Cambodia: Part I Phnom Penh

We arrived to Phnom Penh in the evening, tired after a busy half day in Bangkok. Our hotel – Villa Langka was a cute boutique hotel with an open air reception and restaurant area. We relaxed on the comfy sofa with a cocktail and a nibble and geared ourselves up for a full day of touring the next day.

Our day started with a visit to the royal palace where the king currently resides. It is colourful, sparkly and bright but much calmer and less cluttered than the royal palace in Bangkok. The current king is in his 60’s and not married. He was a ballet dancer in Paris and is very interested in the arts. It’s unlikely he’ll ever marry so they’ll have to look to a different line of the royal family when he’s gone. The locals appear to be fans but he has no power over government and doesn’t seem to do much in the way of helping or inspiring the local people.

On the grounds of the palace is the silver pagoda which inside has a floor completely made of silver (over 5,000 silver tiles), although most of it is covered in carpet. They have a jade Buddha which is an exact replica of the emerald Buddha that we saw in Bangkok and apparently the emerald Buddha was Cambodian and the Thais stole it!!! The pagoda is full of Buddha statues and other deities.

There are two main stupas one containing the ashes of the former king (current kinds father) and the other the kind before that (the current kings grandfather):

There were some very interesting trees and flowers around the grounds. This is the beautiful lotus tree:

We also got the chance to see some local musicians play traditional music:

Next we headed to the killing fields at Choeung Ek. This was a really tough place to visit and this is not going to be a fun post. I am going to post photos so be warned.. it’s upsetting – THIS IS NOT A FUN POST.

On the 13km drive from Phnom Penh to the killing fields, our tour guide gave us some history of Cambodia. It’s definitely been a nation with its troubles and you’ve got to feel sorry for the regular people trying to live a normal life and get by. After a civil war that killed approx one million people the Khmer Rouge came to power in 1975 under the leadership of Pol Pot. He, along with his Khmer cadres set in motion a plan to purge the country of educated people and then families and bring the country back to a peasant based idyllic (in their eyes) society. Approximately two million people were killed during their time in power. If there was an enemy of the state to be killed (let’s say a teacher), they killed everyone connected to them including babies so as to avoid any future chance of revenge.

It’s really hard to fathom that so many people were killed like this in my lifetime. I was 3 years old when the Khmer Rouge came to power in 1975. I know there have been other genocides in my lifetime and I know this kind of thing is happening today but this is the closest I came to seeing the evidence and really feeling it and it was horrific. At this specific place which became known as the killing fields, prisoners who had been tortured at a prison in Phnom Penh were brought to be murdered and thrown into mass graves. We walked around the fields and the mass graves are clearly obvious with some bone and clothes still visible as you walk by.

Our guide pointed out a tree that had been covered with blood from where babies heads were bashed and another tree where a speaker was placed with loud music to drown out the screams and roars.

Around 20,000 people were killed in this one spot… I wondered where the other million plus bodies are and the answer is all over the country. There is a small museum with some interesting photos and information on the Khmer leaders. It’s tough to read and generates so many emotions – sadness, disgust, anger…

There is a memorial stupa in the centre of the area. It contains glass shelves with layers of skulls, bones and clothes of the victims killed here. They are organised by sex and age. You can lay flowers and light incense to pay your respects and oddly enough they allow photographs to be taken. I got the sense that they want the world to see these pictures and to ask questions so that people can be educated and hopefully this doesn’t happen again (will we ever learn).

It was a quiet somber journey back to the city. This has to be tough on the guide, a young lady, who takes tourists here regularly. She told us that most of her mothers family were killed and that her Dad was nearly arrested but for some reason another guard let him go… scary stuff.

Continuing the horror we headed to Tuol Sleng prison also known as S-21. This was equally if not more horrific a place to visit. We walked through cells were prisoners were tortured and killed. There were photos taken on the day of liberation showing dead and half dead bodies as they’d been left, chained to beds, shackled to chairs with blood etc. It was truly horrific. This place had formerly been a school but the Khmer Rouge did not believe in educating children other than to brainwash them about their ideals. It closed lots of schools and made this one its most notorious prison.

On our way out we met with two survivors of this horrific place. It was such an honour to meet them and shake their hand.

In an effort to shake off the doom and gloom of the earlier part of the day we headed to the national museum for a bit of Angkor culture. A lovely old red building, it housed mostly stone statues and carvings from the Angkor temples.

Last stop on the tour was the Wot Phnom temple. Up on a hill looking over Phnom Penh it houses a statue of Madame Penh who allegedly found the city and of course some Buddha statues. Oh and did I mention I got a great takeaway tea!!

With our lovely guide – Pique – the diamond of Phnom Penh

Before we left the temple I had my fortune read by shaking some prayer sticks in front of the alter:

I was told that as long as I remained good (and you know I always try to be good) I will have happiness, good health, wealth and honour… I like the honour bit!

Back to the hotel for a drink after a very somber day and a trip to a “good cause dining” restaurant which was delicious (more of that on a separate blog post). Next morning off to Siem Reap!