Phnom Penh Blog
Everyone has their bucket list places. This post is not about one of those.
One of my bucket list stops was Angkor Wat in Cambodia and we decided to head there during Chinese New Year earlier this year. We bought a round trip ticket to/from Phnom Penh though not Siem Reap so we spent a couple days there first. One the one hand that was a terrible idea because I was really antsy to see Angkor Wat but on the other hand it was a great idea because theres some important stuff to see there.
Not today Seth…not today
Our first day was as slow and riddled with failure as usual. Cheap plane tickets always seem to be late at night so our first days inevitably start late and Phnom Penh was no exception. After finally getting up and having coffee (a necessary first step regardless of when we wake up) we went to see the Royal Palace. And did not see the Royal Palace. You see, the Royal Palace closes in the afternoon for lunch and that is exactly when we went to see it. Classic Seth. Not wanting to wait around we kept walking and headed south a little where we saw the Cambodia-Vietnam Friendship Monument. From there we headed west to the Mekong River then north to where the Mekong meets the Tonle Sap River and wandered through a little market we found.
Having done a little aimless wandering we again decided to specifically look for something and went in search of Wat Phnom, a Buddhist temple north of the Royal Palace. We eventually found it and wandered in. The temple proper is at the top of a hill so we followed a path that looped around the bottom looking for a way up. While following that path we stumbled on…the entrance. Where people were paying to get it. Oops. So we slunk out and came back in the right way. Lesson learned. Then we worked our way up the hill to see the temple.
Day 2 we were rested so we were up earlier for what was a much more muted day that we usually have when we travel. In the 70s Cambodia fell under the control of Pol Pot who tried to change the economy and instigated what became known as the Cambodian Genocide. Visiting Cambodia now you can visit some sites of historical significance and learn about what happened. That was our plan for the second day and we went to the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum at S-21 and the Choeung Ek Killing Fields.
S-21 was a school that the Khmer Rouge turned into a prison. It has since been turned into a museum housing rooms full of pictures, history, and artifacts from the regime in the rooms of the school all surrounding a monument to those who died. We made our way through the museum with audio guides we got at the entrance. The entire area was tough but the rooms of pictures and stories of different people was one of the most difficult.
The Choeung Ek Killing Fields were fields were they killed people. Prisoners were brought there to be killed, including many people from S-21. Like S-21 it now serves as a grisly history lesson. If you visit you’ll learn about different areas of the fields and how they were used by the Khmer Rouge, from where prisoners were brought in to where different buildings once stood. There’s also some areas where you can see the areas previous use as a cemetery.
Neither place is particularly easy to get through but I believe both to be quite important. Although we learn about atrocities like these in history books at school they can seem distant and oftentimes I think people don’t really quite understand the weight of what happened. That is not the case when visiting places like this. The weight of what happened is almost overwhelming. The opportunity to experience history in a much more visceral way is imperative. I think it’s the only way we will truly be able to avoid repeating the horrors of the past.
To try to unwind after such a serious second we went to a cat cafe after getting back to the city. I’d never been to one but it turns out they’re awesome. We bought something to drink to get in then went and played with a bunch of cats for an hour while we had our drinks. Did I mention how awesome they are? If you live near a cat cafe definitely check it out.
After our somber second day we had a much more touristy third day. Our first stop was another Buddhist temple called Wat Botum which turned out to be in a little complex area. From there we continued on to the King Norodom Sihanouk Memorial and the Independence Monument. All three were near the Cambodia-Vietnam Friendship Monument we had seen the first day. In retrospect we should have seen all four at once, but I rarely do the correct thing the first time around.
Next we finally checked out the Royal Palace that we’d missed on the first day. And I got lost a lot. Honestly the area isn’t too big and we had a map, but either the map wasn’t good enough or I just couldn’t keep the buildings apart in my head and could never figure where on the map I was. That said the buildings there were very impressive, which is to be expected since it’s where the Royal Palace is. After admiring the buildings and getting a little sunburn we wrapped up our time in Phnom Penh and got ready to go to Siem Reap.
We did come back to Phnom Penh for about a day at the end of our trip to catch a flight but we didn’t have a ton of time. We did manage to see the (outside of the) National Museum which was pretty cool. Most of time there was at the beginning and it was a great way to start our trip. And please don’t miss the history.
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