Heartbreak and Hope in Phnom Penh
September 20th 2014 Hot, dirty, chaotic, desperately poor and utterly charming - welcome to Phnom Penh. Once called the "Paris of the East", there's a lot to see and do in the Cambodian capital, so I'd set myself a busy few days.
I started with a visit to the Royal Palace, which is also home to the Silver Pagoda. The grounds and buildings are beautiful, and after the tour busses of the north in Siem Reap, it seeme
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taracloud
Tara Cloud
Such contrasts!
The Royal Palace photos are stunning, and such a contrast to the stories from the torture center and the killing fields. Good thing you started and ended with beauty! I've a Cambodian colleague whose professor father was taken, tortured and killed when she was a tiny girl. Her mother took her and the other children into the jungle in the dead of night to escape into Thailand where she grew up in a pretty terrible refugee camp. It sounds as if life is still rough for many Cambodians; thank goodness for organizations helping young women escape the sex trade. Palaces and prostitution--contrasts indeed!