A countries pain (Sian)

We knew that by visiting Cambodia we would be faced with some really shocking things. However we were not really prepared for the reality of either the Killing Fields or the Tuol Sleng museum in Phnom Penh.
We hopped in a mini bus at around mid day for the journey to the killing fields 16KM out side of the city. the road/dust track was pretty grim and went through some of the more unpleasant parts of town. The sight of a decompossing dog by the road being a good omen.
The main feature of the killing fields is a monument which is 50 feep high filled with 17000 skulls of the victims of the Khmer Rouge. It was pretty earie. I had a sick feeling in my stomach and thought that it was a little morbid for tourists to come here and pay $2 entry fee to see a countries down fall.
There are about 50 other killing field sites dotted all over Cambodia, the one we visited housed 86 Mass graves and was the final resting place of about 17,000 Khmer's.
After the killing fields we arrive at the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum. This Museum was once a school but was taken over and used at a prison by the Khmer Rouge Regime in the 1970's. It is still enclosed with the 2 folds of corrugated iron sheets and coverd with dense barbed and razor wire. The four school buildings were used for administration, interrogation, torture and as a prison. Most of the Khmer Rouge Regime's features are in place. The block which was used to house most prisoners is 3 stories high. On the ground floor tiny cells 2'x5' were badly built out of bricks, on the first floor they were the same size and made out of wood. On the top floor was the larger cells which housed 30 people at a time. We saw the iron racks that were used to keep the prisoners together, the racks griped their feet and meant that the prisoners were lying down for most of the day.
The 3rd school block is amass of photo's of the people who stayed in this prison. What is not clear is why they were taken prisoner. People were from every walk of life and of every age and sex. They even captured buddist monks. One picture that will haunt me is that of a mother holding her new born baby. The woman is expresionless so it is hard to guage what she was thinking. The date of this picture was 14/05/1978, a month after I was born. Sadly both the mother and child pictured died.

It is estimated that the Khmer Rouge Regime under Pol Pot's comand wiped out a quarter of Cambodia's inhabitants. 2.5 million out of a population of 8 million, although the true figure will never be known, some people estimate 3 million.

It is hard to say if I would recomend this place to other tourists. It was really moving, but an extremley important part of Cambodia's history. I can see why the people of Cambodia are so happy now, they are propably really pleased to be alive.