After being stuck at the border crossing between Vietnam & Cambodia for over 1 hour, having to surrender my passport and then drive away without it and then having my first taste of cambodian food, I saw my first Motorcycle accident. It wasn't pretty. A lady on a bike was hit by a van travelling in front of the bus I was on. We didn't hang around to see if she was ok. From what I could see she clearly wasn't.
We arrived in Phnom Penh around 3 hours later in 36 degree heat. The first thing that struck me about Phnom Penh was how different it was to Saigon. There were motorbikes, thousands of them, but no where near that of Vietnam. The second thing that struck me as different was how friendly the people were to me. Everyone from the bus driver to the guy who worked at the tourist office to my first Tuk Tuk Driver. Everyone wants to practise their english and love to hear about where you come from.
Phnom Penh was my first city where I had booked no accomodation. My first mistake was telling my Tuk Tuk driver that prior to telling him where I actually wanted to stay. He proceeded to ferry me around to 2 different guesthouses prior to taking me to where I wanted to go. After a very stern "Please just just me to the Number 9 Guesthouse!" he finally understood and took me strait there.
The Number 9 guesthouse had everything you would want out of a backpacker hangout; a Retaurant, a Bar with cheap beer, a TV showing movies & a great view. The one thing it didn't have was nice rooms. I mean, they were ok, they just weren't wonderful. However for $5 a night I wasn't about to complain. Plus the bar and the view made up for it!
It wasn't until I went to have a shower that I realised the bathroom situation. I had a bathroom, with a proper toilet etc etc. However the shower was simply a cold water hose and a bucket.
I guess this kind of stuff is character building at the end of the day!
I met one the guesthouses tuk tuk drivers at the bar that night, who offered to take me around town the next day. The next morning I met up with him, and decided to go to the S21 Toul Sleng Prison & The Killing Fields. There was more to see but I didn't want to cram to much into one day.
The Toul Sleng Genocide Museum was a pretty confronting place to walk around. It used to be a school until the Khmer Rouge came into power in the 1970's, where it was converted into a torture prison for people not part of Pol Pots "Ideal Race". The museum has wall to wall pictures of nearly every prisoner who was kept there and killed. In other rooms it has testimonies written by the families of some of the victims. Some which didn't know there bothers, fathers and sons had died until either seeing their picture on those walls, or hearing from someone else who had seen their pictures.
The museum still has the torture chambers set up with their instruments on the floor. Sitting above that on the wall are pictures of the victims who fell to those instruments.
One thing that was probably the most interesting part for me was in one room they have pictures of members of Khmer Rouge who still have not been prosecuted. On these pictures of the Khmer Rouge senior officers, there is all kinds of graffitti written over there faces in cambodian. I can only imagine what it might say.
There is an ongoing argument in Cambodia as to wether there should be a trail or not, due to the cost involved. Some believe that money should be invested back into the rebuilding of Cambodia.
My Tuk Tuk driver then took me out to the Killing Fields, which is where most of the 17,000 detainees from Toul Sleng (s-21) where taken to and killed. In the middle of the field is a massive glass tower, holding over 8000 skulls that were found in the fields. The shallow graves them selves have never been filled in, and just sit open for the public to see. There are signs at certain sights that read "x amount of women and childrens bodies were found here" ect etc. It was all very moving stuff.
However, you can't help but fell angry as you walk through these places. Angry that a genocide like this could have happened, and angry that nothing was done sooner to stop it.
The next day was a bit more light hearted!
My same driver picked me up again and took me to the Central Market, the National Museum and the Royal Palaces.
The Central Market was absolute mahem. Think of anything you have ever wanted in your whole life and you could buy it there. There were people everywhere!
The National Museum was nothing overly exciting. Some interesting looking artifacts, but it took no more than about 20 minutes to walk around.
The Royal Palace was only a 10 minute walk from the museum, so I told my Tuk Tuk driver I would meet him out the front of the palaces at around 3.30pm.
As I walked along the outer walls of the Palace, a young cambodian girl came up to me trying to sell me water. After explaining I wasn't interested she proceeded to bombard me with questions about where I was from, laughing hysterically at every answer I gave her. When I told her I was from Australia, she just about near wet her self and started screaming "G'Day Mate! G'Day Mate!" at the top of lungs....! I had quite a long conversation with her while I waited for the palace to open and learned that the cambodian kids that go to school go from around 7.30am to 11.30am, then come back at 4pm for the rest of their classes. I also got an introduction into the famous Cambodian humour when the girl asked me if I spoke cambodian. When I said no she said (in between fits of laughter) "Thats just strange, because I am Cambodian in Cambodia and speak english, you Australian in Cambodia but don't speak Cambodian!!". In between feeling stupid and embarrassed, I did manage to have a laugh with her about that one!
Once inside the gates of the Royal Palaces, it was amazing. There was around 5 different temples and palace that you could only see the outside of. It was a fantastic area to walk around and like nothing I had ever seen before.
The next day I left for Siem Reap. My overall opinion of Phnom Penh at that time was that I loved it. However, it wasn't until I left there and started to see more of the "real" Cambodian cities, that I began to have a bigger appreciation for the country as a whole.
No comments:
Post a Comment