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Published: June 19th 2009
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Apologies for the very long delay in our blogs, after spending a few days around the temples we decided to stay in Siem Reap for another few days and just soak up the atmosphere and take advantage of the amazing bars and restaurants there! After a total of 11 stormy but lovely days in Siem Reap we decided it was time to move on to Pnomh Penh before heading back to Bangkok to meet Mummily. The bus journey passed very quickly and the roads were pretty impressive in comparison to the north and we arrived in PP to a sea of crazy tuk tuk drivers all wanting to take us to their hotel of choice. After a bit of lunch and much persistance on his part we agreed to let Somchai to be our guide and it proved to be very comical. On our first day we were up prtty early and made our way over to the killing fields, we found out our driver was pretty insane on the way there as he raced every other tuk tuk driver on the way while laughing maniacally and then when we pulled up at the killing fields he asked us if afterwards
did we want to go and shoot a cow with a rocket launcher!!??? Or a buffallo with an AK47!!?? We politely refused and paid our entrance fee for the killing fields. The killing Fields of Choeung Ek was pretty gruesome viewing. In the middle of the 129 mass graves all over the site is a massive white stupa (A Buddhist religious monument) that serves as a memorial to the approximately 17,000 Men women and children who were executed here by the Khymer Rough between 1975 and 1978.Encased inside the stupa is 9000 human skulls that were found during the excavations of the mass graves in 1980. It was a very eerie place and we both felt very uncomfortable. From here we moved onto the Tuol Sleng Museum. On first appearance there is no indication of the torment that went on here, it looks just like any other school in Cambodia but on closer inspection its awful history is quickly revealed. In 1975 Pol Pot’s security forces turned this normal school into security prison S-21, the largest centre for detention and torture in Cambodia. On average 100 people died here everyday and it was very clear that not much had been
changed since the day the prison was liberated. On entering the first classroom the smell of blood and death seemed to be ingrained into the walls and every room bore testament to the unimaginable torment that had occurred there. In one section of the building there are long corridors filled with the photo’s of the victims and various pictures displaying different methods of torture inflicted on the innocent victims. While we were wandering around a massive storm blew up and we had to spend about an hour and a half in the upstairs of the classrooms, it was pretty grim and you had a tiny insight into what thousands of poor innocent khymers went through on a daily basis before facing their unjustified deaths at this awful place. From here we decided to go to the National Museum to try and cheer ourselves up a bit. The museum was beautiful and featured a lot of statues and pieces that had been removed from the temples of Angkor; we became all the more aware of the stark contrasts that exist within Cambodia, the beauty and the very dark side of the human spirit. We called it a day when we were
ushered out of the museum as it was closing and went back to the hotel for a swim and a quick shower before heading out for a quick tour of the sights and sounds of PP at night and dinner by the river.
We were up early and set off for a quick trip around the Royal Palace and then we had yet another package of crap that we had to send home before flying to Bangkok to meet Mum and Peter the next day. Unfortunately it started chucking it down before we left the hotel and after trips to UPS, DHL and TNT ($300 to send a 4 kilo parcel to the uk??!!) we ended up at the Cambodian Post Office who offered us a much more reasonable rate but I’m willing to bet the parcel is never seen again - hey ho not much else we could do! We arrived at the airport very early and were pretty gutted at the lack of duty free available, we ran out of perfume a long time ago!!! It was a pretty bumpy flight (I had managed to forget my hatred of flying) and we arrived in Bangkok early evening. As
mum and Peter weren’t due for 24 hours we booked ourselves into a dreadful motel place situated right next to Bangkok’s answer to Spaghetti Junction - Joy!! The evening passed pretty quickly in a haze of Leo beer and some dreadful food - it was good to be back in Thailand!
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