Phnom Penh

Although every place we had visited, has monuments relating to the war, all collectively known as the Killing Fields. Phnom Penh has perhaps the most moving memorials and museums relating to the the war in Cambodia. We visited the Killing Fields of Choeung EK, effectively it was an extermination camp during the war. Here they have exhumed some of the mass graves and a memorial has been built with the human remains clearly on display, it was an incredibly moving place and a graphic reminder of the barbaric regime of Pol Pot.

Phnom Penh - Choeung Ek

What amazed us, learning about some of the history, is how recent it is and what little, it appears, the West did at the time to help the Cambodians. Its something that we will probably read further on when we return home. With such a sad recent history, the Cambodians appear to be very optimistic people.

From there we went to the Tual Sleng museum or S21, it was a former secondary school that was turned into a prison during the war.

Phnom Penh - S21

The building has been left pretty much untouched since then with the razor wire still up places and the cells remain intact. The most harrowing thing were the rows of black and white photo’s of prisoners, taken like mugshots. Virtually all the people in these photos were later killed.
In all it was an extremely sombre day but I am glad we went, we learnt a great deal about the history of Cambodia of which we were previously unaware.
The following day we checked out the vast two main markets in Phnom Penh, we bought a couple of Christmas presents, not the first of this trip either. Although tempted to buy a couple of other things, we resisted because of our budget and the logistics of getting it home! Had a little adventure around the supermarkets as well as our Marmite stock were running low – I know its sad but I cannot tell you how good it tastes each morning, like a little slice of home!
In several places in Cambodia you can have a massage from a blind person, several different charities run these places. We went to a place called seeing hands and had a really good massage, its great because just by having a massage you are supporting charity and helping the people that work there – I think this is called a win-win situation!

Phnom Penh, Cambodia