A 14-hour journey from Kanchanaburi via train, taxi, foot, and tuk-tuk, landed us in Siem Reap, Cambodia. Here we visited Angkor Wat, the largest religious structure in the world, as well as many other wondrous temples.
Bullet holes from the Khmer Rouge mottle the exterior of Angkor Wat
Isaac at Angkor Thom
Our favorite site was the Ta Prohm, also known as the Jungle Temple. The Cambodians proudly boast that Tomb Raider was filmed here, and boy, how they love Angelina Jolie! Much of the site lays in ruins, with opportunistic foliage twisting through the rubble. It is a magical place!
Phnom Penh, Cambodia
After several days in Siem Reap, we moved on to the sprawling city of Phnom Pehn. Here we visited the Killing Fields and S-21 Museum, and learned more about the horrific genocide of the Khmer Rouge.
Killing Fields...
More than 8000 skulls unearthed at the Killing Fields are displayed in this memorial shrine.
Some graves have not been opened... there are places along the paths where shreds of clothing still protrude from the earth.
S-21 Museum... a former school, converted into a torture/detention center by Pol Pot...
The last 7 victims of the Khmer Rouge were found bludgeoned to death in these former classrooms... photographs of the scene and the rusted bed frames on which the innocent were found are the only items in the rooms.
Pol Pot insisted a photograph be taken of every man, woman, and child he executed. Their haunting images fill room after room in the museum.
1 comments:
Wow. How powerful to think each one of those was someone's mother or father or sister or brother or child.
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