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Greetings from Phnom Penh!
We arrived in Phnom Penh yesterday afternoon, it is a hot, dirty, smelly deathtrap but we love it! After haggling with tuk tuk drivers for ages we got to our guesthouse in the Boeng Kak area (by a lake). The tuk tuk journey was an experience in itself, Cambodians do not adhere to the highway code, road signs, lanes, helmet wearing etc yet somehow do not die!
Met some people at the guesthouse but unfortunately they were leaving to go to Vietnam today. Chilled out by the lake with some delicious yet deceptively strong cocktails.
Today was hot & sticky & so we foolishly decided to walked for miles along the quayside of the Mekong River. We went to Psar Themi (a massive market) and bought a krama (shawl to you & me) and then had a very Cambodian meal in amongst the food vendors - i'm fairly sure mine had some sort of animal testicles in it but Jo reassures me they weren't.
We walked to the Royal Palace only to be informed we had to be covered elbow to knee, felt like naughty schoolgirls who had rolled their skirts up too high, but seriously in this heat the less clothes the better!! On the plus side as we walked out heads hanging we met two girls (Kate & Jacqui) who were in a similar predicament so we all went for ice cream & a boat tour instead! Happy days, unfortunately they are also going to Vietnam tomorrow, this seems to be a trend!
Plan for tommorw is the Killing Fields & the S21 Museum about the murderous Khmer rule...apparently it is harrowing :-s
Will update again soon
Much love, Jill & Jo xx
Phnom Pehn part 2
If i had to use one word to sum up yesterday it would have to be - brutal! After hiring Lucky as our our tuk tuk driver for the day (hopefully he is lucky as he didn't have any mirrors on his tuk tuk & as previously mentioned the roads are a dangerous nightmare!) we endured a particularly stiflingly hot, dirty & cough inducing (due to the exhaust fumes off the vehicles) 30min drive across Phnom Pehn at "rush hour" to The Killing Fields, which is where the Khymer Rouge murdered countless people - abit like the extermination camps of WW2. What struck me first was how quiet & peaceful the area is - it is hard to comprehend the atrocities that were committed there. The museum also pipes really sorrowful haunting music that adds to the atmosphere of the place. The central memorial is thousands of skulls housed in a glass tower, whilst walking around the memorial it felt like the skulls were staring back at you - some skulls have bullet holes, others have cracks or chips in them made from axes or sticks etc used in the murders. You can walk around the area where the mass graves were which are now simply outlined by wooden fences with a sign saying something like "166 bodies found here without heads". Due to the weather & the inevitable passing of time the graves are now being eroded which has resulted in skulls, bones & items of clothing beginning to poke through the ground...
After that we went to the Russian Market (not really sure the history behind why it's called the Russian Market but nevermind). We spent ages wandering round, haggling over (relatively) extortiantly priced bags & purses and getting lost in the maze of the market!
We headed to Tuolsleng or S21 Prison Museum. This was where the Khymer Rouge turned a school into a prison/torture detention centre. It was so depressing, classrooms had been converted into "interrogation rooms"& cells. It was pretty powerful with pictures on the walls of how people had been found there, chained to metal "beds" covered in blood. Some of the torture techniques sounded excruciating - fingernails being pulled out by pliars then alcohol poured onto them, being hung upside down until unconscious then dipped into a filthy bucket of "water", whipping, beating etc. What i found particularly disturbing was that when we were there a small child was playing on some of the metal frames that had originally been used by the school childern but then were used by the Khymer Rouge for much different activities. There was wall after wall of pictures of each prisoner, most of them look terrified, some were clearly being held in front of the camera, some were women with their babies in their arms - unfortunately one of the Kyhmer's favoured ways of exterminating childern was swinging them by their legs onto trees or walls. Like i say it was a pretty intense & brutal day, thoroughly depressing & its scary to think that this happened so recently & the perpertrators only were brought to justice in the last few years. I think the Killing Fields & S21 Museum are really good & atrocities like this should be remembered.
However, today was definately a day of two halves. We got back to the guesthouse & chilled out for an hour just digesting the day's events then we headed out for dinner. At a little local Indian restuarant we got chatting to an Australian called Dan who actually lived in Cambodia, we went to his guesthouse to play pool & started chatting with the owner who was also a talented Korean tattooist...before any of you panic no we didnt get matching tattoos! We played pool then they taught us how to play poker & we ended up playing to 2am & we whooped their ass - mostly likely beginners luck but i'll take the victories where i can get them! It was a really fun evening & we found out lots of interesting things & got some pointers about where to go/not to go in Cambodia & Laos.
All in all a good if emotionally draining day.
Jill x
- comments
Breen Tansey Sounds very exotic. I hope the Killing Fields and museum don't get you too down (Auschwitz completely bummed me out but it was worth it - everyone should go once)! How about some photos of your travels?
Jill I hope to upload some pictures soon, be patient with me! The Killing Fields & museum were definately worth going to although i did feel drained afterwards.
Jaysephine Sounds like you're having an amazing, if sometimes difficult time - I am utterly impressed at the sheer amount of information you've managed to hold in that tiny woman's brain to then type it all up again, excellent work Tansinator! When do you move on from Cambodia and what's the next plan? You could have got some photos uploaded really easily, if you only had a special usb converter. Doh! Oh well. I wonder if an Edge t shirt would be useful in these circumstances. Keep the updates coming, can't imagine it's the easiest thing in the world when you're living the dream to sit down and pin it all to a blog, and am appreciating the effort for sure - nowhere near as exciting over here, but for further information, I am trotting over to hotmail to write you an email now. Love the t*** off the pair of you. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Jaysephine Oh LOOK it censored me AGAIN. For...f.... right hotmail. Hotmail likes my swearing.
Kath Tansey Hi - got the hang of the blog at last! Sounds like an amazing experience even tho' exhausting. The blog will be like a diary for you. Have fun. XXXXXXXXXX Am not going to swear - couldn't bear to be cenesored!