Phnom Penh, Cambodia

January 17th-22nd, 2009
On the bus ride from Saigon to Phnom Penh we noticed right away a difference in the poverty level. The ditches all along the way were filled with garbage. The huts looked no different than any other rural places we've passed, but in the small town/city we stopped the bus at to pee and cross a ferry at, I was horror struck. I was mauled by children begging and chattering at me and the bus crew had to act as a bouncer for me to even cross the street. It was also filthy here, mostly dirt roads and ox or cows, not sure, rib cages protruding, jammed up the streets. People and cars were weaving about. I thought, "what have we gotten ourselves into coming here?" It smelled bad, it was almost like a world vision tv program. It was so overwhelming!

The capital city, Phnom Penh was a drastic difference for the most part. It was clean, and it was obvious money was sunk into the place where the countries rich live, and the tourists come. The poor were begging on the sidewalk, while the wealthy drove their Lexus', Mercedes, and Cadillac Escalade's down the street.

We absolutely loved it here. The people were lovely. Everyone was very friendly, laughing and smiling, and way less in your face trying to sell you something. This made it so much more enjoyable. This and the fact that it was HOT, compared to a cold 'Nam, and northern Laos, we decided to stay a few extra days.

All the regular annoyances exist here as they do anywhere. Prostitution is appalling. And not discreet at all. (I'm assuming because this country is not communist like Laos and Vietnam?), but everyone is out in public. Old, mostly white men, with very young tiny Asian girls. Any time I was not with Chris he was asked, "you want women? I have all kinds, you like small Asian women?" No Thanks, he'd respond. "ok well you want crystal meth? opium? cocaine..?" All the time. You get used to seeing and hearing this and carry on. Families play in the park, there are some aerobics along the river, kites and music in the streets, an elephant is walked through town every day from a temple down the road, and even kids selling lonely planet books for hours everyday still goof around like kids do. For lack of a better word, we liked the "vibe'' here. lol

We visited the S21 prison that was a school transformed to a torture prison by Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge in 1975-79. It was so horrific. He was torturing and murdering his own people. We saw the rooms they were kept in and actual photos of the people when they came in with a number like our prison mug shots. We saw a group of people looking at the photos and recognize a face in the pictures. Some were just kids about two years old, so scared, so confused, so innocent.We saw the different make-shift cells. One room people laid scrunched together like sardines bound by ankle shackles. The people beside them and also to the next row that was laying with their feet facing their feet. They made water torture chambers and also hung them upside down until they passed out, dumped them in shit water that would wake them up and do it again. They were electrocuted and whipped. It was 3-4 stories high and barbed wire was put along the balconies so people could not commit suicide. They got whatever confession they wanted by these methods, which in turn would "justify" their punishment or death. It was genocide. It was all the educated and influential people in the society first, but it went way beyond to regular people, women and children. Only 14 people survived the S21 prison.

We went and visited one of the killing fields where people were shipped to die. (A main one, but they were 1000's scattered all over the country). Bullets were expensive and the numbers got to be too high to kill in one day, so holding cells were made. People were stabbed, beheaded, buried alive, babies were bashed against trees, etc. They sprayed poisons to mask the smell from neighboring farms, and hung a radio from a tree to make loud noise to hide the screams. Millions died, the approximations of numbers are conflicting. I couldn't possibly convey what we saw in writing.

We did do some things that were not depressing too! We went to the Russian Market. Cambodia has factories for so many brands like abercrombie and fitch, old navy, quicksilver, banana republic, puma,gap etc. and they are sold here at the Russian market. Cheap stuff, leftovers maybe? Its like a sweat lodge inside, we couldn't handle it long but did manage to find a few things. We saw the Presidential Palace and the famous Silver Pagoda, and had multiple spa treatments. (Chris now LOVES massages). We spent some time with a family living here from New Zealand that we met, through a friend of a friend of a friend. This families oldest daughter, Courtney, was there on University break, she took us to an actual shopping mall, and the Central market. Her mom made us a true home cooked meal with actual mashed potatoes and gravy!!! What a treat.

From the little that we learned here, it seemed that although a free country, corruption is a huge problem. We learned a bit because Courtney's mom is a teacher here and her younger sister attends an international school. School is free, but English schools, or good private schools cost money. Teachers are paid poorly so we heard that kids even in free schools lots of times have to pay their teacher some money everyday to be allowed in the class. That even if you get an A you have to pay to get it. So the smart kids that are poor get nowhere and the rich dumb ones get everything. If a car hits a motorbike and it is really the cars fault, it will automatically be the bikes fault because the car has money, and you "hit the car". You have to pay your mailman or he will stop bringing your mail. It goes on.

There are still many children not in school, handicapped etc. begging in the streets. Women sleep with their babies on the sidewalks. We were told that a lot of this is organized by a type of "mafia" for lack of a better word. That the kids don't actually get the money or food, its taken from them, and that those women are dropped off with their children and made to lay on the street for money, also not keeping it. The same corruption exists in many orphanages. Children may be just put there when people come, or may not get any of the food or money that is meant for them. "Orphan Tourism"is a new industry that exploits people's generosity, trying to recruit visitors to donate for their own private agenda. That is not to say that all orphanages are like this. We heard of several legitimate ones that do wonderful things for the children. There are many charities, business that support charities, and many NGO's with kind-hearted people doing wonderful things here. The government is also trying to crack down hard on child sex crimes and posts large billboards etc. which was really nice to see.

I know this is no different than many of the 3rd world countries in the world. But seeing it first hand and for the first time, it really made an impression on us. Our trip to the dump made the biggest impression of all. I'll write about that tomorrow. But here's a few pics of Phnom Penh.

One of the large cells. They laid with no mattress, chained to the bed. The box was the toilet. The walls in each room had a photo of the last victims still laying dead, decaying in a pile of blood on the floor.

Read the writing and notice the bones beside the tree, enough said.

Entrance to the Palace and Silver Pagoda

Amok fish in a banana leaf, authentic Cambodian dish... mmmmm

Loved spending time with these KIWIS