The Killing Fields

This entrance will be relatively short. Not because I don't want to bore you, but because some times there just aren't words to describe what you see or how you feel.

We spent a relaxed Sunday in Siem Reap; Nick sampled the delights of the food market, whilst Steve and I found an English speaking church to visit. After visiting an icecream parlour for the third time in as many days, to purchase their delicious passion fruit sorbet, we got an early night. There was more travelling ahead of us.

It only took four or five hours to travel down to Phnom Penh. The minibus journey should probably have been longer, however, our driver was determined to beat the landspeed record - even if there were other vehicles or rather large potholes in the way. We knew our time in Cambodia's capital was limited, so once we were there, we dumped our bags at the hostel and went to visit a place called Toul Sleng.

Toul Sleng, or S-21 as it became known, was formally a high school, but in 1975 when the Khmer Rouge drove citizens out of the city and made Phnom Penh a ghost town, the building became a high security prison for the regime. Here Pol Pot tortured and killed thousands and thousands of innocent people.

For obvious reasons, I won't go into details, but I was rocked to my core by the things we saw and heard that day. The three of us barely said a word to each other as we walked amongst the haunting photographs of victims staring back at us, we didn't need to.

The next day we learned more about the Cambodian genocide when we journeyed to the Choeung Ek Memorial. In this rural town, about 15km southwest of Phnom Penh, lies a place infamously called 'the killing fields'. As we walked through the peaceful former orchard, it was hard to imagine the brutality that led to more than seventeen thousand people being executed here.

I knew visiting these places would be difficult - but nothing can prepare you to hear about atrocities like this. Conservative estimates place the number of Cambodians killed during the Khmer Rouge's three and a half year reign of the country, at 2 million. 2 million, or in other words one third of the county's population. 

During my travels around this region I have been amazed by the generosity of the people we have met. Everywhere we have gone we have been greeted by smiles and kindness. It was a shock to be reminded just how dark human nature can be as well.