Visiting Phnom Penh, Cambodia

So we had some time off with the TET/Lunar New year holidays so we thought we should take advantage of it and go somewhere that is on our wish list of visiting spots.  We left early in the morning on Saturday, 6.15am, who is awake then?  A friend advised us to take the bus to see a bit of countryside, was also interesting at the border crossing between the 2 countries.  

We saw some very poor situations people were living in.

                 And a few rice paddies.  All pictures taken out of the windows of course.

                        Loved this picture with a family travelling together....seat belts anyone?

At the end of our 6 hour bus ride we arrived in Phnom Penh.  Our initial impression was that it was very poor and dirtier than Vietnam.  Someone told us that all Cambodia needs is a wash and a fresh coat of paint, it's kind of like that.  Our hotel was lovely although quite difficult to find, all the streets are numbers rather than names...street 178 was ours.  It was in a great spot and the staff were very friendly and helpful.  The room was lovely.

http://www.tripadvisor.com.au/Hotel_Review-g293940-d2156361-Reviews-Frangipani_Fine_Arts_Hotel-Phnom_Penh.html

 We could walk to everywhere that we wanted to go in the general central area which we always like as well.

On our initial travels around the street we saw this Lunar New year preparation.  On the eve of Lunar New year people have to prepare their food in advance as they shouldn't do any work on the actual day.

      Of course a cup of tea is always in order.....watching the street life go by on Sisowath Quay.

The Royal Palace

 This little girl looked so cute perched up on the bench of her Mum's stall on the way home, Mum pushing the cart below.

 Below is the beautiful place that they put the ashes of the old king who had just died a few days earlier.  It was brand new and sparkling. His son had already taken over the reins but he was certainly well respected. Night photo and daytime photo.

                                                                 

National Museum picture and the evening traditional show in the grounds of the Museum by a school of the arts.  We saw a marraige, a birth, a funeral...well done.


For sale in the hot sun we saw lots of people selling tiny chili flavoured pippies from carts....didn't try them needless to say.

These waffle like sweet cones on the other hand were absolutely YUMMY!

We also tried the famous Fish Massage that involves putting your feet in the water and having fish nibble on the dry skin on your feet.  It starts out crazy tickly then settles down.  It worked really well too.

                                        You can see them chomping away at my toes below.

THEN on a more sombre note we went to one of the Killing Fields where there thousands of bodies from the genocide were found.  Unbelievably it happened in our lifetime between 1975-1979.

                     Below is a tower built to house the thousands of bones found in the area.

Below are just some of the bones housed in the tower. 

                                          

Above is a tree with many bracelets left on it by visitors as a sign of respect.  This tree was used to beat children to death, held by their feet and swung at the tree to kill them, sometimes watched by their family, too awful to imagine and very disturbing.

Above is some of the clothing that continues to appear over time from the ground in the area as the weather wears away the soil.  We just walked past these couple of bits, I gather there will probably still be peoples bones under here as well.

 
                                 
Then to the Genocide Museum which is housed in an old school where many people were held and killed over the 4 years.  Below are just some of the faces......I couldn't help looking in their eyes, some were resigned, others were defiant, some were angry.  None lived on.

 Even with this not so nice side of the story we understood clearly what had gone before the days we saw a country that was very welcoming and well worth visiting.

        Final drink in Phnom Penh on the river front opposite the Foreign Correspondent club.  This used to be the place the media's Foreign Correspondents hung out in the past, very colonial.