Phnom Penh

A fairly wild ride here - the guy driving the bus was a manic. We ran one thing over on the way - not sure what - but it made a thud. I'm surprised no people were killed. Think - driving on the wrong side of the road, around a bind bend, horn blaring, while the rest of the traffic has to pull off the road.

But thankfully we arrived.

I wasn't sure of what to make of Phnom Penh when I first arrived. There was literally 10 or 20 people all shouting at you. Some for motos, some for Tuk Tuks, and others for hotel rooms. I grabbed my bag, said goodbye to the Swiss people I'd met on the bus, and walked away from the bus station as fast as I could.

After a bit of walking, I managed to find a place to stay, and then went out for food. I was really tired so I decided that an early night was in order.

After a quick breakfast, it was off on the sign seeing trail. Here's a run down of the what I did.

My first stop was Wat Phnom - a temple built on top of the only hill in the city. It's like a park, where people come to hang out, and maybe make offerings, or get a prediction for the future. You see people holding these wooden blocks above there head, stick in a small piece of wood at random, and then the priest reads the page you've picked.

I saw one girl who was in tears while she was praying, but after the prediction seemed a lot happier. Which was good. I felt sorry for her, because she did seem really upset about something.

The hill - with rather nice clock set in the hill side:



Inside the temple:



From there, it was off to see the Royal Palace and Silver Pagoda. It's very similar to the Royal Palace and Temple of The Emerald Buddha in Bangkok - but much smaller. In many ways I actually preferred it, because it feels more intimate some how - and there weren't as many tourists. A real pleasant place for a wander around.

The Throne Room:



The rather pleasant gardens:



Wall paintings:



The Silver Pagoda is so called because the floor is made of solid silver tiles. I did try and wip a few into my rucksack while no one was looking, but they were stuck down. They also didn't allow photos - but it was really incredible inside.

I did notice this rather interesting bamboo scaffolding, tied together with black plastic bags. It held the weight of quite a few people. Nice to see that the health and safety fascists (sorry - I'm reading Jeremy Clarkson at the moment so can't help it :-) haven't got here yet - although it's only a matter of time:



Here's a video of some guy's playing traditional music - these guy's are going to be the next big thing - right up there with bag pipes and Country and Western :-)



From there, it was a quick look in at the National Museum, which was nice. Again - no photo's allowed, but it was full to the brim with carvings from all of the temples I've been to, arranged in chronological order - which was good - if you like that kind of thing.



One great thing about Cambodia is there are a number of initiatives here to train street kids, with the aim of getting them jobs related to the tourism trade. Which sounds like a great idea. I went for lunch at a place called Friends, and would have to say, the service and food were top notch. As good as any of the best restaurants I've been to.

The afternoon took a different turn, as I went out to see The Killing Fields of Choeung Ek. Thousands of people were killed here in the most brutal of ways - and often after having being tortured. It's such a strange place - because it actually looks like a really nice park with a lake.

And yet - there are these shallow graves that have been excavated. And in places, pieces of clothing and bone can still be seen in the ground.

This is the memorial to the dead - which contains shelf after shelf of skulls and bones:



Here are some pictures of the Killing Fields:







As I walked around, I couldn't help but think of Phi-Lay, and some of the experiences he had shared with me.

It's a sad place - but perhaps the saddest place of all is the Tuol Sleng Museum. This former school was the prison and torture center, where people were held before being taken to the killing fields.

The Khmer Rouge were well known for keeping extensive documentation on the people they killed - including pictures. Building B contains photo's of the victims. Each face a person with a story, a family, a history. A very few of the faces smile - clearly oblivious to what was to come next. But on many, you can see the terror.

The worst part was the board devoted to the children. Some looked to be only two or three.

It feels pointless asking why.

I'm not sure there's an answer anyway. But the full story is laid out for everyone to see. And so far, sadly, there has been no justice. The leaders are still awaiting trial. Perhaps so many powerful foreign governments (US, UK, China, The UN, etc.) are implicated that there's no will to move forward. Who can say.

There was one other place related to Cambodia's history that I wanted to see, and that night I headed to the Foreign Correspondents' Club. This is an upmarket bar and restaurant, where many of the press who covered Cambodia's past used to meet. It's a great place for a glass of wine, with plenty of comfy chairs - specially designed for that good book.

Phnom Penh is not the biggest place in the world, and it's easy to see everything in two days. So today I set off to see "everything else".

• The French Embassy - look's like a prison.
• The American Embassy - look's like a mental hospital.
• Hotel Le Royal - Five star hotel in superb French Colonial building. Famous for being the home of the press during the civil war.
• Boeng Kak Lake - Think: the lake in Springfield - home of the Simpsons :-)
• The Backpacker Ghetto by the lake - Bad haircuts, tattoos, and cheap beer.
• The Independence Monument - Angkor Wat throw back in the center of a roundabout.
• The Russian Market (PsarTuol Tom Pong) - Leed's indoor market on Speed and Red Bull.

Having been here for a few day's I've changed my mind about Phnom Penh. Yes - it suffers from "Big City Syndrome" and there's not much to see.

There's also loads of hassle.

Imagine walking down the street, and there's four men all standing together. The first one asks if you want a Tuk Tuk. So you say no thanks with a smile. He asks if you want a moto. So you say not thanks with a smile. And then the second man asks exactly the same, followed by the third, and then the fourth.

This is not made up - seriously. By the end of it, I was ready to ask them to take me to the driving range so I could shoot them.

But it's like that here - walk for five minutes and you'll be asked twenty times if you want a Tuk Tuk sir? No thanks. Need moto sir? No thanks. I take you to Killing Fields. No thanks. You want go somewhere. No thanks. Cheap cheap sir. No thanks. Where you going sir? No thanks. I take you somewhere sir? No thanks. You want smoke? No thanks. You want weed? No thanks? Marijuana? No thanks. Maybe later? No thanks. Where you going? Want massage? Want Tuk Tuk...

But there's something nice about Phnom Penh. Despite the hassle, the fumes, the dirt in the streets, it's got a life and energy to it that's so often missing from "developed" cities. And while there's not much to see - there's always something to see.

And after you've got past the need Tuk Tuk, moto, massage, weed - you can always have a laugh and joke with people. Just like the hassle - the smiles aren't in short supply either.