Phnom Penh

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Heading down from Siem Reap we got on the public bus that we were told would take two hours to get to Phnom Penh, 5 hours later we were still going, this seems to be a recurring theme with SE Asian transport, gets you there in the end though, so all is good. The is a mad city, it is so full on, podssibly in a different way it seems busier than Bangkok, even though a lot smaller, getting across the road is a right mission though, best just to step out and hope everyone avoids you!!!

We stayed in Okay guesthouse, which was OK, they are huge and can sort everything out for you and are nice and friendly. We only stayed for one day as too busy for me but we went and visted the darker side of Cambodias recent history with a trip to the museum detailing the attrocities of the Khmer Rouge and the Killing fields where the people were sent to be excecuted. It is a grim but essential trip really to get an understanding of what the country and people have been trough over the last 30 years and how they are now rebuilding in peace time. Basically Pol Pot came to power in 1975 and declared it year 0, wiping out thousands of years of history like that. He decided Cambodia should be a peasant state and the towns and cities were cleared and everyone forced to walk hundreds of miles to start work in the fields. Even the hospitals were cleared, hundreds of elderly, ill, pregnant women and children died on this walk, anyone showing any signs of dissent were shot. Also any educated peoples, doctors, teachers etc, anyone with links to Vietnam or any person who could speak Vietnamese or with relatives there were shot. The old government were all killed as was anyone with money. This madness went on for 3 years and the place we visited was a comprehensive school turned into a jail/place of torture (Unit 21). It is very eery going round it as it is just in a normal suburb, but the displays they have put in there gives you the full horror of what the Cambodian people endured at that place. In those 3 years over a quarter of the population were wiped out. Any person now 30+ would have been directly affected as all families were split up, all forms of communication banned, no social gatherings and 2 meals a day of just rice, then 14 hours toil in the fields. I wont go on as I am sure you get the picture, it should definitely be on your list to visit if you come here as it puts in tom context how far the country has come in the last decade. Thankfully that is now in the past and the country seems to be reveling in the democracy it now enjoys and is healing the ghosts of the recent past.

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Comments

[tim short]

UK link
I can't believe the Uk and Us supported Polpot just because he was anti-Vietnamese. Jokeshop.