Cambodia: Phnom Penh & Kampot
May 28: Phnom Penh
THERE ARE SO MANY CARS! It's very polluted and smelly and hard to
breathe. And it's really Westernized in an unexpected way: Around our hostel
there were at least 4 organic vegetable shops within 3 blocks. Shocking. Seems there's
a huge French expat community in Phnom Penh, and there are many vestiges of
French colonialism. Oh, and they use USD and Riel ($1USD = 4000 Riel). So, if
something costs $4.50 and you give them a $5, you get 2000 Riel because coins
are dumb and they are not used.
We arrived around 4pm, checked into our hostel, grabbed a bite in the
restaurant downstairs, showered, and went to bed around 9.
May 29: Phnom Penh
Overnight buses really take their toll on us, so we slept in. We
wandered about for breakfast and spent the morning learning about the city and
what we wanted to do. Cafe Soleil was a lovely place for both breakfast and
lunch, and we managed to find a free Lonely Planet book that we were hoping to
find online! Score!
We are not fans of this city, so we decided to only stay 3 nights.
May 30: Phnom Penh
Killing Fields and S21. It was a tough day, with really important
history lessons. The Killing Fields are within the city of Phnom Penh, though
at the time were outside and surrounded by fields/farms and small groups of
houses. S21 was a high school in the city that was turned into a prison, and
now a museum.
In 1975, the Khmer Rouge were elected (likely rigged) and immediately
closed the borders. Their leader, Pol Pot, was set on making Cambodia
self-sufficient and thought there was too much consumerist ideology in the
cities. The country folk were his ideal because they were untainted by greed
and capitalism. This seems reasonable: 'there is too much greed and
individualism, so this country and my people need to refocus on the importance
of community support' (my understanding is that this is, essentially, communist
ideology - which makes sense because Pol Pot was a communist).
So, he evacuated the big cities and ordered the detention and killing of
1/4 of the population i.e. city dwellers, because of their wicked ways. It was
systematic, brutal, and no one outside of Cambodia knew what was happening for
several years. Educated, city inhabitants would be taken to the S21 prison to
be detained, tortured for information, and sometimes killed. Then they were
sent, by the truckload, to the Killing Fields a few kilometres away. There is
an audio tour of the Killing Fields that comes with the ticket, and it is super
informative and very well done.
There are mass graves all over the Killing Fields Even around the
Killing Fields, and people were not very aware of what was going on: loud music
was often played to cover up the sounds of torture and death. It sounded as if
work was happening at night, and I guess, technically it was, for some ...
Andy's account:
First we went to the Choeung Ek Genocidal Center (the Killing Fields)
then later went to the S21 Detention Center.
Choeung Ek was rough, and our first look into what actually happened
through the Khmer Rouge era. We had a recorded audio guide tour, so as we
walked around we could have a recording play that was about the site we were
currently at. It was truly chilling. I had to stop several times and sit down,
as I kept wondering why and how humans could do such horrible things to other
humans. What needs to break in someone to make them think that it's okay to not
only kill but to pointlessly torture someone.
The Holocaust I used to rationalize as extremism, scapegoating and
othering getting well out of hand. With the Khmer Rouge era, it wasn't a
genocide. There was no ethnic othering. It was Cambodian people, largely Khmer,
doing these things to other Cambodian people, largely Khmer. It began as a war
against capitalism and excess, then later became a war against suspected
dissenters.
The truly terrifying part for me was how the ideas and behaviours of the
Khmer Rouge are very present in our western society. Really, the ideologies I'm
surrounded by in my daily life and my social media life are so closely aligned
with the Khmer Rouge revolutionary ideology. Further, the atrocities committed
at the Killing Fields are very present in our media, in movies, in TV, in
literature. In short, we need to be exceptionally careful not to repeat the
mistakes of the past, because if a political revolution did happen and the
current government were to fall, we would be on a very slippery slope to
violent, death-filled madness.
Where Choeung Ek was chilling by hearing people's experiences about it
and seeing first hand the remnants of it, S21 Detention Center was...clean. It
was a series of rooms, often with a broken bed and an empty ammo box. Over and
over again, it was similar. In the upper levels, there was a photo gallery
where someone had been able to show performative art. Art that was designed to
do something.
In another building, it was filled with smaller cells, meant for holding
people temporarily. In this building were photos of prisoners. Hundreds of
them. This facility was specifically for members of the Khmer Rouge. All of the
prisoners that were tortured and executed in this facility were members of the
Khmer Rouge that had been accused of something. This period in Cambodian
history was full of false accusations, and guilty until proven innocent. One of
the mantras for Pol Pot was better to kill 100 innocents than miss a traitor.
S21 was set up after the city had been evacuated, which is part of why
nobody was able to hear the screams of the people. The disturbing part of S21
was personal accounts of prisoner life. In these accounts, if you could fix
things or make propaganda you were safe. If you couldn't, your time was limited
from malnutrition, disease, beatings, torture, and execution.
There was also a display talking about the legal aspects of the
atrocities. Turns out, most of the crimes that Khmer Rouge members have been
accused and tried for are unfounded. 15-20 different crimes are being applied
to every trial, yet only the forced relocation of citizenry, mass killing, and
crimes against humanity actually have foundation. That's it. So while, yes, the
things that were done to people were horrible and should never be done to
anyone or anything, justice rather than retribution or revenge needs to happen.
The Killing Fields and S21 left me feeling sickened, disappointed,
frustrated, and angry at people for doing bad things to people, no matter their
reasons for it. I left shocked at how much the worldview that lead to these
atrocities is so close to the worldviews I and those I identify with have. I
left disturbed at how many of the atrocities I see in media and even in daily
life. Really, we are not so different after all, but we might be able to be
different enough:
|
||||
|
May 31: Kampot
Woke up at stupid o'clock to catch a 7am bus to Kampot, in the south;
didn't like the time, but it was nice to see the countryside. We arrived at
Monkey Republic Hostel around noon, ate lunch, and napped. Then we decided what
we wanted to do in Kampot, and watched some Netflix before bed.
June 1: Kampot
After breakfast, we rented a motorbike. It was way heavier than I was
anticipating. I drove up and down the block a bit, was a little nervous, but
figured I could do it. Andy got on the back and we went to get gas. Before we
could even get the 3 blocks to the gas station, I crashed the damn thing.
Now, we were going slow enough and it could have been SO much worse than
it was. So, dear readers, don't freak out. And here are photos of my injuries -
and I had the worst of it:
The crash occurred when we were trying to cross an intersection, leaving
the first gas station ... though, it wasn't actually a gasoline station; maybe
it was for diesel only. I now understand why scooters and motorbikes begin to
drive on the wrong side of the road, gain speed, and then switch lanes. I tried
to go faster than was smart, while turning, and then slowed down so that we
didn't hit the curb, and then when we started to fall, I didn't speed up so the
bike slid out from under us.
I was pinned under the bike, but Andy was clever and sort of bailed as
we were falling. This meant that he was not trapped, and his injuries were
minimal. Thank goodness. He pulled the bike off me so that I could stand, and
then three people came to help us. I could see that I was bleeding in a few
places, and despite the lack of severe injuries, I was certainly in shock.
I had a hard time seeing clearly (everything was VERY bright), so had
some water, and tried to listen to what the locals were telling me about how to
drive a bike.
However, I was in no state to drive a bike. Or even walk the bike. I had
to sit down a few times and have water, then walked the three blocks back to
the hostel while Andy walked with the bike. We have a first aid kit, so cleaned
ourselves up as best we could.
Andy borrowed iodine from the hostel, and got me a Sprite. At this
point, I was shaking and couldn't stand or sit up on my own. I was just sitting
on the bathroom floor, in my underwear, waiting for Andy to clean himself up so
that he could help me. I am so grateful that he wasn't severely hurt, and that
he was with it enough to both bail and take care of me. Not sure how I would
have handled it had I been on my own.
When my shock subsided, I napped. Awkwardly. Apparently, Andy was dealing
with the after effects of adrenaline and his own shock while I was asleep. When
I was half awake, Andy decided to try driving the bike. He went up and down our
street a few times, and then understood why lessons and a license are
important.
We decided that neither of us was comfortable or interested in driving
the bike, so we took it back and went to the pharmacy for some more medical
supplies. Turns out, they are stupidly cheap! We got 20 ethyl alcohol wipes, 10
individually wrapped gauze pads, iodine, and hydrogen peroxide for $1.75.
Incredible.
We spent the rest of the evening at the hostel, recuperating.
June 2: Kampot
We went on a tour to the Bokor Hill Station. Up a mountain, in the
national park, there is an abandoned town that was the site of a battle between
the Khmer Rouge and the Vietnamese in 1979. The church and casino/hotel still
stand, as well as a house for the King, but the post office has been
demolished. There is an orange lichen covering the church and King's house that
gives it a very eerie air, and apparently there is a Matt Damon film that was
filmed here.... or at least part of the movie. Also, there is a warning about
pea soup fog up on top of the mountain. It's pretty intense.
|
We stopped at a waterfall on the way. It was nice :)
There was a sunset river cruise that we opted out of, mostly because of
our injuries and we were tired. I haven't seriously injured myself in 10 years,
and my body was feeling it. So we watched some Netflix and wandered the town
for dinner and money exchange; turns out, most establishments prefer and may
only have change for smaller bills. Thanks, ATM...
June 3: Kampot to Siem Reap
We booked a bus at 8:30am to leave at 10am. So, we packed up our stuff,
checked out, and ate breakfast at Jack's Place: straight up the best breakfast
in Cambodia, bar none. Real bacon, excellent coffee and banana shakes (those
were two shakes, not a coffee-banana shake), enough food to actually appease
Andy's appetite, AND THE MOST ADORABLE PUPPY I HAVE EVER SEEN.
This lil guy is only one month old. ONE MONTH! AHHHHH MELTED. Best.
Obviously.
We were picked up in a van, which we thought might be our bus to Phnom
Penh, but no. We were dropped off at a stop in town; it was maybe a 10 minute
walk and we easily could have done it by foot (we ate dinner half a block away
the night before). There were a whole bunch of tourists going to different
places at what seemed to be a bus stop. Bus stops here are not at all like at
home. There are no clearly demarcated signs or waiting areas or obvious
uniforms of any kind so that we know to whom we should direct our questions.
We were somehow corralled onto a mini-bus ie a 10 seater van, to make
the first leg of our journey. Oddly enough, we were seated across from each
other rather than beside. Poor Andy didn't have a whole lot of space due to the
size of his seat companion. When we arrived in Phnom Penh it was raining pretty
hard, and we were told to wait until our next bus was to arrive and given
another ticket. I was feeling antsy and thirsty; luckily, there was a coffee
shop right beside the bus office. Fresh apples and absolutely delicious iced
lemon tea. Om nom nom. Waiting for the bus was weird. When we first checked for
how long we would be waiting, we were told 15 minutes. Then 45 minutes. When it
was 3:30, we asked when the bus was coming. Phone calls by two people were
made, and then it showed up 15 minutes later.
It was a very cramped 12 seater van to Siem Reap, and a 6 hour drive
with two stops. We arrived at 930pm and needed to figure out how to get to our
hostel without overpaying. Thank goodness for friendly fellow travelers. Now we
know about Maps Me! And our hostel was less than 1km away, on the same street!
Success!
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDelete