Friends,

There is no witty intro today. This week, we’re talking about our visit to the harrowing, sickening, disturbing, yet incredibly important genocide museum in Phnom Penh.

We’ve sandwiched that in between a summary of how to get to Phnom Penh and a couple of travel tips. (Did you know that collect calling doesn’t exist on cell phones? Or that ants can infiltrate zippers? Neither did we.)

We ask that you buckle up with your discomfort and read on anyways.

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Perry’s Travel Diary

Three nights in Phnom Penh

The Bus

We chose to take the Giant Ibis bus from Ho Chi Minh City to Phnom Penh, as the drive time is only slightly longer than flying for a fraction of the price. Giant Ibis provided a great service that included handling all of the passports and border crossing details for the entire bus, ensuring a smooth process.

The bus itself was very comfortable with leather seats that reclined deeply. Our fare included a can of coffee and a pastry for breakfast.

Other travelers online had noted that a fee (or, really, a bribe) had been charged by Giant Ibis for their border crossing service. We were not charged anything beyond the cost of our tickets (~$40 per person). We did have our e-Visas for both Vietnam and Cambodia issued in advance, and I carried paper copies of both, so that may have had something to do with it. We noticed other customers including cash along with their passports, especially if they were buying their visas at the border.

I will also note that our tickets were a higher price than other travel websites suggested they should be, so it’s not clear to me whether that increase was purely post-pandemic inflation (something we have encountered several times) or if the tickets now include the cost of any border crossing fees.

We used Giant Ibis again for our trip from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap because we were so pleased with their service.

In Phnom Penh

We walked from our hostel to the Royal Palace and Silver Pagoda.

Throughout the country, you’ll find posters of the Queen Mother (pictured above), Norodom Monineath; the current King, Norodom Sihamoni; and other prominent party leaders.

Tuk tuk drivers told us along the way there that the Royal Palace was closed due to a holiday, but there was no notable holiday that day. The Royal Palace was, in fact, closed. According to Google, it is “temporarily closed” for reasons we cannot find. We settled for a photo outside.

The Silver Pagoda is part of the same complex and was also inaccessible.

Tuk tuk?

When we crossed the border from Vietnam into Cambodia, we all of a sudden encountered tuk tuks. Tuk tuks are easily the most popular form of motor vehicle here, followed closely by motorbikes, with cars in a distant third place.

You cannot walk down the street without tuk tuk drivers shouting at you. “Tuk tuk?” they ask. “Tuk tuk? Tuk tuk?”

(This harassment was the same with the rickshaw drivers in Hanoi and has continued - with some local variation between tuk tuk and taxi - throughout the rest of Southeast Asia. Despite their persistence, most drivers will stop asking once you give them a firm, “no thank you,” and keep walking.)

However, in Phnom Penh, it wasn’t just, “Tuk tuk?” In an effort to advertise that they will take you to the top tourist spots, these drivers will look at you and shout, “Genocide museum? Genocide museum? Killing fields?”

Like… imagined being constantly heckled over a taxi ride to Auschwitz. It would be weird, right?

But that was life here, and these guys were just trying to make a living.

(The drivers were universally men. There were no female tuk tuk drivers.)

If, like us, you’d prefer not to negotiate with tuk tuk drivers, you can do what we did and use PassApp to hail a tuk tuk from the Palace to the Genocide Museum. Grab also works.

Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum

The Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum covers a very dark period of Cambodian history under the Khmer Rouge regime between 1975 and 1979.

Prior to the Khmer Rouge, Tuol Sleng was a secondary school. During the regime, it was turned into a torture, interrogation, and execution murder center known as S-21.

Over 20,000 people were imprisoned here. There are only 12 known survivors - 7 adults and 5 children.

Twelve.

Out of twenty THOUSAND people, twelve lived.

Let that sink in.

The audio guide did a great job of conveying the history of the site, but I must confess that it felt like diving into the fourth novel of a series where you have not read - nor do you have access to - the first three books. This feeling persisted even as I read the memoirs of the Tuol Sleng survivors after our visit. You are constantly missing context, wondering how we got here, how on earth this plot line made any sort of sense, and then some new-to-you character that everyone else seems to know shows up to change everything. It's maddening.

I’m going to do my best to summarize some of the main points here, but understand that my retelling of history is going to be limited.

Once the Khmer Rouge came to power, they led the country with a culture of paranoia and extreme fear. They eschewed any sort of education and sought to create an ideal socialist agrarian society (spoiler alert: they failed miserably).

Phnom Penh - including the neighborhoods around Tuol Sleng - was evacuated, its citizens being sent to perform backbreaking labor in the rice fields. Anyone with any sort of education (doctors, engineers, etc.) was seen as a threat to Angkar and sent to prisons like S-21 to be executed. Even wearing eyeglasses was seen as a sign of education and intelligence. Those who weren’t imprisoned often died of starvation or exposure.

(Side note: Angkar was the word used to describe the new government, avoiding any mention of specific leaders. It is not to be confused with Angkor, the fantastic archeological site we visit next week.)

Angkar was incredibly fearful and began seeking those who were “unfaithful” to the revolution. Officers working for Angkar more or less had a quota to fill - so they started turning in people who weren’t guilty of any crime at all. One of the survivors, Bou Meng, had been working for the revolution and was one of its fervent supporters before being sent to work in the fields and, later, to the S-21 prison.

Once at the prison, officers were fixated on obtaining “confessions” from the prisoners in which they detailed their supposed crimes against Angkar. Torture was used. Many prisoners fabricated their “confessions” just to stop the torture.

And once that was done, the officers needed to make room for more prisoners, so off to the killing fields the prisoners went.

Eventually, the regime realized that a society without any form of practical education was (surprise!) a very bad idea. They attempted to train lay people as doctors (another spoiler: didn’t work) and had to bring in mechanics from China. The adult survivors of Tuol Sleng were kept alive because they offered some sort of practical skill, like painting or sculpting, that was needed to run the government. Bou Meng, the painter, was employed painting portraits of Pol Pot, the leader of Angkar and the Communist Party of Kampuchea, for propaganda purposes.

It’s estimated that 1.5 - 2 million people died in the Cambodian genocide. Some sources suggest the numbers could be as high as 3 million as so many people are still unaccounted for.

At the end of the museum, we were shocked to see that one of the adult survivors, Chum Mey, was sitting underneath a small tent and selling his memoir. He is 92 years old. I had held it together through the entire museum, but this moment was too much. We choked out what an honor it was to meet him and bought his book. He asked where we were from and told us about his visit to America several years ago, when he was invited to speak at several universities.

We pulled ourselves together and carried on towards the museum exit, when we were again intercepted by another survivor - Bou Meng. Cool. More tears. Breathe deeply. Repeat the emotional overwhelm. Buy another book.

After a brief conversation with Mr. Meng, we were able to exit.

We have since read these memoirs, and while “highly recommend” feels like a far too positive term to use for their harrowing stories, they were well worth a read. Both books are brief. You can find Chum Mey’s here and Bou Meng’s here, though Amazon is charging far more than the $10 per copy we paid at the museum.

Tourists often follow their visit to the genocide museum with a trip to the Choeung Ek Killing Fields, where many Tuol Sleng prisoners were taken to for execution. We felt that the museum was heavy enough and chose to skip any further genocide-related sites. After our visits to the Hanoi Hilton, War Remnants Museum, and now Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, Pete looked at me and said, "You know, I don't think it makes us lesser people for skipping this one human atrocity."

We spent our extra day in Phnom Penh just sitting around our hostel, trying to decompress and get the energy together to move forward. I’d say we succeeded, but not without recognizing the extreme privilege we have. We were able to walk out of the museum and leave Phnom Penh behind - but so many innocent Cambodians were not.

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A lighter note from Pete

Do you want ants?

If so, Southeast Asia has more ants than you can shake a stick at… because the ants will have likely carried the stick off when you weren’t watching. From very big to very small, there is no lack of variety. The giant forest ants, Dinomyrmex gigas, can grow as large as 3cm.

However, of particular note for travelers, there is a species of ant so small that we have found them capable of infiltrating any and all luggage, zippers, cases, and so forth. This is none other than the infamous Pharaoh Ant, Monomorium pharaonis. It’s smaller than the tip of a congressman’s fine print pen and more crafty than the wielder. Even as I write this, one has found its way onto my laptop and currently crosses my computer screen.

To prevent our folly, keep your backpack and belongings free of cookie crumbs, melted chocolate, or spilled soda/sugar from candy. This will discourage them from their intense pursuit of all things hidden.

Travelers with sticky children… you have my sympathy.

E. O. Wilson is likely laughing in his grave at our futile efforts to purge Perry’s backpack of ants.

We particularly ran afoul of these ants at the Onederz Hostel in Phnom Penh and again much later in Bali, Indonesia. A more efficient burglar there is not. Get creative with food and snack storage and buckle in for the ride!

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Itinerary

Hotel

We stayed at Onderz Phnom Penh in a private room for $21/night. We loved the rooftop pool.

Transportation

• We used Giant Ibis busses for our trips from Ho Chi Minh City to Phnom Penh and Phnom Penh to Siem Reap. Book them through Bookaway. ​
• ​PassApp is Cambodia’s version of Uber or Grab for tuk tuk bookings.
• ​Grab also works well for tuk tuks, taxis, and food delivery in Cambodia.
• Note that our credit cards would not work with either PassApp or Grab, same as Vietnam. You will pay your drivers in cash.

Currency

• Cambodia uses the US Dollar.
• We brought cash with us. You will need pristine US dollar bills without tears, writing, or staining. Even the smallest tear resulted in our bills being returned to us. In the US, banks can exchange damaged bills with the Federal Reserve, but Cambodian banks cannot.
• Make sure to bring plenty of small change ($1 and $5 bills).
• Change is given in Cambodian Riel. Riels are also used for inexpensive items less than $1 USD.
• Credit cards are not widely accepted.

Food

• Our hotel, Onederz, had an on-site restaurant and pool-side bar with very reasonable prices. We ate most meals here for the sake of convenience.
• ​Titanic Restaurant - We ate here for a nicer meal. The view is gorgeous; the hot pot was okay.

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Perry’s Travel Tip of the Week

Can you hear me now?

When we traveled internationally for shorter vacations, we would shut off our cell phones and tell everyone that we were simply not to be contacted.

This approach does not work when you aren’t going to be home for three months.

At some point, you’re going to need to call your bank, or your credit card company, or one of those other super-fun companies who will put you on hold to the not-so-soothing sounds of Cisco’s greatest hit.

We have an international cell phone plan, but it turns out that you can’t dial USA toll-free numbers internationally. Your call will flat-out fail to go through even if you correctly dial it with the USA country code.

But wait! you say. I have that handy international collect phone number on the back of my card!

Yeah… no, you actually don’t. Collect calling does not exist on cell phones. While you can still dial the international collect number, you will pay per minute for your phone call. If you ask the company to call you back, you will still pay per minute for their phone call.

The only way to place a collect call is through a landline phone. More than 90% of our hotel accommodations do not have phones in the guest rooms. You’d be looking for a pay phone (do they even exist anymore?) or the kindness of a hotel receptionist to let you place a call.

So what to do?

Skype.

It turns out that Skype will let you call US toll-free numbers completely free of charge from their computer or phone app. You’ll need to set up a Skype account, and you may need to fund your Skype account with $5, but it won’t be charged.

As long as you have wifi, calling through Skype is quick, convenient, and a helluva lot cheaper.

It took me several hours during an already stressful situation to figure this out, so please keep this tip on hand for your next trip abroad.

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If you enjoyed this newsletter (or at least tolerated it this week), we’d love it if you would share with your friends.

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All our love,

Pete and Perry

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