Hello everyone,

Soooo, we left Ho Chi Minh on the morning of the 20th of August for Cambodia. It was another long journey taking around 6 hours. We went on the Mekong Express bus which was actually really good, although we did have to put up with lots of Cambodian karaoke on DVD! The border crossing was fairly quick and hassle-free which was nice. When we arrived in Phnom Penh we found a hotel and had a wander down to the riverside area. We soon discovered that Cambodia has adopted the American dollar so we had to try and spend the Riels we'd drawn out! Weirdly, in the evening we bumped into the same two guys we'd met during our trip from Thailand to Laos, then again in Hanoi so we went for a meal and discussed our travels.

The next day we hired a tuk-tuk for the day. Firstly we went to the killing fields which was about 30 minutes out of town. This is the site of the mass graves created during the pol pot regime during the 70s. A giant stupa has been created in the middle containing some of the skulls, bones and clothes uncovered from the graves. On some of the skulls you can see bullet holes or big cracks in them which was pretty horrible. Around the site we saw areas of the graves marked out as well as places such as the tree which was used to smash open the skulls of babies. While we were walking around we could see bits of people's clothes sticking out of the ground which was pretty horrible. Apparently clothes, bones and bullets still emerge to the surface today. Before we left we had a look around the museum and watched a video. Although it's such a horrendous place it was really interesting to learn about and it actually felt quite peaceful walking around as it's really beautiful. Next we got taken to the Tuol Sleng museum back in the city. Before we went in we had some lunch in a restaurant where we got harassed by a little boy and girl (this happened a lot!) to buy some books. Eventually were persuaded to buy them some noodles and drinks. The museum is an old school which was converted into a prison during the pol pot regime. Here thousands of people were tortured and killed before being taken to the killing fields. It was really sad seeing all of the mug shots of the people killed there and it was really creepy walking through the makeshift cells in the old classrooms. Although it was harrowing we had a really interesting day. It's important that people know about what went on in Cambodia during that time. I'm currently reading a book about it!

On the monday we had a slightly more light-hearted day. Firstly we headed to the national museum, just around the corner from our hotel which holds lots of  very old artefacts which have been uncovered in Cambodia. Afterwards we went to the Royal Palace which was nice but nothing we hadn't seen lots of times already. Before heading back to the hotel we went back down to the waterfront where there were lots of people praying and waving incense by a temple-like building. In the evening we went to the 'Friends' restaurant which helps to train former street kids to work in the food industry. The food was delicious and it helped a very good cause!

Lots of love,

Jo and Ryan xxx