Phnom Penh – Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum
After an emotional visit to the Killing Fields, I had my tuk-tuk driver take me back into the city to the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum. This former school was used by the Khmer Rouge to imprison, torture and kill Cambodians. They took pictures and kept records of each person who was brought here, and as a remembrance, many of the pictures are displayed. Walking through the museum was more painful than the killing fields because I could look into the faces of the victims. There were still blood stains on the floor. But the thing that’s so striking about these pictures is how many of the victims were smiling or smirking, staying brave and defiant in the face of cruelty and almost certain death.
At the end of the day I was very glad to go sit by the river and have a few beers with a girl from my hostel. She was a lawyer from the UK working in Bangkok and decided to take a long weekend to Phnom Penh. I saw her at the museum as we wandered from room to room absorbing the devastation. Pure coincidence that we were staying at the same hostel. After a couple beers, we went and had dinner, confusing the waiter by ordering three dishes for just the two of us.
The genocide museum is very powerful and a must-see for any visit to Cambodia, but I highly suggest planning something fun and light afterwards. I imagine I could’ve had a very depressing night had I not met Sarah.
You might also enjoy:
- How Much We Spent Traveling in Southeast Asia for Two Months
- How Much We Spent Traveling in Malaysia
- How Much We Spent Traveling in Cambodia
December 12, 2011 @ 1:54 AM
I’ve seen the footage of places like this on TV documentaries before but to actually have been in the place where these atrocities took place has to be a very confronting experience for anybody.
Martin Luther King Jnr used to say that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. That said we as a world community need to be vigilant to stop and if possible prevent these abuses before they can happen.
Unfortunately the world community has had an appalling record in preventing and stopping genocide since the late 1970s and it doesn’t look as though it’s going to improve any time soon.
It makes me very grateful to live in a country where there are the freedoms and the peace to go about one’s life knowing that this kind of thing could never happen.
December 12, 2011 @ 1:42 PM
I love the MLK quote, Matthew! It really was so overwhelming to be at the museum. I’m grateful for having such freedoms as well, although I bet if you asked the Cambodian people 40 or 50 years ago if they thought something like this was possible in their country, they probably would’ve said, no never. Probably the same with the Germans before WWII. You just never know when the next crazy dictator will somehow take over in some places.
December 12, 2011 @ 4:56 PM
I think Australia is a different case in point though compared to other countries around the world. To be honest with you most Australians are too apathetic to get involved in politics or social justice to attend a protest than to start mass chaos of some sort. Most Australians in fact only vote because they have to – it’s the law and you get fined if you’re on the electoral roll and don’t vote.
But I see your point and it’s a valid one although the examples you used were a bit flawed.
With the Cambodia example – if you asked the people of Cambodia 40 or 50 years ago what they feared most they would have said an overflow into their territory of the Vietnam war which by the early 1970s did happen. Many people were killed by the American forces (and probably Australian ones for that matter) which intruded into their territory by the air and by the ground. This then helped destabilize the then Cambodian government and led to the Khmer Rouge taking over in 1975, the same year that Saigon fell and the Vietnam War ended. As you probably know it was only after the Vietnamese forces invaded in 1982 did all the genocide be uncovered and stopped.
There is also the issue of World War II where Japanese forces occupied South East Asia as far south as Indonesia as far east as now called West Papua and as far west as modern day Burma including Cambodia. A lot of Cambodians in the 1960s and 70s would have had memories of this time and of the atrocities that were committed in the name of the Emperor of Japan.
As for the Germans before WWII, they had 16 years of the third reich from 1933 prior to the outset of war and a Munich beer hall putsch a decade before that, plenty of time to see Hitler’s expansionist policies and wiping out of civil liberties all through a democratic process, at least initially.
But coming around full circle though there are countries where genocide has been committed where people would have thought that it would never occur. Rwanda is the first country that comes to mind. Chile during the Pinochet era is another one. Most of the rest of South America for that matter could be lumped in the same basket considering they all had military governments read dictatorships during the last 50 years or so and nobody would have thought that disappearances would occur especially on the scale that they did as they had lived relatively peacefully for hundreds of years before that time.
December 13, 2011 @ 12:16 AM
Well, I clearly need to do more reading about modern history! Traveling in SE Asia has really made me want to learn more about the history of the area, something we just didn’t learn much about in school. Thanks, as always, for such great comments Matthew!
December 12, 2011 @ 4:22 PM
Your advice about visiting something fun and light afterwards is spot on. We went to a Butterfly farm (as light as it gets!!) but even so we could barely speak a word for a few hours after the visit. Such a harrowing place – made worse by the location within a school: a place that should be full of the laughter of children.
The MLK quote is very inspirational.
December 13, 2011 @ 12:14 AM
A butterfly farm does sound like a good light place to go after such a horrible place like the genocide museum. Thanks for the comment!
December 12, 2011 @ 4:24 PM
Great Post. I was in Phnom Penh this summer and did the same visit as you. First the killing feilds and then S21. It really made an impression on me. I had done some research into the Khmer Rouge before that, but this really hit it home.
December 13, 2011 @ 12:15 AM
Thanks Elizabeth! Yeah, it really doesn’t even start to sink in until you’re there looking at the horror these people went through.
December 20, 2011 @ 11:14 PM
I can’t wait to visit here one day! Genocide is my field of research and as such I just have to stop by and spend some time researching there! Thanks for sharing!
December 21, 2011 @ 12:07 PM
It’s definitely an interesting place & I’m sure with your background, you’d get a lot out of it. Thanks Heather!