Phnom Penh
Trip Start
Oct 20, 2008
1
11
15
Trip End
Oct 20, 2009
Phnom Penh,
Cambodia
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Part 1 of 3
We took a flight out of Borneo to Phnom Penh in Cambodia eager to let our hair down a little and hop on the backpacker carousel that is South East Asia. Arriving in the dusty orange light of a Cambodian sunset we were surprised and excited by the clean, vibrant streets of the capital. Modern bars and relaxed restaurants set in buildings of French design ran alongside the wide neat boulevards and monolithic monuments of communist architecture.
As with all cities (and you'll have to bear with me on this) we hovered over the tourist haunts first taking a cycle rickshaw to the Tuol Sleng Museum - an old school complex converted into an interrogation and torture site during the unbelievable 4-year reign of Pol Pot
coconut water
. In stunned and sickened silence we walked around the torture rooms holding single iron beds, graphic black and white photos and dried splatters of blood still on the ceilings; an achingly poignant reminder of the darkness to which man can sink. Blinking into the midday sun of the city we could see the after-effects of this auto-genocide all around the streets in the form of a markedly young population and a great deal of people with missing limbs. There was one guy we gave some money to who approached awkwardly with no arms or legs. Without really thinking I just handed out the money for him to take until I read Fi's covert nodding head and placed it quickly in his top pocket myself.Over the 2 weeks in Cambodia I became dangerously obsessed with Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge trying to get to grips with the extremities to which paranoia can run - a campaign of genocide of your own people (auto-genocide) is unprecedented although I think my relaying of incidents of torture and terror began to do Fi's head in.
Our "must-see" sight was in the town of Siem Reap home to the famous lost civilisation at Angkor Wat and its series of temples. Taming my single geared ladies bicycle we had three days to cycle in blistering heat amongst the impressive crumbling spires & corridors of stone frames extending like infinity mirrors through the temples
angkor 'corridors'
. Despite the onslaught of insistent hawkers going on selling maps, books, water, pineapples, 3 postcards $1, sir, sir looking, looking - looking is free we managed to hide and eek out some time to relax in the ruins by ourselves.On our last day nursing saddle-soreness and feet stencilled in dust over our sandals we made our way up to yet another temple and a panoramic viewpoint to watch the sunset over stunning views of the surrounding jungles (still littered with landmines). But hold on - a romantic sunset with 250 people clambering for a 'perfect' position adjusting lenses and tripods? Bit pointless really. It seemed the weather got embarrassed too and the sun dipping behind a rising cloud well before the horizon.
Back in Phnom Penh Fiona and myself began the dangerous game of eating raw chillies from the jar provided at each local eatery - when one had one the other had to follow. On the last night, sat on the miniature furniture of the street food stalls, I became over confident and, feeling like 'the big man' drowned my delicious thick noodles in the cook's homemade chilli sauce. Within seconds I understood why the plastic furniture was so small as I didn't have far to fall hallucinating on the floor with the burn with Fiona less than magnanimous in victory.
Our planned two weeks in Cambodia were really just to see the sights - at the end of the day a city is a city is a city and as pleasant as it was, being asked every two minutes - Where you going? You want tuc tuc? Where you go tomorrow? You want to shoot AK-47 at some cattle? (and this was just the Gestapo at our guesthouse) - it was starting to grate.
Time to leave for Vietnam.....
