The gold-coloured convertible turns heads on impoverished Cambodia's roads not least because of creator Nhean Phaloek's claim that it can be operated telepathically.
The gold-coloured convertible turns heads on impoverished Cambodia's roads not least because of creator Nhean Phaloek's claim that it can be operated telepathically.
"I just snap my fingers and the car's door will open. Or I just think of opening the car's door, and the door opens immediately," says the 51-year-old, as he proudly shows off the homemade car, named the Angkor 333-2010.
Onlookers gasp as he demonstrates the trick, and with the fibre-glass vehicle having cost him $5,000
(Rs 2.3 lakh) and 19 months of labour he is in no mood to reveal the remote control system behind it.
Kong Pharith, a 48-year-old former maths and physics teacher who has also produced his own car, says the auto industry is about to blossom in Cambodia.
"Our works will motivate the next generation to access new inventions and show the world that Cambodia has an ability to do what you think we cannot,"u00a0 he says.
Pharith, who first came to national attention in 2005 for building a solar-powered bicycle, thinks he has now hit on a truly unique product with his orange, jeep-like vehicle with solar panels on its roof.
Pharith says it took him four months to design his "tribrid" car which operates on solar energy, electricity
and gasoline.
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