As we travel towards the Vietnamese border, I pull aside the green ruffled curtains on our bus only to find even more shades of green through my own reflection – palm trees, rice fields, elephant grass, cactus, various trees, and of course the road signs indicating that our time in Cambodia is quickly coming to an end. Four hours to go and we’ll be in Ho Chi Minh City.
As for now, we bumpily drive by pagodas, stilted houses, and farmers tending the land. Every so often, our bus slows down long enough to wave back at kids or vendors selling waffles, dried fish, and creatively sliced mangos and pineapple. Their faces strong and attractive – young girls with long shiny black hair and the boys with their well-coiffed 50’s style do’s. Reminiscing about our two weeks spent in Phnom Penh and Siem Reap, two weeks full of noodles and tuktuk rides and magical moments - I am sad to leave.
I embarrassingly admit that before coming to Cambodia, I knew very little about its history. In school, our lessons understandably focused more on Vietnam and the devastating war my country ignited. As for Cambodia, I never learned who Pol Pot was, or what happened at the killing fields, or that a genocide (killing off 2 million i.e 20% of the population) had occurred here. I also didn’t realize how recent it all was. Visiting the S-21 prison for political prisoners in Phnom Penh, the killing fields, or Angkor Wat, you get the sensation that this all happened just yesterday. Old blood stains and used bed frames are still in the prison cells. Pieces of clothing from the buried continue to float to the surface of the hundreds of pits the Khmer Rouge dug for its victims. Heads are smashed off the stone-carved 8-headed snakes and lions that protect the temples of Angkor Wat. Although a disturbing (and important) reminder of the tragedies that occurred here, the rawness of Cambodia is one of the things I found most intriguing.
To learn more about the country’s history, we bought “First, They Killed My Father.” Anyone who is looking for a book to read – this is it! It is a truly remarkable, heartbreaking account of Loung Ung’s life after her family was evacuated from Phnom Penh in 1970. What seems like a fictional horror novel – filled with pages too horrifying to imagine actually occurring – is, in fact, a true story that millions of Cambodians were forced to live through. Most of the book takes place when Loung is only a small child... 5 to 8 years old. Meaning, at the age when I was still watching Care Bears and selling lemonade on my street, she had already survived years of starvation, training as a child soldier, and the devastation of losing her parents and several siblings.
As I read this book on our six hour bus ride to Siem Reap, a Cambodian girl, around the age of five, would occasionally walk up and down the aisle with her Dad. As I looked at her, with her chubby, rosy cheeks and innocent smile, it was hard to imagine how something so precious – a childhood – could have been taken away over night. Cambodia, like many of the other countries we’ve visited thus far, has been a reminder of how lucky I am, how lucky I’ve been. It’s history, a lesson in both the cruelty and strength that human beings are capable of. For the past two weeks, we’ve been surrounded by many Cambodians who have lived through a civil war, the Khmer Rouge regime, what could only be described as hell on earth - yet still, somehow, are carrying on. I wonder if I could ever be so strong.
Like the temples of Angkor, semi-destroyed by the Khmer Rouge but still as magical and beautiful as ever, Cambodia and its people stand strong despite their horrific recent history. As I cross the Cambodian-Vietnamese border, I will take with me the lessons learned in this beautiful country, and await my return to be enchanted once again.
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