Today we had a look at the reality of life in Cambodia and saw close-up evidence of the atrocities that have led to the poverty we have already seen. Although very interesting, today was pretty horrific too.

We began the day with a ride in a tuk-tuk to the Royal Palace and had a guided tour of one of the King's residences. We then had a city tour of Phnom Penh on cyclos (a chair with a man attached behind cycling you along) and were taken to a local restaurant for lunch. The restaurant was a non-profit organisation and the proceeds went towards educating children and provided jobs for local people. The food was also pretty good too. Luke and I bought a notebook from the shop at the restaurant, the cover was made from recycled tyres!

We then began a bus ride to the Killing Fields, where our guide, who had lost several family members during the Polpot regime told us how just one man's ideas had led to the death of half the population of Cambodia, 3.5 million people in just 3 years and 8 months. Anyone who was educated or wealthy, or even those who wore glasses (as they could read) were seen as a threat to Polpot so were all taken to prison, tortured for any information they may have about other intelligent people in hiding, before being taken to the Killing Fields. To save bullets and the energy of the men, people were buried alive at times or hit over the head with an axe. Many other ways of killing people were also graphically described to us. The field we visited was one of thousands all over Cambodia, but this was the largest. Here mass graves contained over 20,000 men, women, children and babies. Many of the bodies have now been exhumed, with bones scattered all over the site, constantly underfoot with bits sticking out from the grass and the skulls on display in a huge memorial containing 9000 skulls (see photo).

After a lengthy talk about how this affected our guide's family in particular, and how people were tricked from realising what was going on for a long time (people were told their family or friends had gone for 'Re-Education') we then visited S-21, one of the main prisons in Phnom Penh. Here we met one of seven people who survived this prison during the Khmer Rouge era, the only one to still be alive today. We were shown awful images of the bodies that were found at the prison and shown the tools used to torture the prisoners. There was also a photo of every single prisoner who came to S-21 before being killed, on display. An extemely haunting experience.

The mood was (appropriately) very sombre for the rest of the day. It was very difficult to comprehend what we had seen but it also encouraged a new found respect in the Cambodian people for what they have been through and how they have come back from a country in tragedy and chaos. The fact that the UN has been putting together a case for prosecuting members of the Khmer Rouge regime for years but still no one has been brought to justice is a travesty.