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During the night Tom needed the toilet so had to leave the room to use the communal facilities. Half asleep, staggering about in the washroom there was a young Cambodian man stood there in a towel. Thinking none of it Tom walked by to do his business.......

As he passed the feminine guy "caught" Tom's chest with his hand and made a giggle. Uncomfortable and fast waking up, Tom ran by and forcefully locked the door. On leaving, the guy was still stood there......... Not really knowing what was going on and starting to think the worst, Tom opted for a brisk walk by, not making eye contact, head down and hope for the best. Passing, the guy stroked his towel covered bottom and commenced to shout "bum, bum.......... bum, bum", Tom replied with expletives and threw his arms around, he then ran back to the room to wake Rachael who commenced to laugh, offer to "sort him out", and promptly fall back to sleep.

Getting back to sleep we woke early for our day of touring the city. First stop was the Vietnamese embassy which we needed for our Visa for entry at the beginning for September. The walk took about 40 minutes but the sun thankfully stayed in to keep the heat it bearable. On arrival was asked how much it would cost and it turns out by the time we'd picked it up, it was more than getting it through our guesthouse (although the guesthouse takes 3 days instead of 6 hours), so we got a tuk-tuk back and did it through our guesthouse.

We had breakfast and met-up with Mel and a guy we'd met the previous day named David. We made an itinerary and agreed to hire a tuk-tuk for a few hours, go to the Killing fields outside the city, Genocide Museum, and Russian market.

The killing fields are a centre to show the brutal and barbaric activities of the Ultra Communist Khmer Rouge Regime (UCKRR) in which over 2 million Cambodian people were killed between 1975 and 1979. At the fields were mass graves holding thousands of bodies, men, women and children executed without any regard for human life.

The genocide museum was located in the city where a school had been converted into a large prison in which thousands had been held and tortured, before being sent for execution in the fields under the regime (only 8 survived).

The crimes committed in such resent history were incomprehensible. The day was very interesting, it was good to have a little more understanding about something we'd ignorantly heard little about. Walking around the capital city today, as a tourist, its hard to understand how each person you meet was impacted by the atrocities, it seems a very important part of Cambodia today.

One the way home we briefly visited the Russian market but it was closing so grabbed something to eat and decided we'd used too many tuk-tuks today set off on the long walk home.

Not having a map, but using the sun for navigation, it probably took just under an hour but in the heat of the city it was a little difficult. Its was great to see the city in action around rush hour (made crossing the roads a little fun), and even managed to stumble upon a few tourist attractions. The highlight was watching the hundreds of locals doing their community mass exercises in the park, people walking, running, hacky-sack, badminton, and aerobics to music. The park was buzzing with energy, a stark contract to our actives earlier.

Feeling oddly cultured, informed, and invigorated by this city, we hit the sack early.