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Today we woke up and had breakfast before going outside at 11am where DJ was waiting! He then took us on a 40 minute Tuk Tuk ride through the city to The Killing Fields…
A bit of background about this place; in 1975 a political leader called Pol Pot and his army called Khmer Rouge marched into Phnom Penh and terrorised the place. He wanted to enforce communism and thought education etc was not needed. He believed there didn't need to be schools etc and that all people needed to know was how to build things, grow things, manual work etc…. to put it bluntly, obviously there is a lot more to it than this.
It is very disturbing… they would take anyone they could find who wasn't doing the things they wanted… and take them to a prison ( which we visited after ) just to hold them before taking them to Choeung Ek killing fields to be executed. Age didn't matter to them and they would kill babies to elderly people….sometimes making people kill their own family members, or killing them in front of them. They would judge them buy the silliest things… for example, if you had soft hands you would be considered to not be a hard worker, and would be taken and be killed…. Crazy!!
There are over 300 killing fields throughout Cambodia but this one Choeung Ek is the most well-known. You get given a headset which you press a number on at certain places and it tells you the history of it. There is a grave with over 450 victims in it! Another one where 166 victims without heads were found… and around these you can still see pieces of bones, teeth, clothing that sometimes surfaces from the ground, especially when it rains. Caretakers collect all of these every month but we could still see some. There are thousands of bracelets on the fences of these graves which people have left to pay their respects. In the pictures you will see a tree with lots of bracelets on… which was the most disturbing of all. It is called The Killing Tree and it is where they would grab a baby by its legs, before whacking their head on this tree to kill them, then throw them to the mass grave next to it…. Horrible!
Throughout the tour you listen to stories from people who experienced all this trauma, from rape to murder etc. At the end there is a huge memorial….in which there are thousands of skulls stored behind glass. You can see on the skulls how they were killed, either with axe or knife cracks on the skulls, bullet holes, stab holes etc. It has the rough ages of the victims on it as well.
It was very emotional being there and after we left and met DJ again, he asked us if we wanted to "go to the shooting range to get rid of some anger" ….where you can do things such as fire a bazooka to blow up a cow! He said it was $350 to fire a bazooka but he could get it for $300 for us. After seeing all of that we didn't really want to blow something up!... so politely declined and got him to take us for lunch instead.
After lunch we visited the place where the people were held before going to the killing field. It is called S-21 and is a school that was converted into a prison. In here there is classroom after classroom converted into prison cells… some of them very very tiny. The people were left here with no food or water, before being taken to be executed, if they didn't die in the prison before! This was also very disturbing. It shows you how they were tortured and treated. They were all shackled up in these tiny cells… and you could see blood stains still on the floor etc. They would die from torture, starvation or disease… if they didn't, to the killing fields.
There are a few rooms dedicated to the people who were held here. It is just thousands and thousands of pictures of all of them…. Was so sad to see all of their faces… especially children. 20,000 people passed through this one prison alone, and only 7 survived!....7!!! One of the survivors was there trying to sell the book he has written about it… we had seen enough and didn't really want to read any more about it.
All of this only happened less than 40 years ago, which is so hard to get your head around… and some of the people responsible were only charged and convicted as late as 2007….absoloutely crazy!!!
DJ took us back and we asked him what the damage was! For 2 days' worth of driving us around he said $15 each…. Couldn't argue with that… we had covered quite a few miles! That night we had dinner and got an early night ready to catch a bus in the morning out of the city, to another place in Cambodia called Sihanoukville. There are nice beaches here which is always good…
- comments
Carolyn What an emotional day for you all! Humans can be so cruel to each other!! I bet you all needed that chill out time in the evening. Looking forward to seeing the beaches. Take care, lots of love from Mum x
Nan & Gramps You certainly are learning a lot,we are old enough to remember hearing when these things were first discovered horrid!! You deserved some beers after that day,hope you had a day of fun and relaxation the next day. Let's see some fun photos at the beach! TAKE CARE. Luv & miss you loads Nan & Gramps XXX
Dawn OMG. That's just awful. Was welling up reading that! Must be amazing to see all that but quite shocking that it was such a short time ago. Hope you are doing some fun things there too. Speak soon xx
Granny &Grandad Millard We knew the killing Fields were dreadful but your blog and pictures brought it home. How terrible and very sad. Hope your next stop at the beaches will be happier. Take care. Love