So yeah, we are in Cambodia
The trip to Phnom Penh was a liesurely 11 hour boat and bus trip from the Vietnamese border town on Chau Doc. On the upside we got to see alot more of the majestic Mekong. On the downside it was a really long and hot ride. We got off the boat and boarded a bus for the final hour on what has to be the worst road I have ever riden on. There were pot holes you could lose small children in. It was nuts. We met a guy from California that was building a house there. Cambodia: a retirement destination!? Personally, I don’t think they are quite there yet. The country still has alot of……….character. Land mines are still a big problem here, although they were not put there by the US this time. We spent four nights in the capital, Phnom Penh. The first night our bus dropped us off at a hostel in the back packer district. We wanted to eat before getting a room and by the time it was all done we ended up in a $4 beauty. The room was not terrible, but in all truth is was not nice. Generally, when chosing accomodation, I ask myself if my mother would stay there. If the answer is maybe…if she was very tired, it was late and was for just one night….just maybe then I know I have a winner. But this room even raised objections from my usually low maintenance girlfriend. “There is no toilet seat Marc. There is a toilet, but no seat. What did they do with the seat? Maybe you only get a seat in the $6 rooms. I get the squat toilet, but this….ugh. OMG. There are still pubes on the rim. This is disgusting.” and so on. Later that evening, after a few calming beers, we relaxed on the deck overlooking the lake……and the bobbing sea of trash. When we returned to our room we opened the door to find a very large mouse (or smallish rat) scampering around our backpacks. It ran under the bed. Erica retained her composure however. It wasn’t until she went into the bathroom and found it clinging to the shower curtain, staring her in the face, that she screamed like a girl. We only stayed there one night. Our other room was clean and normal; although it did have cable and we watched some of the Steve Irwin marathon.
The next day we went to the national museum and the kings palace. Hey, if you are in the neighborhood and have some time to kill, check out the museum. It was neat. The palace was a bit pricey to get in, but very fancy (as palaces tend to be). It was built in the 1860s and most of it was just fancy, but there were two very noteworthy parts to it. The first is a huge mural that covers three of the four walls encasing a very large courtyard. The second was the silver pagoda. After over four months of travel it takes alot to get a sincere WOW out of me. This did. The inside of the temple is about the size of two highschool class rooms. The room is tiled with silver. Towards the front of the room is a lifesize solid gold standing buddha. Behind him, on a golden pedestal 10 feet high is an emerald buddha about the size of a large computer monitor. Maybe it is made of jade, I don’t know, but the whole spectacle was very impressive.
The next day was sad and sobering. We went to S-21; the high school transformed into a torture factory by the khmer rouge. That was horrific. Afterwards we took a ride to the killing fields. The monument of skulls leaves quite an impression. It runs out there are over 320 killing fields in Cambodia. About two million people died from 1975 to 1979..mostly by murder and starvation. To add insult to injury, after the Vietnamese overthrew the regime there was a famine in the country because people left the farms to search for their lost loved ones…..no one was left to grow the food. Very sad. There were periodic gun battles in the capital until the mid 1990’s.
I posted most of the Vietnam pictures a little while ago for those wanting to kill some time. Don’t be shy about writing us. Cheers.
Tags: Travel
September 11th, 2007 at 10:43 pm
Though you never even acknowledge that I have written you, I wanted to just say hello. This entry was particularly good - both humorous and sobering. Thanks for staying in touch with us and for staying alive. Ruby misses her Uncle Marc. She will likely start calling perfect strangers uncle. NO, guilt has never been used in our family. Take care and stay away from the smallish rats. Mom would not approve of more hotel rooms like that.
September 12th, 2007 at 1:40 pm
We concur with your sister. Leave your small rodent pets alone and start looking for places like the palace to stay.
Now, that’s my kind of digs.
September 25th, 2007 at 2:43 am
You wanted to live like the locals, I’d guess you got close to it with the rat room, though many of them probably don’t have toilets, much less seats.
Weird how I keep watching movies about places just before I read about you visiting them. We just watched “The Killing Feilds” a few days ago. Then yesterday I was listening to a report on public radio about how many Cambodian children and teens don’t believe their parents’ stories of life under the Khmere Rouge regime, because so little of what happened makes any sense at all, so some people are trying hard to educate them about it so it is not forgotten. They’ve made a documentary about it for Cambodians, and it includes footage of a group of Cambodian high school students being taken on a tour of that very same high school / torture chamber that you visited. The report said that they pretty much left things there as they were, with blood stains everywhere, and that sort of thing. Very disturbing. It’s completely insane that Pol Pot was never prosecuted and they are just now getting around to prosecuting anyone for these crimes, including just arresting the KR’s 2nd in command last week.
It’s amazing that Phnom Penh recovered so well after being completely evacuated and left mostly empty for roughly 3 years by the Khmer Rouge. That whole episode in history is just surreal.
September 30th, 2007 at 9:48 pm
Hey, when are we going to get a new entry? Write when you can. Love, your sister