The Killing Fields
Saturday, 3 December 2005
The most sobering part of the trip to date is our visit to the "Killing Fields" and "S21" in Phnom Phenh. What surprises me the most after visiting the sites of such shocking atrocities is the resilience of the people of Cambodia.
Over a 5 year period an estimated 3 million Khmer people died of starvation or were slaughtered by the Khmer Rouge Army. People were executed because they were "intellectual" or "looked foreign" or even because they wore glasses.
The whole purpose of this mass execution was to create a classless society were money and property were abolished and people were made to live in "collective communities".
Many people working in the rice fields were given 2 bowls of rice soup a day to live on and worked for 15 hours with 2 10 minute breaks.
Families were separated and boys as young as 15 were trained to be soldiers for the Khmer Army often having to "discipline" members of their own families.
The thing that really made an impact on both me and Den was a picture taken just before execution at the S21 facility in Phonem Penh. The women is holding a small child in her arms an the picture was taken on 14th May 1978. It was my 3rd birthday the day the picture was taken. 
