Phnom Penh, Capitol City

Trip Start Dec 28, 2007
1
13
27
Trip End Dec 01, 2008


Loading Map
Map your own trip!
Map Options
Show trip route
Hide lines
shadow

Flag of Cambodia  ,
Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Three years ago, Andrea and Andrew went to Phnom Penh, the capitol city of Cambodia.  Back then, the city seemed very poor, rough and unsafe. This city has a dark and disturbing history.  It has been called "city of ghosts."  In April of 1975, the Khmer Rouge, headed by Pol Pot, entered the city after having defeated the US backed government.  The Cambodian people were excited and thought this was the end of the civil war which was ravaging the country.  Nothing could have been farther from the truth.  Three hours after entering the city, the Khmer Rouge emptied the city by forcing everybody into the countryside.  The people were told the American Army would bomb the entire city within 3 days and everybody had to leave.  This was part of the KR's plan to turn Cambodian into an agragrian utopia.  What happened instead was mass genocide.  All of the educated and powerful people were interogated, tortured and killed while common folk were hearded into the countryside to work as rice farmers.  Many of these people died of starvation and disease.  In 1979 this nightmare ended as the Vietnamese Army quickly defeated the Cambodian army in a three week war Andrew and Simon our guide
Andrew and Simon our guide
 .  To the horror of the liberators and the world, what they found was a country that had killed one third of its population through genocide, starvation and disease.  The Killing Fields, a fantastic movie, touches on some of this history.

Life, as we have all seen, does go on and PP is now a bustling city.  Much has changed in the last three years and the country is growing quickly with a burgeoning economy.  It also has become much safer to go out at night as tourism has been recognized as an intergral part of this rebuilding process.  There is a great restaurant scene and a thriving nightlife.  It is still a bit seedy, though, with rampant drugs and is very sad in the extreme proliferation (also fed mainly by the demand of tourists, of extensive prostitution.  There is a wild west sort of atmosphere, but nothing like the wild days of the 90's when it was a true outlaw destination.  An excellent book about this city is seedy recent past is "Off the Rails in Phnom Penh".  

Our main activities were visiting S-21, the Killing Fields and the Russian Market.  S-21 is also called Tuol Sleng and was the interrogation center for the KR where people were tortured and imprisoned prior to going to the killing fields for execution.  It is one of many such sites, but the most famous and is now been turned into the "genocide museum."  It is absolutely a horrifying cite, but one nobody should miss lest history repeat itself Cambodian Coconut Dealer
Cambodian Coconut Dealer
 .  Under the paranoid mindset of Pol Pot, many of the imprisoners eventually became prisoners themselves.  S-21 used to be the biggest high school in PP, then became a prison and now is a museum.  It is said that 20,000 people entered S-21 during the KR regime and only 7 survived.  Only seven people who entered S-21 survived, left behind when the KR quickly left as the Vietnamese moved in after quickly defeating the Cambodian army.  One of the seven survivors is the artist of the paintings in the photos.  There is an excellent documentary book and film (on dvd) about S-21 (both bearing the same name, S-21) for those interested. 

The killing fields are one of many mass graves where cambodians were executed and buried.  It is about 15km outside of PP.  It was where people were taken after interrogation at tuol sleng aka S-21.

We realize many of these photos are horrifying and gruesome.  They are posted out of hope that such horrors will never be forgotten and that the victims of the KR will be remembered.

The Russian market is a market where you can buy just about anything at unreal prices.  We loaded up on silks, t-shirts, silver jewelery and lots of other cool stuff.

Our hotel in PP was very nice.  We stayed in the hotel portrayed in the movie the Killing Fields and it is called Le Royal.  It is a beautiful french colonial building with wonderful old rooms, although the service has gone downhill since our last stay. 
Slideshow Print this entry