Hello hello from Phnom Penh - been here just for the one night so far, staying in a hostel on the lakeside with awesome views of the sunset - part of the restaurant is a boat moored up at the end of the backyard...pretty nice. The temples at Angkor that I saw from Siem Reap were inspirational - the detail of the carvings and the size of the statues of various incarnations of Hindu and Buddhist deities was awesome. Angkor Wat itself was probably the most "impressive" of the 100 or so Wats around the area, due to its magnitude and location, and of course the masonry that went into it...but I was blown away by one of the temples - Bayon - I think it's the one most photographed, and the most recognisable image for the Angkor area. There are around 54 columns, all with 4 calming, smiling, knowledgeable Buddha faces looking out in each direction, and the effect is one of pure serenity - helped by the nearby pagoda full of Buddhist monks chanting, meditating and praying. Yeah, I was impressed. Sorry about that little spiel.
So the sunsets and sunrises at the temples were fantastic, and the actual town/city of Siem Reap was good fun to cycle around, but the main highlight, although not for the normal reasons, was the landmine museum I made it to, way out of the city centre and down over a mile or so of potholed dirt tracks. It was started by a Cambodian who fought with the Vietnamese against the Khmer Rouge towards the end of the last millenium, and is a 'free' museum, although you feel so awful by the time you leave that the donation box must need a lot of emptying. He has been taking in children who have been injured by landmines since he started the museum, and now has around 30 of them - they all have distressing stories - one 12 year old was out collecting firewood near his village with his two brothers and stepped on a landmine, which blew off his leg. His brothers ran back when they heard the explosions and his screams and ran over a tripwire which detonated another mine, killing them both while a piece of shrapnel took out the first brother's left eye. I read this and then turned around to see him standing a few feet away, laughing and talking in English to some other tourists. Every single one of the accounts of the children rescued by the curator is as awful, but to see them around the museum, being educated and housed was a moving experience. The curator himself still goes out most days of the week armed just with a stick to clear mines, and manages up to about 30 a day. There are estimated to be well over 6,000,000 active, undetected landmines left in Cambodia alone today. Not good. As you may be able to tell, I was pretty moved by all this - my apologies for the fairly downbeat journal entry!
So now in the Cambodian capital, with plans to explore on a bicycle, possibly head to the Toul Sleng museum (which will be another barrel of laughs - all about Pol Pot and his warped genocides...best remove my glasses before heading there...) and do all manner of other touristic sightseeing.
Hope you are all well, will upload more photos very soon, lots of love, David. xxxx
Just went to the Toul Sleng (S21) museum - as horrific as expected and it all happened so recently. And then you remember that it's still happening today. Sort it out.