Phnom Penh

Phnom Penh was crazy! It had the best energy of any Asian city I have ever visited, with people, tuk-tuks, trash, palaces, restaurants, shops, and everything else all meshing really well into one perfectly chaotic mess. I spent 4 very pleasant days and nights there before moving onto Angkor Wat in the north. On my second full day we rented a tuk-tuk for the day to take us to the extremely depressing Choeung Ek killing fields and the Toul Sleng Genocide Museum. Choeung Ek, a mere 17 kilometers outside of Phnom Penh, was the site of mass executions of the Cambodian people by the rebel group known as the Khmer Rouge. In less than 3 years (between 1975-1978), the Khmer Rouge are estimated to have brutally murdered between 1 and 2 million of its own people, roughly 20% of the entire Cambodian population. The Khmer Rouge began with senior military commanders of opposing parties, to monks, to the elite and educated, before moving onto the rural poor and members within its own party. Reasons for the mass murders are still unclear, but the man behind the genocide is well known as Pol Pot or "Brother Number One" within the regime, who unfortunately died before he was able to be brought properly to justice. Even today, the Cambodian government and the UN are unable to come to an agreement as to how to most effectively put to trial those few elderly Khmer Rouge members that survive and so there is still a lingering open wound in the hearts of all Cambodians. Visiting the killing fields was an extremely sobering experience as there was still so much fresh evidence of the murders: when wandering around the now peaceful fields one begins to notice bits of bone and fragments of clothing still embedded in the hard earth from those who perished in those mass graves. We then moved onto the Genocide Museum. This was a former high school hijacked by the Khmer Rouge and used as a facility for torture and murder of thousands of men, women, and children. Filled with photos of the deceased, one could feel the presence of all these ghosts around them and the atrocities that they suffered.

After a thoroughly depressing morning, we felt that some retail therapy was in order and so made our way to the Russian Market. The market was a surprisingly pleasant experience as none of the vendors were hawking or screaming their wares, yet left us in peace to browse as we pleased. Every stall was filled with clothes from The GAP, Old Navy, Zara, Abercrombie & Fitch, and Adidas straight from the factory complete with price tags and hangers from the company! I bought a $1 GAP tank top originally priced at $9.50 and placed by the saleswoman into a Border's Bookstore plastic bag. I then went to UCare Pharmacy (similar to CVS or Walgreen's) to buy some shampoo, but I encountered an entire row of Kirkland Signature (Costco's brand) vitamins and medicine instead. Where in the world they came from is beyond me! One thing that is supervery strange about Cambodia is that virtually all business transactions are conducted in American dollars. The ATMs only dispense American dollars, all menu prices and shop prices are in dollars, and the locals prefer to be paid in dollars rather than their local currency (the riel). It makes all transactions super easy for me, but I have never been to a country other than my own in which I can use only my own money. Bizarre!

Coming from Vietnam, one notices how much wealthier Cambodia is. Phnom Penh has a good infrastructure of roads, buildings, and everyday city things, the streets are filled with more luxury cars (Lexus', Mercedes', Hummer's, etc.) than I have seen since leaving the states, there is very little begging, and the majority of the people are well-dressed and driving well-kept motorbikes. There are even proper toy stores everywhere, something which one does not see in either Laos or Thailand. However, the reason for this wealth is corruption. Cambodia suffers from one of the most corrupt governments in Asia with virtually all foreign aid money being put directly into the pockets of government workers rather than into social betterment of the people. Nowhere is this more evident than in the capital. When driving through the countryside, there are signs proclaiming "The Cambodian People's Party" every few hundred meters, in order to remind everyone of their power throughout the country. Yet, even through all this corruption, Cambodia (as in Laos and Vietnam) has absolutely no McDonald's, Starbucks, Pizza Huts, or any other Americanized institution of fattening food. It is so refreshing to finally find a little corner of this earth in which America has yet to put its stamp of consumerism. I'm sure that we only have to wait a few years though until the ink comes down.

After spending a couple of more delightful days in the capital sightseeing and gorging on local Khmer curries, we headed on a local bus to Siem Reap in order to be dazzled by Angkor Wat