Streets of Phnom Penh. Craziest traffic Ive ever seen.From Siem Reap, Aaron, Pat and I took a bus to the capitol Phnom Penh. The bus was comfortable, had A/C, and played videos of Cambodian standup comedy. We had a close call with a cow that wandered into the road. The 6 hour ride dragged on, until finally we made it to the bus station.
Phnom Penh is much cleaner and more orderly than I would have predicted. It has some nice parks. It's very modern, and the streets are in pretty good shape. The traffic is unreal though. There appear to be no road rules. Mopeds come from every direction, with no stoplights or even stop signs. Every intersection is a four way merge with horns blaring.
The view from Wat Phnom
The Silver Pagoda houses a solid gold Buddha. The entire Royal Palace area is just beautiful, really a smaller version of the Royal Palace area of Bangkok, which it was modeled after.Now for the harsh reality of Cambodian history. This country went through living hell from April 1975 to January 1979. The Khmer Rouge killed approximately 1.5 Million people. That amounts to one out of every seven Cambodians alive in 1975. No one should come to Cambodia without first watching the movie "The Killing Fields", and reading at least one book about the genocide. I recommend "First They Killed My Father". It seems inconceivable that such a thing could have happened here. Cambodians are so friendly and funny. But it did happen, just 30 years ago. Anyone over the age of thirty you meet would have some terrifying stories to tell. Sadly, after a few days in Cambodia you realize that there just aren't that many people over thirty walking around. It is a youthful country, and for all the wrong reasons.
During that late 70's Phnom Penh was a ghost town. On April 17, 1975, the Khmer Rouge forced the entire population to flee to the countryside with only what they could carry. Imagine the population of Boston being sent into the woods of Massachusetts and New Hampshire with nothing but a bag of potatoes, having to fend for themselves for food and water. How long would those people last? Not very long.
Faces of the inmates from Tuol Sleng Prison. 17,000 people were incarcerated and tortured here. All but 7 ended up dying in the prison or being murdered at the nearby killing fields.We visited Tuol Sleng Prison, also known as S-21. The Khmer Rouge took this school and made it into a torture death camp. They imprisoned anyone who was educated, worked for the previous government, anyone that could possibly be considered a threat to their bizarre reorganization of society. They kept records of every inmate. The photos of the inmates are displayed throughout the building. It's quite moving to look at row upon row of pictures of people that you know were tortured and killed.
One of the beds on which people were tortured. The metal box is an ammo canister that served as their toilet.Next we drove to the killing fields on the outskirts of Phnom Penh. 20,000 people were murdered here by the Khmer Rouge between 1976-79.
One of many mass graves.
The stupa of skulls. Layer upon layer of unidentified skulls found in the killing fields. Even seeing all the skulls, I couldn't wrap my mind around the magnitude of murder and inhumanity that existed here.
I wasn't sad to leave Phnom Penh at the end of our visit to Cambodia. The city 's traffic, smog and frightening history wore me down. I will miss Cambodia though, and will certainly return to Siem Reap.
