Phnom Penh

The journey by bus to Phnom Penh proved longer then expected and not a lot of fun as I started to become slightly feverish. However we made it ok and after a bit of haggling with the swarm of pushy tuk tuk drivers at the bus station headed for our first hotel in the Monivong West area. Tbh we were not particularly keen on this area despite guidebook recommendations and opted to move the next day. We found the central area near the national monument more pleasant.

After an afternoon feeling grotty, fever and headache, I felt up for a stroll to find a restaurant and we ended up at the well known Romdeng. Run by a charity called Friends the restaurant trains street children for the hospitality industry and offered super service and lovely food. Although suffering a bit the fish Amok, a Khmer curry, was excellent. Em's salad choice was generously portioned and very tasty.

The next day brought a twist to my ailment, fever fully abating, but being replaced with digestive issues. This was later potentially diagnosed as Cryptosporidiosis with a trusty bit of internet self diagnosis, and with an Aussie doctor friend we met agreeing this could be a possibility. Likely place of infection being the jungle trek which supported likely incubation timescales and also discovering my water purification tablets used on jungle water do not prevent this. With rehydration and recuperation the key to recovery we would take it fairly easy for the next few days. This parasitic bug typically passing after several days.

After a gentle start for obvious reasons we visited both the Grand Palace and Silver Pagoda. Whilst slightly less impressive than the Thai equivalent the palace was still a spectacular piece of architecture. The Silver Pagoda's key differentiator its solid silver floor tiles. Expecting gleaming solid bars, in reality these felt a little more like an industrial tin floor beneath the feet. It was here we met Steve, the aussie doctor, and Lorna who we enjoyed drinks and dinner with, the next couple of days. Albeit taking it a bit gentle on the food for me knowing eating still produced abdominal pains and more nightly trips to the porcelain bicycle.

We also had the pleasure of meeting up again with our Irish friend Jamie from earlier in the trip. The next day we jumped in a tuk tuk together with Jamie and his friend Patrick, $15 for the day's hire, and made the necessary but sobering trip to the killing fields and S-21 prison.

These two grim and historic sites are inextricably linked. When the Khmer Rouge fought its way to power in 1975 it began a brutal programme of restrucuring the country into an agricultural based cooperative. This extreme maoist ideology resulting in the death of 1-3 million Cambodians. Amoung these 20,000 being detained and tortured in S-21 before night time transportation to Cheong Ek killing field and a brutal death.

Our first stop was the killing field. Strangely serene this national monument to the atrocities includes a memorial pagoda displaying tiered shelves of victims bones unearthed from the mass graves on site. A sober and reflective site which takes the visitor on an excellent audio tour of the sites graves and workings. In places bones surface in the path beneath your feet and remind of the recency and brutality of all that happened here. An essential visit revealing the nations deep scars and attempts to reconcile and heal albeit not a lot of fun.

The afternoon saw us back in town at S-21. A school prior to the Khmer Rouge ascendancy, prison would be a slight misnomer. S-21 was more  torture centre where political prisoners and others were held whilst confessions were extracted. It's a strange feeling place. The layout and wide stairwells consistent with schools the world over you could imagine childrens voices echoing up the stair wells. However stepping into the first rooms you encounter the true horror of the place.

With a single original photo blown up on the wall of a classroom you are presented with a steel bed and shackles in the centre. The photo illustrating the position of the dead final prisoners found chained to these beds. Killed just before the captors fled advancing Vietnamese liberation fighters.

Victims passing through the complex were kept in brick or wooden cells in another school block. In other blocks all were photographed and confessions archived. Reading some of these confessions was eerie. All were extracted repeatedly under torture until they hit the right note with the prison authorities, usually admitting treasonous activities against the wonderful regime.

One that particularly struck a cord was of Australian David Lloyd Scott. Alongside other westerners Scott, 32 years old, was in a sailing yacht which strayed into Democratic Kampuchea waters. Arrested, tortured and murdered under the pretence that he and the rest of the crew were CIA spys.

Whilst every victim of the Khmer Rouge regime is just as tragic the fact that it is so easy to relate to someone like yourself in some way made his story hit hard. The rest of the crew including Brit John Dawson Dewhurst all met the same cruel fate. Young guys on an adventure sucked into something unimaginably awful.

Also notable was the disregard held for the the innocence of children. Brutal treatment and death were not withheld, with the regime extolling the removal of the roots as well as the grass of opposition.

Trials are still ongoing for some members of the regime. One of the saddest things surrounding this whole dark chapter in the worlds history is how little the international community did to prevent the killing and even assist in the fall of the regime. The UN even affording the Khmer Rouge the Cambodian seat in the UN. Geopolitics and national interests over riding humanity. It was the Vietnamese army who finally brought about the fall of the regime in 1979 although pockets of Khmer Rouge fighters lived on in the jungles in the west well into the nineties.

Next stop Battambang.