i arrived in the morning and cabbed it to the raffles hotel. the raffles is unique and historic as it was a regular stopping point for jackie o and was the last bastion of safety for foreign journalists during khmer rouge. it didnt hurt that the hotel is completely gorgeous as well...
it is always so great, when you arrive at a nice hotel in asia, you are typically greeted with a tasty juice or cocktail and a cold towel!
the pool that i read, napped and ate by...
i spent the first day by the pool and then ventured out on foot a bit later. i wasnt really bothered other than by the tuk-tuk drivers and the motorcyclists all looking for business. however, i did not once feel unsafe or assaulted in any way (versus places like jakarta or manila where you feel uneasy the entire time day or night...). after a short walk, i came to wat phnom which is the tallest religious structure in phnom penh.
i enjoyed going up the hill and enjoying the view until i came to this:
i think me snapping pics gave me away :(
the next day, i got up early-ish and went for an uplifting day of sight seeing. i paid leap, my friendly tuk-tuk driver USD30 for the whole day! we started out by going to s-21. s-21 was completely depressing, sad, mortifying and tragic. s-21 was a school but then turned into a torture center during pol pot's rule. you were allowed to take pictures but i didnt, couldnt, except for this one:
i took this one and only shot at s-21 because the tree was so beautiful. it goes to show that nature will pull through, things will re-grow and bloom again despite what happened in the past.
so after going through the establishment that "processed" (yes, that is the word they use) about 200,000 people where only 7 survived, i hit up the killing fields.
this is the entrance to the killing fields. the pagoda in the background houses skulls, various bones and clothes found when the mass graves were dug up.
again, photos were allowed at the killing fields but i just couldnt. why would i want to take a picture of that? its just too much. the graves were dug up because cambodians are a combination of hindu and buddhist. buddhists believe that the spirit continues on and it is just the end of the time in that particular body. therefore, in order to move on properly, the body must be laid to rest...not in a mass grave. there are many unearthed graves left and the cambodian government has begun to make efforts to dig them up.
this was a worker taking a nap inside the killing fields - i thought he looked like a big corn or empanada!
after leaving the killing fields, leap and i ventured off to the royal palace where the king still occasionally resides. after seeing royal palaces in beijing, seoul, paris and london, i have to say that this one was the best. certainly not the biggest but by far the most artistic and beautiful, in my opinion. here are some pictures and you can see for yourself:
the leaf is on the way up to a pagoda and people write their dreams & wishes...beautiful writing. and i am obsessed with monks...
so believe it or not, that was the short version of my trip but there is always room for monkeys!!!!
