Phnom Penh, Cambodia

Our time in Phnom Penh passed incredibly quickly. We visited the city to explore its history and learn about its tragic past, planning to leave soon after since it didn't have the best reputation.

Despite our brief stay, the city left a lasting impression. Arriving around 6pm from our sleeper bus, we reached our hotel and were welcomed by the smell of lemongrass before quickly dropping our bags and heading out in search of food. I found a beer garden featuring live music and beautiful decor where we enjoyed a glass of red wine and marked the third country of our Asian adventure. However, we were surprised when the bill arrived, as Cambodia uses the US Dollar, making things more expensive than we expected.

On our first full day in the city, we spent the morning working before exploring the city center. I felt somewhat overwhelmed by the level of poverty and the sheer amount of people out and about. The city was bustling, but in a completely different way than Ho Chi Minh City, it's hard to describe, just wasn't a huge fan.

Choeung Ek Killing Fields & Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum

On the second day, even though we had mentally prepared for a challenging experience, no words can truly capture the emotional toll of witnessing the remnants of the Khmer Rouge regime. The day began with us being picked up from our hotel and driven to the Choeung Ek Killing Fields, where over 20,000 people were killed between 1975 and 1979. Upon arrival, our tour guide used his laser pointer to turn our attention to the remnants of clothing still to be seen in the mass graves, explaining that fragments of bones are still discovered weekly, if not daily. He then nonchalantly mentioned, "Oh look, here's a tooth," almost right under his foot, setting the tone for the day.

We walked around the mass graves ending at a memorial about 17 stories high, filled with the bones and skulls of victims, showing the marks of their suffering. I couldn't bring myself to get close to it. Our guide shared so many horrifying details with us during the tour, pointing to trees to say this is where they hung speakers and played music so nearby residents wouldn't hear the screams and telling us about the chemicals that would be poured on the live people further increasing their pain but ensuring they would die.

For part two of the day, we visited Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, the memorial site of “Security Office 21” (S-21) which served as a prison during the regime. It originally was a high school, which is especially twisted when you think of people going there to better themselves and help improve their lives turning into a place where people were broken down and tortured. It was harrowing to walk through the building to see the classrooms converted into as many cells as possible where many died. There's a poster listing the rules of the prison, many of which were unavoidable but brought lashings or electric shocks if broken.

One of the prison blocks showcased headshots of the prisoners, and it was eerie to see their expressions, some smiling and unaware of what would happen and others with pure fear. Between 14,000 and 17,000 prisoners were detained at the prison, with only 12 believed to have survived. It's an atrocity that affected every single member of Cambodia - our tour guide shared the story of his mother, who at 12 years old, was removed from home and sent to go work in the fields. Of her parents and her 6 siblings, she was the only one who returned to the village. When a member of our group asked if the international world knew about it, and if so, why they didn't stop it, our tour guide glumly replied, it's still happening today - what are you doing to stop it? I'm a firm believer that we need to learn from history in order not to repeat it, and while genocide is still happening around the world, it's quite character-defining to see it up close and forces some self-reflection on who you are and what version you want the world to be. You know the saying, we can all make a difference, and they come together collectively to make a big difference.

In the end, it was negotiated that only the top five Khmer Rouge leaders would go to trial. A joint operation between the United Nations and the government of Cambodia, it wasn't until 2018 that we saw a guilty verdict handed down. It's incredible that we don't learn more about this in Western schools as the atrocity didn't happen very long ago and shares a haunting message about a group indoctrinating others to go out and kill their own people.

How's That for a Happy Holidays?

We sure planned a morbid Christmas visiting the Viet Cong tunnels and the Khmer Rouge sites a week ahead of the holidays, but timelines don't exist when you're living as a digital nomad. That said, I'm looking forward to putting the dark sites behind me and heading to our next destination. We will be boarding a three-hour bus to Kampot and spending Christmas next to the river surrounded by coconut trees - I can't wait!