mental-health services for gambling addicts in the town.

Poi Pet is home to a special border zone between Thailand and Cambodia with regulated gaming, popular among Thai gamblers, as casinos are outlawed and gambling tightly regulated in Thailand.

The Cambodian government has outlawed informal gambling in Poi Pet. But gamblers claim the police abuse the law, demanding exorbitant bribes when caught.

Savuth, 27, who did not want his surname revealed, said Poi Pet police demanded up to two-thirds of illicit gambling earnings when caught.

That added heavily to the weekly "corruption tax" as he put it, which involves paying another cut to the police just to avoid harassment.

Rock bottom

A thief-turned-casino employee, Savuth claims he was once drawn by the glamour and potential of big gambling years ago in Phnom Penh and lost everything. One night, he promised himself he would play only three times at the city's Naga Casino, but bet $1,500 and his motorbike – crucial to his career as a taxi driver.

As a result, he became a thief in the capital, and developed an addiction to hard drugs. He kept gambling to sustain his addiction and soon lost his house.

His commune intervened, donating $50 a month to his personal expenses until he found a new job. Instead, he gambled it away.

"I went crazy at that point. I couldn't find help anywhere, because everyone was so angry at me," he told IRIN. "And I was homeless."

With his family and friends having abandoned him, Savuth shaved his head - signifying a promise for purification – and succeeded in beating his gambling habit but not drugs. He migrated to the border where, ironically, he found work at a casino.

With a lack of services for gambling addicts, such stories are common. "I've known some people who lose everything, can't repay their debts, and are hunted down by criminals and killed," he said. "Sometimes their children must repay the debts."

Gambling on the weather

Illicit gambling is so pervasive in Cambodia that residents in Battambang and Phnom Penh bet daily on the rain, with wagers topping $1,000.

Such gambling is considered a higher-end sport in Cambodia, according to recovering addict So Sopheap. "It's an activity of richer people," he said. "But it's also an activity where the rich lose everything."

It has spawned underground mafia-style networks. Participants can bet on the minute and hour rain will occur, as well as how much.

"The networks really get you hooked by promising a lot of money," he said. "But the fact is, you can't win this game unless you know weather patterns from observing rain for years."

Sopheap lost his house, property and car. His children had to find better jobs just to support his addiction, but he did not stop until he developed a serious drug addiction and his family intervened.

Vietnamese gamble on Cambodian town Border town casinos show gap between Vietnam's rich and poor since economic reforms

Feb. 2, 2008
Makoto Ota
Yomiuri Shimbun Correspondent (Japan)

The crowds of Vietnamese trying their luck at the casinos that have sprung up in the southeastern border town of Bavet are a tangible example of the widening social divisions in their home country.

While some of the people crossing the border for the casinos in Cambodia (gambling is illegal in Vietnam) are betting millions of dollars, others stay there for the free food-- a mixture of haves and have-nots that has become more evident since Vietnam introduced its "doi moi" policies of economic liberalization in the 1980s.

Seven years ago, Bavet, an hour by car from Ho Chi Minh City, was surrounded by rice paddies. But it now has seven casinos, and is illuminated round-the-clock by neon lights.

A man from Ho Chi Minh City, identifying himself as Quon, was playing baccarat at a table lit by chandeliers.

"I never keep track of how much I bet," he said as he placed another 500 dollars bet after having just lost 500 dollars. "Probably several thousand dollars a day," the 45-year-old Quon said.

More than 90 percent of the 7,000 visitors the casinos receive each day are Vietnamese. Food and drink is free, while complimentary accommodation is available next door for those placing a certain amount in bets.

The average monthly income in Vietnam is about 150 dollars, though some of the guests clearly earn far more than this. The 32-year-old Vietnamese assistant manager of the Le Macau casino, the oldest casino in the area, said: "Betting tens of thousands of dollars is nothing special here. I know one customer who spent 2 million dollars."

The casinos have benefited from the money flowing out of Ho Chi Minh City.

"I made a fortune thanks to my connections with the [Vietnamese] government," one patron said. "I bought some real estate after obtaining some useful information and sold it on. With the surging property market, I knew I'd make money."

As there is no private land ownership in Vietnam, trade in land-use rights is roaring, creating a housing bubble in the country.

The assessed value of the land per square meter in front of the Ben Thanh Market, in the center of Ho Chi Minh City, was 200,000 dollars, or 21.7 million yen, in 2006--more than the 19 million yen the same-sized piece of land would cost in Tokyo's ritzy Ginza 2-chome.

But while some Vietnamese have benefited from the emerging market economy, many have been left behind, and have even abandoned their hometowns altogether for Bavet.

A 50-year-old man identifying himself as Tieng came to Bavet with his wife from the southern province of Tay Ninh in Vietnam eight months ago. Tieng said that back home he worked irregularly as a day-laborer, earning about 37 dollars in a good month.

But he said that he now earns enough to make a reasonable living through gambling, having three meals a day at the casinos and sleeping on a sofa.

"I can earn 10 dollars a day," Tieng said. "Everything I earn is profit, because we don't need to pay for food."

Tieng said about 20 Vietnamese have left their hometown because of poverty and settled in the casinos, adding the number of "settlers" has been growing as rumors of easy money spread.

Income disparities in Vietnam have been widening steadily under the doi moi policy. According to statistics from the United Nations, 29.9 percent of the gross national income is held by rich people, who account for just 10 percent of the population.

The figure is comparable to that in China, a country facing its own problems with inequality, where about 33 percent of the country's wealth is held by the rich.

For Thai people: Lady Luck comes either in a lottery ticket, or a journey to a Casino at the Cambodian border

You Can Win 2 Million Thai Bath

Tuesday, January 15, 2008
SooNews Staff for SooNews.ca (Canada)

Bangkok, Thailand

He stands on the temple grounds, waiting for his next customers who at the time seem occupied in prayer. Could their prayers be answered with a vision of the luckiest lotto numbers yet?

Being the only form of gambling that is legal in Thailand, "The Lottery" is a very serious sport. That's right, no midnight runs to the casino here. The nearest casino is across the border into Cambodia where casinos are legal. For the Thais who are not willing to travel that far, the paper ticket lottery is the real deal. The numbers are drawn live on national T.V. twice a month.

Tickets are bought from street vendors (agents), which receive the tickets from authorized distributors. These agents often setup tables in a large group in high traffic locations. Other independent vendors set up kiosks in small street markets or often walk the streets with a fold-up display case. Some of these vendors (photo) are visually impaired or may have other disabilities and earn a small income from ticket sales.

A winner goes to the Government Lottery Office to claim a prize. However, because it can be a lengthy wait, many winners pay a small percent to an agent who will endure long hours in the hot sun. There is a tax to be paid by the winners, which amounts to less than 1% of the total prize.

One number is drawn for the top prize of 2,000,000 baht ($69,500 CAD), 5 numbers for 2nd, 10 for 3rd, 50 for 4th, and 100 numbers for fifth prize at 10,000 baht ($350 CAD). A ticket costs 40 baht (approx. $2.50 CAD). One million tickets are printed for each number, which means a million tickets are winners of 2 million baht. There is no splitting of the prize here. Each ticket wins the prize.

In Thailand, a country where it costs about $3 CAD for a half hour taxi ride and less than $2 CAD for a meal in a local eatery, the top prize doesn’t seem all that small.

James Mancuso, a local art instructor in Sault Ste. Marie and operator of SaultSeller.com continues his visit to Thailand.