Cambodia Re-Visited

Angkor Wat.



What a disaster, and yet how good for Cambodia. Angkor wat is full of foreign tourists. The heat is intense. The humidity fills up the courtyards like fog. You sweat, you drink, you stop sweating, you worry. The rains are coming, but they have not come. You have to record what you see but the sweat runs into your eyes, you keep shooting, frame after frame, teh Nikon motor drive whirring and whining as your eyes fog over. You drink more, you enter another courtyard. The Japanese barge you out of the way while taking their “special photo”. You ignore, them politely, step to one side an try and take it in. You sweat. You use your hat to fan yourself, it does not work. The oppression of the humidity is too much. You walk slowly out of the central complex, sit by a pond and drink more water. You pour half the bottle over your head. You feel better. The contrast between 7 years ago when Pat Hubbuck and the annoying Jean Michel clambered over everything in solitude could not be more stark. Tourism in Siem Reap has come of age. I am so happy and privileged to have seen Angkor in 2001 when it was desolate. Good for Cambodia. Sad for me, but nor worries, Cambodia needs fame more than travellers need solitude.

The temples of Angkor are still the temples of Angkor. They are majestic, and magnificent and incredible. That was the reality of Siem reap.

Having seen enough of Angkor we took a boat ride on the Tonle sap with our friend and guide Janny. For a pittance, we toured two villages by boat. “This one is Vietnamese, this one Cambodian”

“Where is our captain from? ”I asked

“He is Cambodian, but he likes Vietnamese girls, so he stays here”

The story the world over I thought.

The next day we hopped onto the super mekong express to Phnom Penh. A great japanese bus, with a very worn crash box (gearbox). The legroom was fine, but the width of the seats was definately asian. I could not complain. The bus chugged along at fifty miles an hour through brown sand like fields and past wooden houses on stilts. It may have been raining, but it was not enough to change the colour of the fields. After a couple of hours, we came to Kompong Thom and stopped for tea. in 2001 this journey took a day in a pick up truck. When it rained, it took two. Now, in rainstorms, it took 120 minutes. The last time I did this journey was by pick up truck on the BMX bike track that masqueraded as national highway no 6. Ourdriver battled through rainstorms, wandering buffalos and the occasional bad driver. Compared to Iran or India, this guy was so safe, he could have driven for the London Ambulance Service.

By the time we arrived in Phnom Penh I felt slightly more righteous. But this was still easy enough. But as I get older I do not complain. Smooth roads and bearable seats are not to be sniffed at. May the journey continue!


This morning I found myself writing in my diary. “What defines cambodia? Surely the killing fields do not define Cambodia, and yet in some ways they do” I shall expound on this later, as I have things to do, and I do not want to fall into the trap of the scando girls next to me, who spend hours on facetube (or whatever these sites are called) keeping touch with their friends they should be out travelling, seeing the real world, or at least talking to real people....
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Cambodia re-visited- A closed Shop.

It is 0621hrs in Phnom Penh, I am sitting on the floor of our room typing while Cisca still sleeps. Today may be the day that we cross the Mekong and enter Vietnam. I am desperately trying to write about Cambodia without it being mundane, to write something that truly describes the nation. Perhaps even defines Cambodia. But how on earth can you define a country? Cambodia has an air of regeneration that is waning. Cambodia has gone from being special to being pleasant.

Eight years ago, I wrote:
“If the King dies, this country might go back to civil war.” I said. “Hun Sen (the prime minister) is a “converted” Khmer Rouge Cadre, the King was the King, none of the major players have changed. China is almost certainly sticking her nose in, as is Vietnam and Thailand”

“Hmmm- never thought of that”replied Patrick
“You do realise that we are privileged to see Cambodia now. If the theory is wrong and all goes well, French package tourists will flood the place… either way we have seen something that is in the midst of change. It’s going to get worse either way.”

“Thanks for telling me” mused Patrick

Only on re-reading this do I realise how correct I was. the King has not died, and there is a new king. There should be no civil war. I only got the nationalities wrong. The packaged Asians are here not the French. They have a different agenda.

Phnom Penh has retained its charm. Its market is still vibrant, its avenues and side steets are broad, green and clean. French colonial architecture is still everywhere. The buildings are low and many have balconies. The cuisine is exquisite and the price for everything is quite reasonable. Bars and restaurants have sprung up along the esplanade that borders the Tonle Sap river. Asian and European tourists sit by the river talking and eating. Phnom Penh is most definately not the same barren outpost that it used to be; when you could count the daily international flights on one hand and all foreigners were known to each other.

The city is littered with huge luxury Toyota Land cruisers. Most of them belong to the great and the good of Cambodia while the rest, belong to various NGO’s. I fail to understand why, in a country of very bad roads, why NGO’s need the less capable luxury 4x4 rather than the cheaper utilitarian version.

The Killing Fields

And so I come back to squatting on the floor, and now tweaking this in an internet cafe. ....Could I define Cambodia? Not really

The killing fields were the ultimate story of communist madness gone wrong. This is old hat, but in case anyone does not know the story: they kicked everyone out of the cities and forced them to work in the fields. They closed the nation and purged the country of its intellectuals, leaders, doctors and anyone who could read. Then they purged themselves over and over again. Purging meant torture for a few months and then having your head staved in with a blunt instrument. This madness continued from 1975 to 1979. They did their murdering over a five year period.


The Khymer Rouge annoyed Vietnam by attacking the south and saying that Vietnam attacked them. Attacking Vietnam was perhaps not the cleverest move of the communists. The Communist Vietnamese had seen off the French, and the Americans and regarded the Cambodians as a mosquito bite. To the relief of any sane Cambodian left alive, the Army of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam invaded eastern Cambodia in 1978 and by 1979 had swept the communist Cambodians out of Phohm Penh. The Americans may have been a bit miffed, but the rest of the world breathed a sigh of relief. As an 8 year old boy I distinctly remember the end of the Khymer Rouge regime. Then the figures came out. 2-3M people dead. The purges involved torturing you almost to death for a few months until you confessed, and then smashing you round the back of the head with an iron bar and shoving you into a mass grave. It was all really rather horrific.

I remember the famous British TV program called Blue Peter having an appeal for bottle tops. They then managed, in recession torn Britain to raise enough money (with the bottle tops) to buy two lorries that were sent to Cambodia to supply food to the rural areas. I remember watching the footage of the lorries being unloaded from a hercules at Pochentong airport and being driven off into the bush. Pol Pot, the chief murderer ran away.

One’s mind boggles. You meet the Cambodian people and they are kind and pleasant, and yet anyone over 50 (and there are not that many) who looks fat has to have been in on the killing game. It’s a bit like meeting a Rwandan who tells you. “well, we did some things that we had to do, to stay alive” The politics of life and death usually mean someone else’s’ death.

Every tourist in Cambodia makes the obligatory pilgrimage to Tol Sleuk, the torture chamber cum prison, and the killing fields at Choeng Ek. They tour the death rooms and read the madness that the Khymer rouge called rules. A précis of them would go like this:

You must confess your guilt
You must not make it up.
If you do not confess we will electrocute you.
You must not scream when we electrocute you

So the truly innocent are doomed. Lie, and we will torture you, don’t confess and we will torture you. Oh and when we do, please don’t squeal.

My Cambodian friend “Janny” tried to explain the complex situation: “the Khymer Rouge just went into Thailand. We don’t like the Thais, they don’t like us. Then they fought a little bit, and now they are all in power. The Cambodia people’s party is full of them. These murderers were never sent to jail. As soon as Pol Pot died in 1998, they were brought into the system. It was a form of reconciliation. The Khymer rouge just changed their politics” I got the impression from Janny that he would rather see them hit over the head with an iron bar and shoved into the tonle sap.


Now if Cisca’s Tailor can deliver the goods its off over the border and into the Socialist People’s Republic of Vietnam. Another south east asian country and another closed shop!


I am glad I have re visited Cambodia.

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