Cambod-Ian

I am feeling a bit sad, after my first full day in Cambodia. I'm not lonely or depressed or anything. It's just that I've spent a good portion of the day touring museums and monuments to the Cambodian genocide that occurred under the Pol Pot regime.

Once again, I arrived in a new country, not knowing a heckuva lot about the history. I knew a little bit about the Killing Fields, and some about the genocide. But I was not really prepared for what I saw today. I've never seen so many real skulls in all my life.

As you know, I was booked for a tour in Cambodia. Today was the Phnom Penh tour. Basically, it consisted of a variety of monuments, palaces, temples and other historical elements. First stop on the tour (and a lovely way to start the day) was the notorious Killing Fields. This was where the systematic genocide of millions of innocent Cambodians took place. Basically, if you were a Cambodian that resisted the Pol Pot regime, or were an intellectual, artist, wore glasses, read a book, etc, you were tortured and then executed. I saw thousands of photographs of people that were killed. Strangely enough, the KR photographed each and every person before they were killed. Sort of like an inventory list. Then after they died, they were photographed again. So many of the victims were young children and mothers. If you were a relative of someone that was about to be killed, you got rounded up and killed too. So sad.

After this portion of the tour, we were taken to the Royal Palace (much more my style). It reminded me of the Royal Palace in Bangkok. Very similar architecture, with somewhat less gold. Most of the places we went to today forbid photography, so it was not all that worthwhile for me. But, I still obtained a large amount of photos from the architecture of the places, even if I couldn't go inside for photos. The rest of the tour group (3 Americans) went in to ooh and ahh about the various and sundry Buddhas, while I spent time outside photographing the buildings. While I appreciate that other people like to marvel at the religious artifacts, I am only interested in the buildings and the history. You've seen one Buddha, you've seen them all.

Overall, I like Phnom Penh. It's a fairly cosmopolitan city. I am writing this in an upscale restaurant called K West. There is a very western feel to it. Great food, good wine list. Many of the restaurants here are quite modern. I was surprised and impressed. I think that Cambodia is ahead of Vietnam that way.

Tomorrow, I head to Siem Reap, the gateway city to Angkor Wat. I am anticipating that it will be the highlight of the tour in Cambodia. Well really, it's the REASON to visit this country. Anything else is just fodder. The bus ride tomorrow is another 6 hours, and it starts at 7 am. Ugh.