Tragic But Amazing Cambodia

As we start the 5th month of our travels marking the half way point, we cross the border into Cambodia.

At first glance as we cross the land border there is no difference between Vietnam and Cambodia, they blend seamlessly into one another. Even on arrival into Phnom Penh as we get off the bus the vultures that are the tuc tuc drivers, motorbike & taxis drivers harass you within an inch of your life just as in Vietnam. But that night as we took a stroll around what seemed a decidedly dodgy area in which we had chosen to stay – the streets were deserted, except for one or 2 drivers sleeping in their tuc tucs. The streets were quiet, left for the rats to roam, something you wouldn’t see in Vietnam’s capital. (Well the rats maybe…)

The next day we took it easy and made our way over to the Russian Market in search of some Angkor like statues. We were very excited as we’ve been looking forward to finding some statue buddas etc to ship home and we were going to the place where Willem and Grazyna brought all theirs 2 years ago, which is where the one we currently have housed in our living room came from. However, upon arrival it was infact only 2 or 3 stores that sold them and quite a limited collection too. It wasn’t a market that sold them although they did sell some small new rip offs, as we thought so we were pretty disappointed! But hopefully we’ll find some more opportunities as we go along and I’m sure in India we’ll be able to find some too.

The market was…well another market, but we had a good look around as they are still fun and interesting. They never seem to get old. And it was here that I finally saw what I thought I would have seen a lot more of. A table full of bugs ready to eat!! Huge cockroaches (the only thing they’re good for, if you’re into that sort of thing, if you ask me!), bbq’d snake, frogs, flies, maggot like things – oh it was GROSS! I tried to take a picture but the lady wanted $1 to do so which was ridiculous. But then I don’t blame her for asking as she can’t earn any money selling that load of ‘food!!’

After that we went to a temple to have a look around and driving around in a tuc tuc I immediately saw a difference in Cambodia to Vietnam. Even though Cambodia is one of Asia’s poorest countries, in Phnom Penh at least, it seems much more developed and in better shape than Vietnam, but that’s probably as it didn’t get bombed to smithereens. The temples and buildings are immaculately kept. It could also have something do with the amount of money that the locals seem give to the Buddhist temples on a daily basis when praying. We witnessed some sort of fortune/horoscope reading involving a small book that they hold above their heads and at random choose a page in which to insert an attached piece of cord. They then hand it to the ‘reader’ who reads it and they seem to be happy. But I was amazed at the amount of money that is sitting in the still hands of the statues. The electricity bills must cost a fortune too (as I’m told it’s really expensive here - & they charge $5 a night extra for air co to run) as the temples are lit up like Vegas. Flashing coloured lights and jewellery adorn the statues.

Being a non religious person myself, I have a very hard time relating to the rhyme and reason. But then, I haven’t lived through the atrocities that Cambodia has and the more I learn about what happened here 35 years ago, the more I can see why they would devote so much time and money to their faith. And even though I find the ways in which Buddhist monks ‘earn’ a living…interesting shall we say, in order not to offend anyone, without religion this country seems as though it would collapse.

Day 2 in Phnom Penh took us to S-21, the concentration camp of the Khmer Rouge and the torturing head quarters where prisoners were held before being taken the The Killing Fields.

And all I can think since standing in the DMZ in Vietnam until now, standing in an old school ground which saw humanity at its worst, is that America has a LOT to answer for! It really does, and I dread to think what they hell is happening in Afghanistan. It’s so easy to bury your head in the sand and not think about it, but if the wars were like this back then – who only knows what horrors are going on today!

S-21 chills your blood and whilst the photos aren’t as graphic as those in Vietnam’s War Remnants museum, it’s so atmospheric. The fact that it was a school, where young children ran and played, where the swing bars in the playground were turned into torture instruments…it’s harrowing. Inside one of the camp blocks they have pictures of detainees that were held at the camp, hundreds of them, and as we walked through I made sure to look at the face of each and every one. It was my way, a miniscule way, of paying my respects to these poor poor people.

From what I can gather, the lead up to the well known genocide of Cambodia is complicated. There were so many influences that instigated it. The fall of the Cambodian King Sihanouk, the Chinese funding, the rapid recruitment of the then small revolutionary movement Khmer Rouge, the spill over of the Viet Cong in Cambodia and the American War, secret American bombing, just so much internal and external politics it’s hard to keep track. But basically, the Khmer Rouge took Phnom Penh and went about implementing one of the most radical and brutal restructurings of a society ever attempted. Its goal was a pure revolution to transform Cambodia into a peasant dominated agrarian cooperative. (Communism ideals.) The entire population of Phnom Penh and towns were forced to march into the countryside and work as slaves. The year was proclaimed Year Zero. Currency was abolished and postal services were halted. The country cut itself off from the world. The genocide began to cleanse the nation of intellectuals, government officials, anyone with the slightest education (even if you wore glasses you were deemed to be clever so were killed!) who could cause a rebellion. It’s still unclear how many Cambodians died at the hands of the Kyhmer Rouge but it is estimated at around 1.7 million! Hundreds and thousands were executed while hundreds and thousands more died of famine and disease. The end is just as complicated involving the Vietnamese and the UN and about 25 years too late there is supposed to be a trial going on for the leaders of the Khmer Rouge and their crimes. But it’s still ongoing and cannot seem to keep up with the rapid ageing of the surviving leaders. The main leader Pol Pot already died in 1998.

All in all Cambodia’s history is devastating, but I love the feeling here. The people are friendly (nicer than the Vietnamese – which I think is due to the fact that they can interact more due to being a non communist country) and tough, doing they best they can. We finished off day 2 by walking around another temple and having dinner whilst watching ‘The Killing Fields’ movie. A very moving day.

Day 3 we thought we would visit the last ‘attraction’ of this terrible era – The Killing Fields. It’s about 15km from the city centre and when you get there it’s just so moving. The surroundings are really beautiful and the main memorial which was built a few years ago stands tall as the main place of commemoration. It contains approximately 9000 human skulls that were found during the excavations in 1980. It’s just soooo soooo sad. You walk around the mass graves and even as you do so you are walking on areas where human bone and clothing is visible, which made me feel like I was being so disrespectful, but…I came to pay my respects and learn, and that part of the experience I just had to put to the back of my mind. There’s also a big tree there which was notoriously used for smashing babies against before being thrown into the pit. Oh the whole place just makes your blood curdle – and all the leaders can say is ‘I’m sorry!!’ These people are not human. They are missing a heart!

Our final day in Phnom Penh was spent on a less devastating sight – The Royal Palace. Although if you ever find yourself here – don’t bother. While the buildings themselves are beautiful and stunning, less than a third of the buildings are available to look around in, making it rather a disappointment. But Tymon managed to get some good shots of some monks hanging out and the scene was very peaceful.

Next stop was down to the coast, a place called Kep. Willem and Grazyna and been here 2 years ago and Willem had told us it had the best crab EVER! We even stayed at the same place as they had before. We arrived just as it got dark but as we entered the very small town it didn’t look particularly lively. The hotel was nice though and that evening we ate in the restaurant and sampled for the first time the real Kampot pepper which is simply the best pepper in the world. It’s green and when fried off it’s just delicious!!

We spent 5 days in Kep and we noticed quickly that even though Chinese New Year was imminent it was deathly quiet!! We walked around the tiny town and it was deserted, although this was a nice feeling also. There wasn’t a very nice beach however, so no swimming but the hotel had some patches of sand they had moved in to create a sunbathing area and when the sun really got too much you could walk down to the sea. But it was ankle deep for miles so you could just splash yourself to cool off – not that you’d really want to swim either – it was muddy water. But we managed to top up our tans. We also ate at the crab market which was just round the corner which was basically a row of low key local restaurants overlooking the water which at sunset was beautiful! The local ladies were out with their crab baskets fishing and it was a great view. But not as great the crab. Willem was right – the crab in Kampot pepper was DIVINE!! We thoroughly got stuck in, sucking and cracking – brilliant! So we basically spent every evening in the same restaurant, bar one night which we regretted as it wasn’t as good, eating crab!

We did a day trip to Rabbit Island with the Dutchies which was great as this had a proper beach. So we played Volleyball in the sea (which I sucked at! Apparently volley ball is a sport in Dutch school in P.E. so they were all really good!) and Frisbee and ate pancakes! Another chilled out day!

Chinese New Years Day we went to the market and well – it was like a different place. It was packed!! A lot of people come here for the long weekend with their families and the market was in full swing. Crab trading the predominant feature was crazy – I’ve never seen so much crab and it was hectic bargaining going on. There were so many people the place was transformed. They were all telling us Happy New Year – it was a really lovely moment.

The following day we headed over to Kampot, the next coastal town up. We had actually done a day trip to the town and thought it was very dull. Even more quiet than Kep and was ugly too so we were going to bypass it. But we were on a specific mission that took us to a hostel called the Bodhi Villa. Willem had been here also previously and when we arrived it’s what we have been lacking the whole trip so far. It was the ultimate chill out zone, backpackers haven overlooking the river in which you can swim. Just jump right off the jetty and in from the bar. It was ram jammed full and we loved it – hence we were coming to stay in Kampot to only stay at the Bodhi villa! We even brought another couple with us from Kep, some Dutchies who loved to play Poker! Hurrah!!! So I am writing this from the bar. We sleep, read, swim and work on the laptop catching up on ourselves and we drink and eat delicious food and shakes! And a lot of alcohol! And if I tell you that the place is probably at least half full of Dutchies, you can probably guess what bought us here. Chill out to the max!

Although we did witness and really nasty motorbike accident on New Years Day. 2 guys lost control of the bike and crashed into a street stall sending an old woman flying just like in the cartoons when the legs go completely head over heals in the air! The driver of the bike some how managed to sort of hop off but the back passenger skidded for about 20 metres with the bike along the road. He got up quite quickly but he was in complete shock! He was standing in the middle of the road with one side of his head bleeding out. God it was everywhere, all over his hands and shirt it was terrible. He just stood there dazed. It all started kicking off as the woman had got up and started shouting and then the police arrived but no one took any notice of this poor guy. The police were only interested in the old lady and the driver – who did look like he’d had a beer too many. Eventually some guy on a motorbike came and told the bleeding boy to get on so he could I assume take him to the hospital. At least I hope that’s where he was headed!! It made my legs weak. Especially as we had just crossed the road literally 2 minutes before hand – I dread to think what would have happened as we would have been pretty close the point it lost control!! I bet he’ll wear a helmet from now on!!

We hired some bikes (push bikes after what we’d seen!) yesterday and went to get lost which ended up taking us across the river and down into this dirt track road that went on for miles and miles and miles through local villages. It was fab. Passing all the shack housing and then the odd mansion. All the kids would chase after us shouting ‘hello’ and waving. We both totally had a moment of thinking – we’re travelling! We’re riding a bike in the back end of Cambodia! I loved it! The people were so friendly and kept laughing when they saw us as if to say ‘what the hell are you doing out here?’ We didn’t see any other tourists! It’s also quite sad as the children aren’t in school I don’t think. There only seems to be education available in the big cities but they are so adorable. The children are so beautiful…and dirty! Haha. It was extremely hot so we weren’t out all day but it was a superb experience, one that will definitely stick out in my memories! Honestly witnessing these villages and life going on in rural Cambodia is something everyone should experience. It’s so different and it’s so hard to write how it feels and how it looks. But the following words are what hit me: it’s hot, it’s dirty, it’s dusty, it’s dry, it’s poor, it’s beautiful, it’s charming, it’s family, it’s community, it’s home.

Willem is leaving us tomorrow to head back to HCMC as he flies back to Holland in 3 days time and we are going to stay here for a few more days. Tymon is going to paint a mural in exchange for free accommodation and food and from looking at his sketches it’s going to be awesome. I am more than happy to chill out here while he paints which he is very excited about.

So I will write again once we are on the road again. But for now I bid you a very tropical and travelling ciao!

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