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After taking in as much knowledge as possible yesterday at the genocide museum we headed to the killing fields today. We knew this was going to be a tuff one.
There were over 300 killing fields and 100-200 prisons throughout Cambodia but the ones in Phnom Penh were the most secretive and bigger. The prisons were tricked into going to the prisons, they were told they were going to a better house or what ever.
Grabbed a tuk tuk for $15 return. It was a fair old jaunt of about 15km each way. There is no way we would have found this on our own on a moped, it was through little alleys and dirt tracks, literally out in the sticks!
We were given audio headsets for our tour, I do love a good audio tour, me! Only trouble when I'm listening I stare into mid air and catch flies with my mouth. Haha attractive aren't I.
There was a big building as we walked down the main path, called the steepa. It had a glass cabinet in it with 17 levels to it. The bottom were clothes that had been recovered from the field and the bodies. The rest of the levels were bones and skulls, all had been forensically checked to diagnose the cause of death. There were stickers on the bones to show how and some were teeth being ripped out, axed in the head, beaten over the was with bamboo rods or metal rods. Some of them were awful! There were very few that were shot in the head with bullets because the soldiers were to keep them as they were 'precious' obviously incase of war. So the prisoners were bludgeoned to death. The skulls in there were all ages, babies to elderly.
There was what was called a truck stop next to it which was just a piece of grass, and there used to be a few shacks there too. They built the shacks after the increase of prisoners started coming to the fields and it became difficult to kill 100 everyday!
So they would sit them all blindfolded and handcuffed into this shack. They'd sit there for over 24 hours until it was their turn. Bother shack with chemicals that they would pour over the dead bodies to prevent the smell and finish them off basically because they weren't always dead when they were thrown into the pits, just unconscious or dying from the torture they had been through. Some were most likely buried alive.
There was a huge tree which was on the other side of the ground, called the music tree. They had speakers on it that they would play music on when they were torturing and killing prisoners so that the ones waiting to be killed couldn't hear the cries.
There's a sugar palm tree in the fields that has spikes on the stem which are really sharp, they would be used to saw people's heads off.
There were shacks still standing which were actually graves, they found 166 headless bodies in the one and 450 children, babies and women in another one which was next to the killing tree. They would hold the babies by their feet and swing them against the tree smashing their heads on it and once they were dead or unconscious the bodies tossed over their shoulders into the pits. Done with absolutely no remorse!
The graves had been dug up, each grave holding between 100 and 1000 bodies. The field is small compared to what I thought it would be. There's a lake at the back of it which has graves in but they've chosen to leave it alone and let them rest at peace. The place is so eery and hard to believe all these awful things happened only 40 years ago.
Sign posts telling us to beware of where we are stepping because the fragments of bones everywhere. When you look down and watch where your stepping you can see bone and teeth showing through the dirt, obviously not everywhere had been dug up and rain will wash dirt away and people walking over it everyday will make them show through more. It's just an unreal experience.
Mum - you gotta sort your belly out and get over here, dad would be in his oils with the history oozing out of this country! :)
After the killing fields I sort of realised that every person over the age of 40 have been through this. Every person I looked at I wondered what they had been through, the farming and the slavery work they were put through. Because nobody escaped it, everyone in the country was effected by Pol Pot's reign.
The homeless men and elderly women sat on the streets, some with no legs. How did that happen? Where are their family? What happened to them at the time of Pol Pot? I'm so intrigued but I can't just go up to everyone and ask them. It's such a sore subject, as you can imagine!
Another saying of Pol Pot was something along the lines of you have to cut the roots of plant to prevent it from become stronger and bigger' relating to the killings of the babies, killing the generation will decrease the chance of war with these psychological f**k ups.
After the fields we were both pretty gobsmacked and a little traumatised listening to the stories of the survivors and learning what happened on the soil we were stood on. We had to have a drink. 50cents for a beer. That was good enough for me! Bring me three.
We went to the river and watched the fishermen again, not as many today. It must be a Sunday fun club down there for them. One man nearly fell in. There were quite a few fish being caught but they were only tiny baby ones.
After dinner tonight we got talking to a retired history teacher, you could tell he was a teacher he could bloody talk! But he was nice enough! We were there for a good hour putting the world right.
I was (as always) people watching because it's my most favourite hobby!
Watched this tall and slim, hard faced 60 odd years of age Asian man get out of a truck with his dolled up Asian wife. The posture on him was like he had a metal pole up his arse. In his slow-no pace he strolled across the road not even looking at the traffic with the attitude of these people will stop at my command I'm god. He clicked his fingers and grunted at the waiters, they were soon rallying around him. Something about this guy... He's a p**** (Excuse the language guys!)
My bets he was a solider during the Khmer Rouge reign. You could tell he thought he was above everyone in that restaurant, he turned his nose up at so many homeless men begging, he just looked them up and down and pulled a face. This guy was an a******. Smoking his pipe sipping on whiskey. He clocked me scowling at him a few times, I just can't help it! I didn't like him and it was so obvious that he was ex military, but a horrible ex military. His whole persona was so rude and mean and nasty.
No Cambodian are stuck up or look down at beggars or each other, they don't click their fingers at one another because they have all been through a crappy passed and they stick by one another and look after each other. Okay I'm not saying they're all good and everything is sharing caring sort of thing but the majority of the people here are I think, everyone we have met seen lovely and look after each other. Even the tuk tuk drivers and that's a tuff business around here they're bloody everywhere!!
The waiters looked terrified of him!
We walked to the night market, there was no night market. So he ventured back to pack the bags and get ready for the bus journey outta here tomorrow.
Phnom Penh is a lovely city, it has a nice atmosphere about it. Not too big and not too small. There's a lot of poverty but doesn't every city have that problem?
The palace was a gorgeous building and the national temples all looked beautiful as well. But for the time being we are a little templed out.
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