Cambodian Palace and The Killing Fields -- Cambodia (May 25)

Today was a solemn one, mostly anyway.  We visited one of the 367  “Killing Fields” in Cambodia and then went to the Tuol Sol prison where the Cambodians prisoners were tortured and then killed by the Khmer Rouge.  Before the solemness, however, we visited the Grand Palace and after the solemness, we had cocktails and dinner, along with some necessary processing downtime.

We have now seen 3 grand palaces: one in Bangkok, Thailand; one in Vientiane, Laos; and this one is Phnom Penh, Cambodia.  All are awash in gold and buddhas, with graceful curved rooflines and this particular one had the roofs held up by two mythical figures (well, mythical in my mind):  ??

We could only get in a few of the buildings because the king was in residence and the place was being prepped for the opening of some sort of sporting event which the king was going to start.  There also were preparations for a state dinner between this king of Cambodia and the king of Indonesia (think red carpets).  This location and these buildings have served as the palace of the Cambodian king since the 1860s, outside of the time of the "reign" of the Khmer Rouge.

the throne room -- note the red carpet in prep for other royal visitors

we caught the tail end of the parade marking the beginning of the sporting event

There were multiple beautiful buildings including one housing a jade buddha which seemed to glow and other buddhas in gold – one was solid gold, large, and covered in jewels including diamonds.  Pretty spectacular.  The building itself is called "The Silver Pagoda," or Wat Preah Keo.

the room where the emerald buddha is held.  The buddha itself is quite small and is towards the top of that gold stand in the middle  We couldn't actually take pictures inside, so this pic is from the internet. 

the emerald buddha (pic from internet), again - it's quite small

Then we traded the glitzy gold for whitened skulls – literally – when we went to Choeung Ek and walked through the killing fields.  We saw the indentations where there were mass graves, and we saw the bones, clothes, and dismantled Chinese graves (the site was previously a Chinese cemetery).  We saw the trees which were used to kill people, including women and children.  They didn’t want to waste bullets, both because of the sound and because the bullets were needed for their war, so they resorted to other slower, more painful methods of death.  They believe around 2.5 million Cambodians were killed by their countrymen, the Khmer Rouge.  And both the perpetrators and the victims are still living together in the same country, trying to forget to violence. . . .

I am reminded of Carolyn Forchee’s poem “The Visitor” which ends this way:  “There is nothing one man will not do to another.”

Our second stop (post lunch) was at the Tuol Sung prison.  We listened to one of seven survivors of the prison.  Everyone who passed through this prison was tortured until they told secrets (mostly made) up just to stop the torture: names of possible infiltrators or traitors to the Khmer Rouge cause.  Once the prisoners became informants, after about a day, they were sent to the killing fields.  This man (one of the seven) – named Bou Meng – was an artist, and because of his skill, he was allowed to live to paint pictures for the leaders.  The few others who lived were mechanics or had some other useful skill.  He told his story (his wife was also in the prison but she was sent to the killing fields), how he ended up alive, and his life after that time.  I bought his book, as well as the book of another survivor (they were the only two still living individuals).

Bou Meng's painting in the lecture room of the prison 

He talked with us for about an hour.  He was forgiving of the Khmer Rouge, but never once smiled and looked extremely sad.

We then walked around the prison, saw the museum memorial with all the names etched in granite, saw the rooms where they were tortured, and Harold saw the items used for torture.  It was as sobering as the morning at the killing fields. . . .

granite markers named the victims 

part of the museum memorial included walls of pictures of the victims.  The Khmer Rouge photographed everyone who came in.

We went back to the hotel and had cocktails with the same crew: Greg, Dan, Margaret, Cheryl, Orren, and the two of us.  Occasionally, our cocktail group is joined by the other five members of our group of twelve: Linda (alias Remi), Gary, Jeanette, Hal (Harold), and Elyse.  We are a good group.  We said good-bye to Sun, our guide in Phnom Penh, and said hello to Rath, who will be our guide for the Siem Reap portion of our trip.

We had a light Japanese dinner with Margaret and Greg.  One of the guests at the restaurant was the former prime minister of the country.  He was at the table next to us talking political strategy in English with one other person.  Then they both went upstairs for a private meeting and dinner.  I think there was a large group of government officials upstairs.