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Published: October 20th 2008
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Sui S'dey from Cambodia and welcome to the second part of our Viet Nam/Cambodia update.
"Same-Same, but different" is how the local saying goes and it describes the country very well. It's quite similar to other SE Asian countries in terms of scenery but it has 2 features in particular which make it unique, the first of these is The Temples of Angkor.
We flew from Ha Noi to Siem Reap and spent 4 days exploring the walled cities, palaces and temples of the Angkor Area which in total number over 100. These were built by the Angkor dynasty between the 8th and 12th centuries to ever grander designs and are considered to be the heart of the Khmer cultural identity.
Some of the sites are relatively small and can be walked around in a few minutes whilst the largest are up to 1500m square. From the 16th century Angkor was abandoned to the jungle following defeat by the kingdom of Siam but was rediscovered by the French in the 19th century.
The most prominent of the temples that we visited were;
Ta Phrom - Featured in the film Tomb Raider owing to its derelict state with
trees growing into and through it's walls
Bantay srei - Pink stone walls and intricate carvings
Preah Khan- Huge Buddhist monastery
Angkor Wat - Arguably the most picturesque and famous temple
Angkor Thom - Huge walled city with in our opinion the most impressive architecture of four faced pillars in the central 'Bayon'
We'd only ever heard of Angkor Wat before so we were pleasantly surprised to find so many temples in a relatively small area each of which had its own unique characteristics.
After our days of tomb raiding we hired a taxi and headed south to the capital Phnom Penh. On the way we passed numerous military convoys heading towards the border conflict with Thailand as well as the usual paddy fields, water buffalo's, palm trees and road side stalls selling deep-fried tarantulas.
Phnom Penh is a strange mixture of chic elegance and third world poverty. It retains a strong French colonial influence and it's the sort of place where you see ex-pats hanging out in cafe's, drinking Ricard and reading Le Monde whilst mine blast victims, often missing limbs, beg for 50 cents.
Underneath its sophisticated veneer Phnom Penh hides a much darker
recent past. In 1975 the Khmer Rouge under Pol Pot forcibly drove the entire population (about 2 million) out of the city and into the countryside. Here everyone was forced, as part of a deranged socialist plan, to become farm labourers.
Anyone with an education, teachers, students, writers and people who wore glasses (A sign of intellectualism) were rounded up with their families and sent to Security Camps such as S21 at Toul Seng for 'Re-education'. At S21 the prisoners endured extremely harsh conditions whilst undergoing months of torture before being taken to Choeng Ek where they were 'Destroyed' and buried in mass graves which became known as "The Killing Fields'.
In four years Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge committed the genocide of 2-3 million of their own countrymen and created " a desert of great destruction which overwhelmed the Kampuchean (Cambodian) society and drove it back to the stone age".
S21 was a brutal place and when we visited it made Tina feel extremely unwell just to think of the atrocities that had been committed there.
The Killing Fields at Choeng Ek is now a Genocide Museum and contains a white stupa which is
piled high with the skulls of the 20,000 people from S21 who were assassinated and buried in the mass graves that pock-mark the surrounding ground. Like S21 it is a thoroughly depressing place and the most disturbing thought for us was that all this took place during our life times. We can remember news stories about Cambodia but not realising what was going on. At the time the rest of the world feared another Viet Nam style war and so chose to turn a blind eye to the atrocities of the Khmer Rouge.
Phnom Penh was finally liberated by the Viet Namese army in 1978 and people slowly started to return. Now barely 30 years on, the city and warm & friendly people are a testament to the human spirit. Spending time amongst these happy, smiling people has, for us, been a humbling experience.
So, The Temples of Angkor and The Killing Fields are two extremes in what has proved to be a fascinating country. The Khmer people (and their food) are lovely and we'd definitely recommend Cambodia to anyone looking for a destination that is "Same-Same, but different"
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