First impressions

It’s siesta time, Saturday lunchtime on 18^th September. We are in a small town on the Mekong River called Kampong Cham, about three hours north-east from Phnom Penh, the capital. We have been here since last Sunday for intensive language training and are here for another four weeks. Siestas are very long here so, two and a half weeks in, I thought it would be a good time to start writing this blog.

We arrived on Thursday 2^nd September, flying from Bangkok to Phnom Penh early in the morning. It is the rainy season at the moment, so on the way in Cambodia looked completely flooded, with patches of lush green vegetation here and there, and lots of wooden houses on stilts, the traditional Cambodian house. It was already hot when we arrived and two VSO staff met us at the airport to sort out visas and to take us to the VSO programme office.

       The first week or so was spent getting to know each other, acclimatising to the sweltering heat, getting to know Phnom Penh and having lots of briefings and training sessions about VSO’s work, the political context of Cambodia, health and security etc. All very interesting, especially the political briefing with the British ambassador at the Embassy, although sadly we weren’t offered any tea or biscuits.

       We also spent quite a lot of time seeing Phnom Penh, which is quite a small capital but very busy. Everyone rides motorbikes or moto-variations, including tuk tuks (local taxis made up of a motorbike and a wooden cart) and stalls attached to motorbikes. It took us a few days to get used to the Cambodian traffic system: everyone does exactly what they want to do regardless of the flow of oncoming traffic. It was quite fun cycling round the city once we understood how the system worked. I didn’t see that many of the tourist sites as there will be plenty of time for that later, but we did go to Tuol Sleng, the Khmer Rouge interrogation centre which is now a Genocide Museum. I had read quite a few memoirs and history books about the Khmer Rouge period but I still wasn’t prepared for the experience.

      Tuol Sleng had been a secondary school in Phnom Penh, but when the Khmer Rouge took power in April 1975 and the entire urban population of the country was evacuated, it became the main interrogation and torture centre for political prisoners. 14,000 people were imprisoned there between 1975 and 1979. Each prisoner was photographed and tortured into writing a full confession of their alleged anti-regime activities, before being taken to Choeng Ek where they were clubbed to death and left in the most famous of Cambodia’s killing fields. Of the 14,000 prisoners at Tuol Sleng, only seven survived.

      I think the most striking thing about the site were the room after room of black and white photographs of the prisoners as they arrived into the museum, particularly as quite a lot of them were children. Apparently when the museum first opened in the early 1980s, quite a lot of people came to look for their missing relatives among the photos. The fact that the site still looks like a school was very disturbing too: classrooms, still with their blackboards, were used to hold prisoners and for interrogations, and the monkey bars and play area had been used as part of torture techniques.

      Overall the experience was horrible and I felt nauseous as I came out, but given that everyone over the age of about 35 has memories of the Khmer Rouge period and that it is only very recently that the political situation has stabilised, it’s an important place to visit, I think.

      That’s all very grim and there’s a lot about present Cambodia that is very disturbing too – huge levels of street poverty, high levels of infant mortality, complete absence of any social security and very inefficient public services – but overall Cambodians seem very positive and cheerful, and the atmosphere is a happy one. They are also very welcoming towards foreigners and particularly here in Kampong Champ where we are more of a novelty, lots of people smile and say hello (in English) when we walk past.

      Last Sunday we came by bus to Kampong Cham which is apparently Cambodia’s third biggest city but feels very small. Language lessons are going well and are very useful – we are already able to communicate fairly well in markets and restaurants and can even have basic conversations, (as long as the conversations only involve words and phrases we have learned.) Yesterday Gilly’s husband Sam arrived so we are now a complete group of sixteen volunteers. We are here for another week and then go to visit our placements for a week, before returning for two more weeks of language training.

      So, so far so good! I’m even getting used to the food although I’m not that keen on rice soup with chicken for breakfast. Those interested in visiting should note that every café or restaurant offers free tea all the time! (No milk though.)