Sorry for the long blog. It wasn’t until a few months before I left for the World Race that I heard about the Cambodian Genocide so I wanted to share more.
Cambodian History / Culture
– Most of the Cambodian population practices Theravada Buddhism. Theravada Buddhism incorporates animistic spirit worship, Chinese ancestor worship, & Hindu symbology. Only about 2% of Cambodians are Christians. Cham people group are mainly muslim.
– Looking for a pay phone? You won’t find one in Cambodia. Instead, you’ll find a 5′ x 2′ box with numbers writen on the side. Next to the box will be a person that will let you use their personal cell phone. And you pay them. Weird.
– There’s a village called ‘the taranchula village’. We stopped on the way to Phemn Penh. You’re able to eat taranchula, have one crawl on you, eat any other kind of bug, eat fried whole chickens with head and feet still on, and be swarmed by probably 100 people trying to sell you anything and everything. I ate a taranchula leg… didn’t really taste like chicken, more so tasted like burnt crunchy meat.
– Money: Cambodians use the US Dollar & the Riel as their currency. It’s nice when something is a flat amount but when you get change involved thats when it gets tricky. So if you buy something for $4.50 and you pay with $5 USD you will get back 2,000 Riel. Most times if change is owed I just hand them some Riel and hope they take the right amount.
– Traffic is CRAZY here. I thought traffic was bad in Thailand, its hooorrible here. I would say there are less cars here but about 5x as many motors (or motorcycles) plus there are now Tok Toks here. You are free to drive down the road the wrong direction, in reverse, with 5 people on your motor after you’ve done a U turn in the middle of the road. Red lights are ignored for the most part, especially if you are driving a motor.
– 50% of the Cambodian population is under 20, 80% under 30 and only 3% over 65. The average life expectency is 61.
– You can bargin with any vendor or Tok Tok driver. Since we’re not Cambodians they will start out with a high price and we’ll counter with a low price. Usually we’ll meet in the middle but if they don’t budge you walk away and they’ll almost always come after you and agree with your price.
History
– Cambodia has been in existence for about 2,000 years. The first Khmer kingdom was an important stop in the ocean trade route between China & India. Both Indian & Chinese traders would business with Khmer people and began to introduce their culture & religions. This started to influence the area and because of this, Cambodia later came to be known as Indochina.
– In 1970’s open civil war began between Lon Nol’s government & Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge. Many people jointed Pol Pot because they weren’t happy with American bombings or the new government. Lon Nol was loosing the war & when American lost the war in Vietnam they also stopped helping out Cambodia. In April 1975, the Khmer Rouge took the capital of Pheom Penh and forced everyone out of the cities. Everyone was forced into farming communities.
-Once the Khmer Rouge was in countrol they began to kill everyone assocaited with government or military. If your family worked for the government or military you were killed. Khmer Rouge also killed eduacated people (or anyone with glasses), teachers, and doctors because they were thought to be corrupted by Western thinking. They also killed all religous people, killing 90% of Christians. If you weren’t killed instantly you were forced to work hard & were starved. Tuol Sleng / S-21: Previously used as a high school, S-21 (security office 21) was turned into a prison. 20,000 people were killed at S-21, there are only 7 survivors. We had the opportunity to visit S-21 so I will have a blog on it soon. By the end of the Khmer Rouge’s rule in 1979, 2 million people were killed, 1/3 of the Cambodian population.
one of the many many boards with photos of those killed at S-21
– Cambodia was one of the most heavily land mined countries in the world.
