Day 12 – 14.10.2016
Today was going to be a very tough day. We visited the killing fields and S-21, the jail where Khmer Rouge opponents were kept to be transported to the killing fields to be executed. For more information, check out the film „The Killing Fields“ that brushes on several aspects of war and actions of the Khmer Rouge.
We first headed outside of Phnom Penh to see the Killing Fields or Choeung Ek, Genocidal Centre.
We followed our tour guide for today and he informed us on the most important details of this site. Here you can see all the craters of the fields. Each crater represents a mass grave where between 40 and 400 people were murdered. These mounds of earth are due to the excavations that have been done around here. The whole area has a very eerie feel to it. You walk along a natural path and left and right of you are these little hills, where you can just imagine what had happened to people here only a few years earlier.
You can still see pieces of clothing that has been swept up by the rain, as well as if you look closely on this picture teeth on the front stone. Bones can still be found lieing around and it just gives you a glimpse of what occured here.
Before the pathways had been installed, people could literally walk over the graves, breaking bones without even knowing that they were doing this.
This is a spiritual tree. The Cambodians believe that in this trees the souls of the deceased will live on to take revenge on what had happened to them.
The Khmer Rouge on the other hand used this tree to hang up loud speakers and to play loud Chinese music in order to drown out the moans of the people that were being executed from those people still awaiting their turn.
The Khmer Rouge chose this site for executions, as it was close enough from Phnom Penh, but still far enough to not be close to any citizens that could here and smell what was happening. One side of the premise was framed by a lake and so an escape was nearly impossible too. As a matter of fact, no one ever did escape the killing fields. It furthermore was previously used as a Chinese cementary and so having dead bodies under the ground would not be as suspicious as any other location.
Here are the remains of one of these Chinese graves.
Over the years more and more clothing and bones have appeared on the surfaces.These have been collected by visitors or the excavators. As it is not possible to determine to which head or body they belong, they are kept in these boxes on display to warn the future generations.
The next part is really quite horrific. This is the killing tree. Adjacent to it is a mass grave of over 100 women and children. This tree was used to execute children. Since ammunition was so expensive and not worthy to be used on the prisoners, all prisoners were executed using blunt objects such as bamboo sticks, machetes, iron poles etc. The children however, if small enough, where taken by their limbs and smashed onto the tree until they were dead.
In a documentary we got to see at the memorial site, a survivor described this tree as to still have remains of blood and brains sticking to the tree when the site was discovered by returning men into their villages after the Khmer regime.
That is why so many visitors (mainly foreigners) have left bracelets on the trees and on the other mass graves.
This is how the site looked during the excavation.
More rags of the victims.
During the Khmer regime, everyone was forced to were the parties black colours and uniform. Everyone who wore brightly coloured clothing that wasn’t black were deemed as capitalists and were imprisoned and executed. In this glass container there are several colourful rags, as well as childrens clothing, and some Khmer Rouge uniforms, from Khmer Rouge army members who had chosen to go against the regime or were in the way of a larger plan.
Cambodians believe that a person can only find peace if he is cremated in its entirety. So the following grave was especially difficult for the families of the executed. This grave just contained bodies without heads, that had been clearly removed either during the execution or beforehand. Without the heads they can never be cremated and can never find peace and the way to paradise.
More examples of former Chinese graves, pushed over by the masses of earth from the mass graves.
The killing devices.
Prisoners that arrived from S-21 to be executed were sometimes lead to detention hut. Here they would sit with their feet shackled, blindfolded, awaiting their fate. They would not be able to hear anything as the music from the loudspeakers would muffle any sounds from fellow inmates, and one by one they would be taken away straight to their graves, to be executed right on the spot to be dumped into the grave. The executions would normally only take place at night, and so sometimes if up to 300 people arrived per day, they would make them wait out their turn before their execution for several hours.
To remember all those victims of the killing fields (also those that were killed all over Cambodia, whose killing fields could not be turned into memorial sites and were not maintained) a monument was constructed. This monument houses hundreds of skulls and bones, as well as rags and weapons used for the killings as a warning for future generations and in order to give these people a place where they can eventually find peace, possibly with their bones in the same memorial temple
After visiting the killing fields, we headed to the place from where most of the executed prisoners came from – the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, or formally known as S-21.
Tuol Sleng was a school complex prior tot he Khmer Rouge who didnt believe in education. They repurposed these houses to prison cells.
Some of the larger detention cells contained a bed with shackles for the feet, as well as a pillow and a mattress. Prisoners would receive a metal container and a plastic bowl. Unfortunately not for the first thing that comes to your mind such as personal belongings or food, but the metal container for faeces and the plastic bowl for urine, so that the prisoners wouldnt have to leave their cells to go to the bathroom, and the smell was kept to a minimum.
There were rules that had tob e complied to. No political paroles could be proclaimed, if a prisoners did not do as his guard demanded, he would be punished and so on.
An image of the last survivors of the prison, a couple of very young kids and those prisoners who stayed alive by offering their painting skills, mechanical skills or whatever else was handy for the prison.
When this complex was still a school, this wooden construction was used as a rope climbing exercise and was used for physical activity.
During Khmer Rouge times however, this wooden construction was used as the gallows to hang prisoners upside down until they lost consciousness and then dunk them into a large container of filthy water usually used as fertiliser on the fields, so that they quickly regained consciousness and the interrogation process could continue.
In this picture in the background, you can also see the graves oft he last 17 people that were killed just as the Khmer Rouge had to abandon the prison. They were found all along the prison still shackled in their cells.
We then moved on to a little exhibition as part of the prison showing photographs oft he people who had come tot he prison. Each prisoner was photographed, measured and his details were noted down in order to distinguish between each prisoner and in order to not loose any along the way.
The Khmer Rouge believed that when a member of a family was deamed capitalist, his whole family was too. They believed that a disease has to be erradicated by its roots, and so the whole family even the small children were arrested and executed. That way there would be no one who would want to take revenge on the Khmer Rouge in later years, as they too had died and all people who were left had a pure take on the communist views of the Khmer Rouge and not a tainted one by their past memories.
After the prisoners had arrived they were brought to this room. Here they were all shackled together with long metal bars.
After they had been taken away individually for their interrogation, they were not rejoined with the people shackled to the iron rods in order to not give on any information as to what was going to happen tot he rest of the new arrivals. Instead they were individually brought to little cells were they were shackled to the floor.
To keep the image of Pol Pot present at all times (here some information on his history. His name comes from the abbrevition of „Political Potential“ ) These busts were created and pictures were drawn of Pol Pots to remind the prisoners of the „greatness of Pol Pot“.
We were incredibly lucky, since today two survivors of the prison were present and were signing and selling their books to the visitors. I was able to take a picture with Bou Meng, a prisoner who survived by creating life like pictures of Pol Pot and therefore remained a necessity for the Khmer Rouge guards.
You notice how recent this history is and especially when the survivors of this genocide are still alive today.
Moving on to a different part of the prison where the actual cells have been kept as they were. All parts were blocked off with barbed wire as to not enable prisoners to jump to their deaths and to hinder them from ever escaping.
The cells were tiny.
On the second floor the cells were made from wood.
Outside the building is a memorial to the victims of the prison.
Here are some devices used to torture the inmates. Usually they were taken out of their cells and transported to neighboring houses where they were tortured and interrogated. At some point every one confessed to some crime or another (even if innocent) in order for the ongoing torture to stop.
Means of torture and babies being taken from their mothers (sorry, thats exactly where the flash hit the image)
Waterboarding, removal of finger and toe nails, breaking of limbs.
The prison complex overview.
We were all happy to get out of S-21, as the start of the day had been very emotionally draining. It was a good way to experience the history of Cambodia in a very extreme way, but I think it was equally important to see these sites to never forget.
We headed onwards for lunch to go eat at a non profit organisation or NGO (Non Government Organisation / foreign charity) called friends, where we would support the local community, as they take on kids from the streets and in some cases their families too, to train them and help them get on their feet.
I had a lovely beef curry with crispy noodles that was seasoned well and a litt bit spicy!
I also had some hummus with dried tomatoes that too was delicious!
Their concept is based on tapas, even though the size of the plates is just so large, that I was ready to roll out of the restaurant as walking was no longer an option. But hey, never say no to desert – I tried a little piece of this banana and sweet potato fried crunchy street food snack. Exquisite!
Afterwards we had some free time on our hands, and I opted to head out and have a look at the National Museum. Here they display all sorts of statues and ornaments from the ancient Khmer times. By the way Khmer is just another name for Cambodian.
Here a couple of images from the musuem, unfortunately you weren’t able to take photographs from inside.
After the musuem I chose to try out a blind massage! It was a great one, done by a blind masseuse. She knew exactly what needed to be done and I felt so relaxed afterwards!
The king in Cambodia is a big thing. So is the royal family and pictures and images of them are on display everywhere.
After the massage I decided to head out and look at the Royal palace and its royal splendor.
Members of the royal court have to wear a different colour each day of the week. So for example on Sundays the court wears red. On Mondays Orange and so on to the right. Why unfortunately I do not know.
The costumes of the royal family for big receptions (like the reception oft he Chinese prime minster the night before.)
Beautiful gates along the way.
The silver temple – called silver temple because it’s floor is made of silver tiles. That you can walk on only when there is a carpet lieing over them. Inside is a display of the riches of the royal family – with golden and silver Buddha statues given as presents from the royal family or to the royal family. Little embellished cigar boxes and ornaments and just a large arrangement of gold, silver and sparkle.
In the centre there is even a little temple surrounded by lush vegetation – as if you were going into the rain forest and on a little hill there was another temple.
More of these constructions around the premise.
After the prime minister, the royal court were preparing for another day of celebrations. Tomorrow there is the remembrance of the anniversary of the former kings death. All the staff were preparing the tent and its decorations, where airing out carpets and painting plant pots, and on the side parcels and the like were brought into the palace, all part of the celebratory event.
At the palace they also have an exhibition of the elephant saddles that the royal family has and still uses. Some of these are very large, others are highly embellished.
I very much enjoyed the time I had to myself outside of the group and so I decided to head to the water front and observe the people that were roaming about here and on the river. All very calming and helping me to digest this very tough day.
After that I headed back to the hotel by tuk tuk, and later joined the others for a little dinner of barbequed meat (Rib fingers to be precise). Off to bed it was, only after having finished the film Killing Fields to comprehend even better what went on and to connect a couple more jigsaw pieces together.
