October 2007

Our trip to Siem Reap by road from Phnom Penh reinforced one of our initial observations of Cambodia and her people: this is a special place. Unlike most of the terrain we have covered since leaving Tibet, Cambodia is a sudden expanse of rural beauty. The rice paddies do stretch for miles around, but instead of many small dingy road towns and tourist trap shops, the country is dotted with endless palm trees across the flat-scape of paddies, punctuated by tidy rural villages comprised of huts with frontages of pink or white water lily ponds bordered by banana trees and inhabited by friendly smiling locals going about their daily business farming, cooking palm sugar or tending to their children. In contrast to her growing neighbor Vietnam, we quickly notice a distinct reduction in the number of motorbikes, in favor of cheaper bicycles, which only further enhances the idyllic scenery. While Siem Reap, the gateway to the magical realm of Angkor Wat, held the promise of 5 star luxury hotels and amenities, our overland journey showed us the real treasures of this recovering nation and reminded us yet again how lucky we are to be able to journey to such places.

Jacquie, me and my parents at Bayon temple

Monks wander and wonder just like us

Our ultimate destination in Cambodia was, Angkor Wat, the “City of Kings”. Stunning ancient temples and spires set amongst the jungles of northern Cambodia are set upon by legions of tourists eager to snap photos, climb around, and look for spots where nobody else has trekked. Which is impossible. This complex of ancient ruins covering some 60 square miles and serving as the Khmer kingdom’s capital from 802 to 1295 A.D. are truly a remarkable site to behold. In actuality it’s dozens of sites to behold, from Angkor Wat which lends itself as the very symbol of Cambodia on her national flag, to fascinating jungle scenes at Ta Prohm (also used in movies like Tomb Raider and Two Brothers). Many temple sites have been restored to pristine condition with nicely kept grounds, while others have been maintained as they may have been found 146 years ago, in cool jungle settings, with trees growing over them, obliterating them in places, and in others wrapping their roots around structures looking like so much wax dripping down a huge candle and pouring itself over ancient stone.

A few scenes from our first day touring the temples

The intrepid photographer

Close encounter . . . ?

From Sunrise to sunset there are perfect places to go, and must-see views to be had, and everyone else knows them too. While the number of temples, spires and Buddha representations seem to be innumerable, the number of tourists easily outnumbers them, 10 to 1. And yet, there are moments of magic, when the crowds melt away in the mid-day sun, or the sheer amazement of certain structures make the noise of buses, tuk-tuks and minivans packed with every nationality (led by the Koreans, Japanese, Chinese and Americans) fades to an imperceptible hum. Such are the qualities of this area that you can scant believe it was built a thousand plus years ago.

My Mom and Dad take an elephant to one of the hilltop temples

Despite being pillaged during years of conflict and by Khmer Rouge, or French archaeologists after it’s “discovery” in 1867, the area offers many amazing vistas, and many temples are inscribed with beautifully intricate reliefs depicting anything from glorious battles, to scenes of everyday life a thousand odd years ago. One could be lost in the details of a single wall, and spend days shuffling along foot-by-foot enraptured by the pictures. Of course, at $20 a day, or 3 days for $40, it makes sense to cover as much ground as possible. And this is best achieved by Tuk-Tuk. While we spent our first day with my parents in a mini-van and a guide (both nice to have when travelling with a group of 4), Jacquie and I set out on day 2 around Angkor via Tuk-Tuk at 5AM to catch the sunrise over Angkor Wat. In many places, we have ventured out earlier than seems reasonable, and waking ourselves at 0445, this felt like one of those days. Surely we would be rewarded by a quiet, wondrous sunrise? But no – as during the day, the crowds descend early, and as we pulled up to the gates of Angkor, behind us down a straight strip of road a mile long, all you could see was headlights bumping toward us to capture the same view.

The view at sunrise . . . oh so early!

Our sunrise adventure at Angkor Wat

It is honest to say that our build-up and hopes for the event were higher than what we actually witnessed. In our minds, we would witness a crimson sky burning beyond the towers of Angkor Wat, the hushed tones of monks traipsing in the background our only disturbance. In reality, the crush of onlookers jockeying for prime pond-side space and noise of the multitude of different touring nationalities was more than we expected. Yet, the event was worth our early morning endeavors despite the loud company, to witness the natural glory of sunrise to behold this amazing man-made wonder.

With the sun just starting to burn through the morning haze, it promised to be a beautiful day. All around us, birds sang sweetly while monarch-patterned butterflies flittered from wild flower to wild flower. Children teased each other, delighting in the coolness of the day, and betrayed only by the sounds of their young voices being carried in the wind from the school a few feet away.

Have the 20,000 souls found their peace, here at the most well known of Cambodia's Killing Fields?

Cambodians don't like to talk about the genocide that saw up to 25% of its population (about 2 million people) murdered between 1975 and 1979. For many, it's just too personal: it would be hard to find a family here that did not lose a loved one. For others, silence is the only appropriate response to events that defy logic, that can never be understood. The genocide is not discussed openly. But it is far from forgotten.

The Memorial Stupa at Choeng Ek. The covered structure on the left is a former burial pit.

At Choeng Ek, about ten miles south-west of Phnom Pehn, visitors walk around the sunken pits from which thousands of bodies have already been exhumed. But it's not all butterflies and wild flowers. At several times during our tour, and even though we were sticking strictly to the trail, we were horrified to realize that we were walking on some recently exposed human bones. The Cambodian guides - perhaps in the pursuit of an extra dollar of two - do seem to focus on the most gruesome details, and we have no doubt that some of the "clothing" emerging from the dirt was far more recent than 1979, but the bones were - regrettably - real and we think a raised walkway is the least these victims deserve.

The Memorial is simple and effective. Shown in the picture above, it is glass-sided, with shelves lining the entire interior, from floor to ceiling. Human skulls and bones are alternately neatly lined up or heaped on the shelves. There are more than 5,000 skulls here. Skulls that have been punctured, crushed, sliced. Gruesome - yes, but it couldn't be called gratutious. Literally eye-to-eye with death, this monument delivers its promise to never let Cambodians forget. Fear. Horror. Terror. Is it possible it was only thirty years ago?

Eye-to-eye with death. Enough said.

The fact that Choeng Ek is one of more than three hundred "Killing Fields" throughout Cambodia gives us an idea of the scale of the atrocities here. Pol Pot’s regime was nothing less than a terrifying social experiment to transform the population – almost overnight – into a pliant, agrarian workhorse. His soldiers included impressionable young children who could be transformed – with staggering ease as it turned out – into violent killing machines, sometimes tasked with the “official destruction” of even their own families.

In many cases, prolonged torture and interrogation preceded inevitable death. Security-Office 21, or S-21, was created to manage anti-Angkor elements and, while it was a highly secretive organization during the late seventies, it now evokes images of the most terrible war crimes for all Cambodians. At Choeng Ek, a Cambodian message humbly assesses that the Cambodian genocide was more terrible even than the crimes perpetrated by the Nazis in Europe during World War II.

An important S-21 facility was located right in the heart of Phnom Pehn, in a site formerly used as a school.

Tuol Sleng was a school before it was a detention centre.

Having been quickly abandoned as the Vietnamese approached Phnom Pehn in 1979, the complex was discovered by a photo-journalist who - literally - followed his nose. He photographed the hastily-killed victims still lying on metal bed-frames, and it is these harrowing images that are now used to remind visitors of the horrors executed here. The exhibition's simplicity is its strength; some rooms house only a single bed frame, and a single photograph of a violently mutilated victim.

Much is known about Tol Sleng's residents because documentation was meticulously maintained regarding the prisoners' backgrounds and their subsequent 'confessions' of crimes against the regime. In total, the centre is believed to have housed about 20,000 inmates over its four-or-so years in operation, the vast majority ultimately finding their deaths at Choeung Ek, the most famous of Cambodia's Killing Fields, located about 10 miles southwest of the city. Pol Pot's regime targeted the educated (doctors, lawyers, engineers, teachers), the disabled, those who wore glasses, even those who spoke foreign languages. In short, only faithful farmers and labourers capable of 16 hour days were spared. With so many hours in the fields, these labourers should have been well rewarded for their work, but rice was being sent to China in exchange for military equipment, and many Cambodians starved to death during this period.

A monk contemplates Cambodia's violent past at Tuol Sleng.

Cambodia’s war criminals have still to be brought to justice. A Khmer Rouge tribunal has been underway for several years and – like most tribunals – will doubtless continue to be mired in complexity. It has just been announced, however, that the S-21 cases will be separated from the others to accelerate the trials of former S-21 Director Eav, known commonly as ‘Duch’ and other leading “Brothers”. The tribunal noted that this was possible only because of the “relative simplicity” of the case, which must point to the very detailed documentation of inmates at Tuol Seng.

Of note, and according to the Cambodia Daily, “only one person has so far come forward as a civil party to the tribunal proceedings”. This is in large part due to the fact that so few Tuol Seng residents – less than two handfuls – survived to tell the tale. Maybe it’s also partly due to Cambodians’ desire to put the past behind them. Or maybe it’s that they’re still afraid to talk.

It had been more than 36 years since Lloyd Sr last saw Tri Ton. When he left the town in August 1971 after a year's service in Vietnam, he was no doubt looking forward to being reunited with his wife, Ingrid and his son, Roger. And he must have been excited – too – knowing that he would soon be seeing, for the first time, his son, Lloyd, born in December 1970.

Armed only with photographs taken in 1970, we arrived in Tri Ton on Sunday morning after an hour long drive from Chau Doc. Our mission was to try and locate the US military compound that had been Lloyd Sr’s home during his service as part of Military Assistance Command. Of course, a town changes a lot in 36 years, so we had our work cut out for us trying to match the profile of a nearby hill, and read what clues we could from an old aerial photograph.


An aerial shot of Tri Ton taken by helicopter in 1970.

In the course of our search, several groups of local Vietnamese came out to see if they could help, invariably sending us off in a different direction than the last. Our interactions were always fun, however, with young mothers thrusting toddlers at us, urging them to respond in English to our hellos and goodbyes. Others joined the group to peruse Lloyd Sr’s old photographs, or simply to marvel at our white skin and alien demeanour. I managed the seemingly endless line of older kids anxious to try out their basic English phrases, and took photos of them with the digital camera resulting in the inevitable sniggers as they considered their own images.

It turned out, of course, that we had driven right past the old compound location as we entered the town! Identifying the correct place was more difficult because every single building had been pulled down to make way for what looked to be a Communist Meeting Hall. Lloyd Sr recognized a very old stone wall that ran one length of the perimeter, however, so he was confident that we had found the right place.

On the left, the two Lloyds at work. On the right, just a few of the locals who dropped by the check us out.

Immediately opposite the compound was – and is – a beautiful Cambodian temple. We spent almost an hour there, retaking some of Lloyd Sr’s old snaps. In contrast to the compound, not much had changed at all!! A few stupas had been added or painted, and foliage was considerably more dense. Orange-robed monks loitered around doors, curious about our intentions but too shy to ask. As we explored the grounds, young boys skipped around us, camouflaging their ‘hellos’ with embarrassed laughter while a scrawny old man arranged wood to dry in the fierce midday sun.

Temple - Then

Temple - Now. Lloyd Sr is holding the 1970 snapshot shown above.

Temple detail.

With our primary mission accomplished, we decided to check out nearby Tuc Dup, which became infamous as the "Two Million Dollar Hill" after a prolonged (and failed) US bombing campaign. While Ingrid enjoyed the gardens below, a group of kids ranging from maybe eight to fifteen years of age immediately took the three of us under their wing. We weren’t quite sure of their function at first, but the trail suddenly ended and we found ourselves clambering over and around giant boulders with only the young kids’ guidance in terms of footholds. If there was a difficult step (and there were many!), one or two tiny hands would appear almost from nowhere to offer support. As we stumbled around, the barefoot children bounced effortlessly from rock to rock, bantering all the while no doubt about their slow charges.

Our young guides, leading us into the depths of Tuc Dup.

This boy appeared to be part of a mining party we passed on our way down.

So while we got more than we bargained for in terms of the climb, the view from halfway up the hill was worth it, with flooded paddy fields stretching for miles. While us old folk rested for a few minutes and enjoyed the view, our guides entertained us by exploding leaves on their hands with the maximum ‘bang’ possible, tiny echoes – perhaps - of the bombs dropped here by the US more than 30 years ago.

Our day out to Tri Ton was memorable, for me, as it took us firmly away from the tourist trail and offered insight into a ‘real’ Vietnamese town. I’ve no doubt that, for the three Thyens, it was rather more significant and we’re working on Lloyd Sr to write a guest entry for the blog, sharing his own thoughts on today’s step down memory lane.