Friday, February 24, 2012

Day 4- The Zoo

That day, we woke early since we will be going somewhere far from the city. Our guide, the helpful Mr. Alex actually arranged a van for us to use to make the trip much more comfortable and faster. I got breakfast from Cafe Fresco with Effa and wow! the breakfast set is 6 USD excluding my cappuccino.. Even so, I still ordered a  healthy breakfast of mixed fruits. With the prices we were paying for meals, we started really feeling at that time that Cambodia is expensive for tourists.

Anyway, everyone piled up on the van and we got to meet another member of Mr. Alex's family, the driver  who happens to be his brother too. He was too talkative for my own liking but I guess he is just fine for the other girls.Halfway through the ride, the girls at the back were sleepy but the mood suddenly turned partyish when we discovered this field of lotus and the driver opened the top of the van. Everyone had a blast shouting and greeting people along the road.

                We got lucky to have a car like this. It was so much fun riding through the countryside.

As we approached the foot of the mountain leading to the zoo, we were surprised to see this long line of people begging. The guide explained about poverty in the countryside which led to people turning beggars to earn a living. Most of them are old people and some children. I think, families also use them to appeal more to tourists since they look so much more pitiful. From being cheerful, the five of us became silent as we passed the stretch of people begging along the road. It was like a kilometer of beggars just a few meters apart.

 
   The long line of beggars. After living in third world countries my entire life, I have never seen such display of  poverty. Even when Baguio was hit by an earthquake in 1990, at least people tried their best to survive and did not turned to begging. It is still a memory that is disturbing to me.

So, we got in Ta Mao Zoo and it is a mountain with cages. I wasn't really expecting something very good but it is obviously new and needs a lot of funding to fully operate better. As someone who saw Taman Safari in Indonesia where animals are left to roam free, I feel it would be better if the animals are also let out of the cages but  I guess it would cost a lot. The impressive thing though about  Ta Mao Zoo is that the animals are all from Cambodia and nothing is taken overseas. We had fun checking out the animals at the zoo and there was this one incident where me, Ritchell and Nikki were checking out the monkeys on one cage. I noticed that one was swinging happily on a tire and I noticed it's shit coming out. With just one scream to the other girls, we were away from the cage in a matter of seconds. Who knows we could be the recipients of a "flying shit" and I don't want to remember Cambodia as somewhere I got hit by a monkey poo.

   The sun bears. There were signs not to feed them but sometimes I don't understand people why they just need to do the opposite. They are small bears not as we expect of bears and according to Google, they are the smallest bears. The shape on its chest is really beautiful. It is another work of art by nature.

     It is the smallest kind of monkey in that zoo that I had seen. I was disappointed though because they snubbed the banana that I was giving them. I guess they were so tired of bananas all the time. This one was happier to munch on the sugar cane.

  One of the beavers in the zoo. They were bathing at that time when we passed by their cage. Beside was the tigers cage. Talk about unlikely neighbors.

                               The other tiger was hidden out of view. Chilling under the midday sun.

                        Another kind of monkey. I was giving the banana but it ignored me again.

        It was also fun feeding the elephants. They love the sugar cane. We didn't had anything else anyway.

                 I don't know exactly what is this but it was one of the hundreds of birds in the zoo.

                                   Ah..the lovely parrot...there were probably fifty or more of them.


                 The poor owl had one eye missing. They should probably put an eye patch over the bad eye.

              There were at least monkeys roaming free around the zoo on our way out. There are I think a hundred or more of monkeys in Ta Mao Zoo.

It was really fun having to go to the zoo without having to drag children or children dragging me around. I hope that the zoo will improve the next time if I will ever visit it again.

Sunday, February 5, 2012

Day 3- Part 2- Shooting Range and S-21

Of course, we wouldn't pass up a holiday without shooting since we started last year in Laos. It's pretty
exhilarating to do it. So after the Killing fields, we headed to the shooting range. It was well known so there was no problem going there. It was past the airport which I found looking deserted by the way and near a military base. I guess when we arrived, the people over the place were surprised to see  three girls looking for guns to shoot and they keep on suggesting    for me to use the M-16 which I refused since I already used it in Cu Chi Vietnam. I guess the guy wasn't convinced at all looking at me who doesn't look like  I can shoot. So of course I got the same handgun that I used in Vientiane after being told that they don't have the guns that I wanted. And Mitch and ayEffa got their AK 47 and M-16. Well, it was more expensive than Laos and Vietnam but we shot anyway. They even have hand grenades and rocket launchers if you want but no we sticked to our guns.

 My pose and I actually hit one near the middle while the rest landed somewhere else. It was expensive though as I paid 30 dollars for  just 7 bullets.



After blasting away the paper target, we headed off to S-21 or Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum. The facade looks like my high school and it was actually a school before it was turned into a prison. There were three three floor buildings arranged in a U shaped form with a small building in the middle. The first building housed the offices and the rooms for the VIP prisoners and of course the torture rooms. The VIP prisoners are of course not given special treatment but I think they were the previous government officers and important intellectuals. The rooms were actually  typical classrooms with some desks still preserved which were probably used for the reeducation lectures. They even have chalkboards up until today.

 A prisoners room with the shackles, bed, the can used as latrine probably and a bowl. I guess this is where they torture and keep the VIP prisoners since most of the rooms just have one bed.

                                           One of the writing boards in the classroom prisons.

                                                A translated version of the rules at the prison.


Near the next building are the gallows.


The next building had the classrooms divided into smaller cells to accommodate prisoners. The divisions were actually poorly done and a man can easily break through it. But when you are just given one meal a day with mostly water, I don't think anyone can have the strength to do anything at all.




                                                                One of the single cells.      

                                                        The building where it all happened

And the last building housed the thousands of pictures of all  those who died and there is one common thing. Everyone faced the camera expressionless and with hands bound behind their backs. It also shows pictures of  tortured people dying or dead. You can see pictures with faces, staring eyes open, with froth coming out from the mouth and nose. A bloated body obviously dead for how many days, naked and twisted. And to read the biographies of the people who caused such things. They were all educated overseas in very good universities. Sometimes, we ask what could they be thinking to do the so called cleansing. Killing innocent people, children, common people. Had they ever thought of what good should it come from it. Had they ever thought that it could be possible or impossible in this world. We get a lot of these things in the news and it just leads to  innocent people being involved and losing everything they have without knowing the reason. It is scary to think that brilliant minds can do such horrors too.

Probably, some of the lower rank officers who carried out the orders were just plain ignorant of things. But the question again is "Don't they have any conscience at all?" Probably fear. The questions are endless but I hope nothing like this will happen again because it ended up with neighbors and relatives against each other.

And how ironic it was that a bat landed in front of me at the last building in S-21.

Saturday, February 4, 2012

Day 3- Killing Fields and S-21

January 22, 2012

Ah...I felt much better that day. I woke up to the sound of cymbals and gongs and I remembered it was the traditional Chinese New Year. I just went out of the balcony of the guesthouse and waited for the parade to pass.While waiting, I had time to admire the sunrise on the river. The Mekong river on that side of Phnom Penh is actually comprised of three rivers. It was really wide.

                                                               Sunrise over the river.

                                    It was just a small group of dancers performing on the street.

Since we already got up, Me and Effa, the only Malaysian who is travelling with us went to these bakery to eat breakfast. I finally got pancakes for breakfast and fruit salad. I was really craving pancakes that unfortunately I cannot get in Hanoi.

Then off to the killing fields for our first tour. After travelling for about an hour with the Tuk tuk that we hired for 20 USD a day, we finally arrived at the Killing Fields famous because of Pol Pot. We paid 3 dollars for tickets at the entrance and we chose not to get the Audio tour which my sister( Mitch) and the other two girls with us (Nikki and Ritchell) decided to take. Thus we got separated, me and Effa went ahead with our tour. We arrived at this tall one room building that houses all the skulls that were dug at that area. We had to remove our shoes to give respect to all the dead and proceeded inside the glass building. It has from what I remember 7 levels that houses all the skulls dug out from the surrounding field of most of the victims of the genocide. At the bottom were the clothes of the victims. The clothes were still intact because the tragedy happened around three decades ago.

                                         The building that houses most of the skulls at the killing fields.

The killing field is known as Choeung Ek. It was funny that Ritchell keeps on saying that it is the killing farm which is not far from it. It was actually a chinese cemetery before the war and a farmland before it was discovered. Touring through the grave sites reminded me of my history lessons. When you learn about who are these people like Pol Pot and when you read about the things that were done and when I watched the movie the "Killing Fields" I was just there to absorb but not truly understand the extent of everything that was done. Being in that place made me understand the real lesson to which I must learn from all of these. It occured to me then that had I been born at that time in this country, I could have ended up as one of the skulls on that stupa or some nameless baby that was smashed against one of the trees in the field. I am just so thankful to be born in my home country.

 The skulls were arranged according to age. Some levels have skulls of men aged 50 and above, others 20-30 years etc.

                                                           The clothes of the victims.

There were also signs everywhere to point out the places where things were done at the area before the final executions were done.





I think, what is more painful is the fact that you are killed in a very inhumane way. The things that were used to kill are ordinary tools used in the fields or  things that are used everyday. It would have been much better to be killed with a gun or a bomb. The fact that probably a lot have to painfully wait for their death is even worst and for a mistake you haven't committed or just because you are a part of the minority.


 This is the tree where children are killed. They are killed because they are feared to get revenge when they survive and probably because they make too much noise. Sometimes I wonder how can some people even do this? To think that they have families, children. What must have they felt after doing such things? Did they had nightmares? It's scary thinking how can people just kill. Probably some of the killers are still alive now.

                                And the museum where we watched a short clip about the genocide.

And so with a heavy heart I left the place, I hope those who are buried in these place have finally found peace. When I talked with Mitch, she told me that it is more emotional to take the Audio tour because of the stories of the survivors. Either way, I think it is a very good opportunity for us to learn about this part of history and I also learned from our Tuktuk driver that majority of the Cambodian people are Khmer and the government that did this were the Khmer Rouge.

Looking back at the place, I don't think I would want to go back. It is just a another place in the middle of a flatland with the stupa symbolizing everything that it is about but it is just too depressing to go back. I learned something about it though, we should have our own convictions and not just follow people. This is the result of following the wrong ideals or probably executing good ideals in a wrong way. Either way, it was caused by people who are smart and educated.

Day 2- Phnom Penh

As it is, we woke up really early the next morning for our bus trip to Cambodia. We headed to the Singh Cafe office and we rode out of Hanoi at 7 in the morning. Because of lack of sleep, i immediately zonked out upon settling myself on my seat. It was after 1 and a half hour that we were woken up to get down the bus for the immigration at the border. The guide took all our passports and we had to wait in front of the immigration for our names to be called out after being stamped. It was as fast as the usual routine at the airport but it's just confusing waiting for your name to be called without any proper line to follow or a waiting area to actually wait. And so we finished the outgoing part and we entered the Cambodian side. It was much easier to queue for the stamp since we belong to a country that belongs to the ASEAN while the rest of the other nationalities had to fill out visa application forms.

Then we were in Cambodia. The first thing that you notice are the buildings. Most of them are new and in the border there are lots of Casinos.

                                          The bus for the trip from Ho Chi Minh to Phnom Penh

I literally slept most of the way but about 1 hour away from our destination the bus went into a ferry to cross a river before we resumed our journey. The countryside resembles that of the lowlands of the Philippines. It was an endless flatland with fields and houses. I didn't even see any mountain.

                                           The view of the river from inside the bus on the ferry.

Upon reaching Phnom Penh. I noticed again that the buildings and houses are very new and the city is clean.
It is like a bigger and more urban version of Vientianne, the capital of Laos. We arrived at the Singh Cafe office, got off the bus and Tuk tuk drivers came swarming immediately to offer their services. As newbies, we agreed to a five dollar ride to our hotel which I learned later on our last day that it is actually just three dollars.
Anyhow, we were happy that our hotel is actually situated near the palace and the museum, it is just next to the river and near  all the restaurants, shops and hotels.

                                                                  My bed at the hotel.

Our hotel, the Mekong Imperial Boutique guesthouse is located at the tourist street of Phnom Penh, the Sisowath Quay. We had a  three bed room at 11 per person. It was the best for the price. I had a chicken with ginger for lunch and everyone is excited to walk around town but I wasn't really feeling good so I headed back to the hotel to sleep.

In the evening, I was feeling much better that we decided to go out for dinner. I had my taste of the famous Cambodian cuisine, the "Amok fish" it is fish cooked in coconut oil. It was really delicious. After dinner, we visited the night market. It was the typical night market for us since we are asians. There were clothes and stuff for decorations. What surprised me was the food court. It was really homely.

                                                        The night market food court.

I didn't buy anything since I didn't find anything interesting. Most of the things are the same as in Vietnam and Laos so i decided to get from Siem Reap goods to bring back in Hanoi instead. So we ended the day after the window shopping. It was nice to be in a city where it is still alive at 11 in the evening. I guess we were so used to Hanoi where we have to rush eating before 11 pm since almost all restaurants close before midnight. Walking on the streets at midnight with a lot of restaurants still open was a very welcome experience that day.