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Back to Phnom Penh, again
2008.02.15
Our car, with it's additional passenger, stopped to refuel before leaving Kampot. We noticed they were not using the gas tank. I hopped out of the car to see what was going on and to shake the giant, fanged spider off my leg. This was some sort of specialized gas they were adding, filling a tank that featured a pressure gauge. I was duly frightened.
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Skulls recovered from the Killing Fields mass graves are kept in this pagoda. The shelves of skulls reach all the way to the top. A pile of clothing of the deceased is on the very bottom level.
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Some victims of the Khmer Rouge were shot, but many others were bludgeoned to death with pipes or axes in order to save bullets.
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A wall of skulls.
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A chicken scratches in an exhumed mass grave at the Killing Fields.
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Back in town, the money changers have every currency known to man.
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We shared a car with a Dutch girl back to Phnom Penh. The car showed up, but the driver was insistent we all sit in the back. Turns out, he intended for his buddy to go to Phnom Penh in the car too. But first we had to pick up his motorbike in town and drop it off at the driver's house, in the village.
A few bumpy roads later, it was determined we could all go to Phnom Penh, and we did, the driver navigating with such skill and aplomb that we all gave each other frightened looks and buckled up.
Back in Phnom Penh, I checked out the Killing Fields, which are pretty much the downer you'd expect. You can't walk the paths without stepping on scraps of clothing embedded in the dirt. Prisoners brought here from Toel Sleung prison by the Khmer Rouge were executed and buried in mass graves.
It's a peaceful setting, in a former orchard, which makes the pagoda of skulls, the bits of clothing and the tree labeled as one upon which KR combatants bashed babies to death all the more surreal.
A few bumpy roads later, it was determined we could all go to Phnom Penh, and we did, the driver navigating with such skill and aplomb that we all gave each other frightened looks and buckled up.
Back in Phnom Penh, I checked out the Killing Fields, which are pretty much the downer you'd expect. You can't walk the paths without stepping on scraps of clothing embedded in the dirt. Prisoners brought here from Toel Sleung prison by the Khmer Rouge were executed and buried in mass graves.
It's a peaceful setting, in a former orchard, which makes the pagoda of skulls, the bits of clothing and the tree labeled as one upon which KR combatants bashed babies to death all the more surreal.
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