The above are pictures from Tuol Sleng Genocide museum. Ethan, Erica and I visited here one afternoon, while David took the younger girls for a swim. These sites are definitely not for children.
This used to be a High School, but was taken over by Pol Pot’s regime for use as a prison, known as S-21. It has now been turned into a museum and serves as a record of that time, displaying crimes committed by the Khmer Rouge.
S-21 was a place of torture with the aim of extracting confessions/information. Nearly every person who came through here as a prisoner was eventually sent to the killing fields ~ 20,000 people including children. The Khmer Rouge believed that if one person was deemed a ‘traitor’ to the regime their whole family should be killed, including infants. The saying was ‘when pulling out the weeds, remove the roots and all’.
It’s believed that most prisoners were innocent of the charges against them and forced into making false confessions via torture.
There were also multiple foreigners who ended up at S-21, including sailors who were picked up from boats in the ocean off Cambodia. They were all murdered.
It was a very somber visit. We listened to audio guides, including some accounts from the very small number of people who escaped S-21 alive. Some had unique skills such as painting or photography that were utilised by the people running S-21, which helped to keep them alive. I remember an account from one former prisoner who encouraged forgiveness - very inspiring and so challenging given the atrocities they lived through.
We had a lunch break at a Greek restaurant.
There was a dat at the restaurant that seemed to really like Erica. Erica is allergic to cats, so she didn’t think this was ideal.
After lunch, we visited the killing fields..
This was once a longan orchard here, but now contains mass graves resulting from the Khmer Rouge era. We listened to audio guides as we walked around the area.
Inside the Memorial Stupa are more than 8000 skulls that have been exhumed from the site.
Back at the hotel. View over Phnom Penh
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