So Alec and I had a 19 hour lay over in the KL airport which really sucked but we got through it by alternating from the check in area and the McDonalds. We managed to get about 4 hours of in and out sleep so we were absolutely beat for our first day in Cambodia. We arrived in Cambodia at about 8a.m. and took a taxi to our hostel which was actually a really nice place it has a pool, pool table, and a nice bar/lounge area to meet people. We shared a room with 5 other people who we ended up hanging out with later on that night.
Once we arrived we took a dip in the pool and took showers with hot water which was a great change of pace since we haven't had a hot shower in over a month. After we got ready we took a tuk tuk to the genocide museum. A tuk tuk is basically a moped with a carriage type thing on the back of it that can hold like 2 or 3 people, those are the cheapest form of transportation around here. The genocide museum was a great way to learn about the history of the Khmer (Cambodian) people. The “museum” is actually the place where tons of people were held captive and beaten and tortured. It was a school that got turned into a jail type of thing. It was crazy to think that all that happened like 30 years ago. You could walk through most of the rooms in the school and they had the bed frames and shackles and stuff they were tortured with laying out in most of the rooms. In the second part of the school they had all kinds of jail cells still up they were held in as well and pictures of the people that had been held captive. It was crazy they had barbed wire up in front of all the hallways of the school to prevent the captives from committing suicide just so they could torture them more. There were rules that the captives had to follow and they were...1. You must answer accordingly to my questions - don’t turn them away 2. Don’t try to hide the facts by making pretexts this and that you are strictly prohibited to contest me 3. Don’t be fool for you are a chap who dare to thwart the revolution 4. You must immediately answer my questions without wasting time to reflect 5. Don’t tell me either about your immoralities or the essence of the revolution 6. While getting lashes or electrification you must not cry at all 7. Do nothing, sit still and wait for my orders. If there is no order, keep quiet. When I ask you to do something you must do it right away without protesting 8. Don’t make pretext about Kampuchea Krom in order to hide your secret traitor 9. If you don’t follow all the above rules you shall get many lashes of electric wire 10. If you disobey any point of my regulations you shall get either ten lashes or five electric shocks. I just thought that it was crazy that they would actually do that to people. After the museum we took our tuk tuk to the killing fields which is another place were thousands of Khmer people were murdered. You can walk around the fields and you can see peoples bones and tons of pieces of clothing coming up from the ground. The first part of the day was a great way to learn the history and really hits home so that is why we finished our tour off by going to the Russian market. The market is full of souvenirs and lots of cheap knock off clothing and jewelry. There is also a huge food market that has tons of nasty local food, it smells so disgusting! For those of you that watched the Cambodia edition of Anthony Bourdain’s show we are pretty sure that is the market he ate at.
Once we got back from our tour around the city we just chilled at the hostel for a bit. We ended up talking to our roommates down there for a long time about our trips and eventually ended the night by getting dinner with them down by the riverside.
The next day we got up bright and early to catch a 6 hour bus ride to Siem Reap. It was a terrible bus ride, we had tiny seats and my arm rest was broken off so we had crappy seats. Every single road on the way to Siem Reap is crappy too, half are dirt roads and the ones that are paved are half paved and bumpy so we had a bumpy 6 hour ride. Once we arrived in Siem Reap we took a $1 tuk tuk ride to our hostel and just walked around town for a bit.
Everybody has asked why we are going to Cambodia and are quick to judge the country and say they here bad stuff about it but all those people are wrong. Cambodia is a very nice country and is way more modernized than what I thought it’d be. All the Khmer people are really friendly and are willing to help out, they will ask of you need a tuk tuk ride and we will say no thanks and they will reply by saying thank you. So far I have nothing bad at all to say about Cambodia and I encourage anybody that travels to this side of the world to stop in Cambodia because you will be surprised at what you see.
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