The Sad Side of Phnom Penh

Cambodia is on the rise, picking itself up and with world interest in Angkor Wat, Siem Reap seems to be much seedier in this process then the capital. Phnom Penh has the gruesome sites to offer, the Killing Fields of Choeung Ek and the notorious S-21 prison. Both of these moving monuments to the Cambodians slaughtered under the Khmer Rouge rule are worth seeing.

The Choeung Ek Killing Fields are located about 15km outside of the capital and were associated with the S-21 prison. In the center of the field stands a white temple dedicated to the 17,000 men, women and children who were executed on these grounds with over 8000 skulls on display. The skulls are stacked in age groups and by gender. Quite a few had obvious bullet wounds, machete marks or just signs of blunt trauma showing the brutal way these people were executed. All the people found in over 100 mass graves here were murdered between 1975 and 1978, not a very long time for so many atrocities. Not all he graves have been unearthed, I think the point has been made with what was found and the rest will be left in peace. The mass graves were somewhat organized in gruesome ways, decapitated bodies in one, children in another most with clothing stripped but as you walk around the grounds clothing is still coming to the surface along with other human remains. There are so many bones in this area and the country is still so poor that the remains are merely stacked on a little shrine, it is the best they can do. One of the larger trees was used to to beat woman with children because the loud speakers were placed int he tree and it muffled the crying of the children. It is just such a confusing place to walk around, there is no way to understand why these people would turn on their own in such a unforgivable way. The memorial is a somber place as we wander around and the mounds of dirt and the shallow graves surround you, everywhere you look.

We then headed back into town and the tuk tuk ride was helpful in digesting at least some of what we saw. This time we were heading off to the notorious S-21 prison, where prisoners were sent to wait to be taken out to Choeung Ek. The Tuol Sleng Museum started out as a high school and later had two additional buildings added for a primary school. But after the Khmer Rouge drove everyone out of the city the school was no longer of use and it was converted into Security Prison 21, known as S-21.

The museum today is set up to show the deplorable conditions the inmates suffered, small rooms held shackled prisoners with 20-30 people attached to the same 6 meter long bar. The guards at the prison were made up of children recruited by the KR. It was reported that the children were some of the cruelest and least forgiving in the KR army. The KR claimed to have a medical service but this too was run by children who had no medical knowledge. The people were kept for months in the prison before being sent off to the killing fields and most often whole families would be locked up, with the exception of small children and babies. The guards did not like the crying of small children and babies so most were ripped from their mother's arms and brutally smashed against the walls until dead.

Over the few years that the KR regime was in power and operating this prison it is thought that 17,000 people were incarcerated in S-21. Out of all of them, and most historians believe this number to be on the conservative side, there were only 12 survivors! The mug shots of so many people are on display of all social, economic and ethnic backgrounds. If you happened to be in Phnom Penh in 1975 regardless of who you were or where you were from you most likely ended up there. One of the saddest parts was the high security, there was no where for these people to go even if they did escape seen as the whole country was swarming with spies people couldn't help others. All the floors above the ground level had fine wire mesh so that people could not commit suicide and would have to wait for the KR to decide when they would die.

There are so many other things we saw and read in this place but it is just all too much to write about. The prison was horrible, beyond imagination, even the things we saw we couldn't understand. But it is an important step for the country and they are moving on, amazing as it might seem. In one of the guide books it stated that Cambodia has a booming birth rate and even factoring in the increase in birth 1 in 3 Cambodian people are still directly affected by Pol Pot's regime. Over 200,000 people were killed in a country that only had a population of 800,000 at the time. The people go about their jobs and every now and then you would hear something, as our waitress mentioned how hard it was to find food under Pol Pot one day when we were chatting after lunch and another time our waitress was chatting she said her Uncle had moved to the US but she thinks he is dead now because he doesn't write and neither do his kids. Such a weird comment for me to hear. If one of you don't write for a long while, or vice verse, death is not what I think of first. I think my friends/family are busy and we'll catch up later. Such a different way of thinking for someone who lives in a country where so many people just stopped hearing from people and they did end up being dead.

So this was the Sad Side of Phnom Penh. Please still visit Cambodia it was an amazing place! The markets, the fried bugs, the BBQ tarantulas, the other animals we couldn't even recognize the sights and smells were truly Cambodian and all together so beautiful.

Cambodia

How such a place can hold such beautiful and devastating histories is hard to fully grasp, but it has long been a spot on the map I have wanted to visit, and Yancy was a good sport to agree to return.

Again trying to be frugal we waited till out month long visa was about to expire and found the cheapest flight from Bangkok to Cambodia. It ended up in our favor seen as Siem Reap was much more expensive we had the chance to visit Phnom Penh as well. Another travel tip, Air Asia, is the low cost Thai carrier and they fly all over. They have the same open seats as Ryan Air so sit close to the door at the gate and you get an early pick of seat and you can save a lot of money flying around Asia.

Phnom Penh is a large city, larger than it feels. I think this is because big cities normally have tall buildings, this one doesn't, there are many short buildings most 2-3-4 stories. There are a few taller but they are the anomaly. The tourist section is focused on the bank of the Tongle Sap river, also in this area are most of the temples, palaces and other sights of interest.

The city is home to the Royal Palace very close in style to that of Thai palaces this one, however, is still used as the royal residence of King Sihamoni. Being an actual home it is only partially opened to show off it's gorgeous gardens...make sure to check opening times if you want to visit. Our views were only from the outside as it closes for siesta.

The major roundabout in the city circles the Independence Monument. This originally was the monument dedicated to Cambodia's Independence from France but has since become a memorial to those who have died under Pol Pot and those referred to as Cambodia's war dead. Under the gate was a large memorial similar to the eternal flame monuments found around the world.

The temple area to be seen in Phenom Penh is the Wat Phnom, located on a hill in the middle of the city. Legend has it that the Wat was built in the 1300's to house four Buddha statues. The four statues were brought to the city by the river and washed up on the shore. The statues were dscovered by a woman named Pehn, and that is how the city got its name. Phnom Penh, the capital's name, literally means Hill of Pehn. As you walk up to the temple there is a huge clock on the base of the hill, a little out of place I think but this is a country where past and present are constantly interacting. The grounds around the pagoda are gorgeous and in typical tourist trap fashion there is a few elephants wandering around to give rides.

The city is on the shore of the Tonle Sap river that flows all the way to the Tonle Sap Lake. After arriving very early in the day we decided to go see the floating village that is on the Lake. The lake feeds and houses two groups of people the Camboians and the Vietnamese. The Cambodians live in thatch sided and roofed houses built on stilts running the entire road to the lake. The lake levels vary dramatically from wet to dry season so sometimes they are on the shore and sometimes they are a good 20 minute drive down the dirt road to the lake edge. The Vietnamese live on the lake in floating houses. We took a tour of the lake on a long boat and were able to see floating schools, hospitals, homes and businesses. The lake was full of people, everywhere you looked. Mum's would motor their little boat up to ours and the kids would swing aboard with sodas, water and snacks for sale. The kids were tiny but savy business people already, knowing how cute they were and that people would want to take their picture they posed for a dollar. We boated to the center of the lake to see a catfish and aligator farm (use that term loosely) and found fish that would go absolutely crazy for food.

In need of some relaxation

I can see all of you guys rolling your eyes and heaving that collective sigh, perhaps even saying "yeah right!" So maybe we are in the middle of a huge relaxing period but you even need a break from that now and then, or atleast we are going to stick to that line of thinking. So in search of new views and a new town we headed for Hua Hin.

Hua Hin is a short bus ride from Bangkok, so opting for the cheapest way to get there we boarding the "express" bus and headed down the country. We think there are the regular paying customers, like us, who check in at the government station and pay the full fare for the full ride and then there is everyone else. This bus stopped at every little bus stop and then at almost every corner on the way down. The trip could have been a lot shorter but it was really the noise that drove us nuts! The bus was equipped with a really loud air horn, that the driver loved to us. Problem was, it sounded like it was pointed into the bus not outwards so every bus stop, random motorbike or ven when there was no one around us the bus driver felt the need to HONK HONK HONK! Travel tip, use these cheap buses in Thailand, they are great cheap ways to travel but buy ear plugs first and don't sit in the front seat unless you have to, the middle and back are bit quieter.

Anyways...Hua Hin, we arrived and found a cheap guesthouse. Then we walked around and found out our cheap guesthouse wasn't cheap...not expensive but we shouldn't take the first one, lesson learned. The area has long been the vacation spot for the Royal Thai family and is known for being the tidiest town in Thailand, just incase the King wants to pop down for the weekend.

We managed to whittle away our vacation with long walks on the beach, strolling through thte winding streets of the little beach town, watching kite boarders (I was attacked by a kite board, not reccomended), and wandering through the night markets and bar areas.

Walking the entire length of the beach we ended up at a 30 foot tall, golden, statue of the Chinese Goddess of Mercy. She is in the traditional pose with the palms together gesture, the wai., overlooking the sea.

On our last day wanting to do something different we found a bowling alley complete with private kareoke rooms. While I have been sad that I have trouble up-loading our videos so far, this time I am pretty happy that I can't. We came out of there with some funny pictures and pretty horrendous video!