Killing Fields

Mass graves where the bodies were dumped and DDT was poured over them to cut down on the smell of thousands of rotting human bodies.

Over 8000 skulls were recovered and put on display of the hundreds of thousands killed here at the Choeung Ek Killing Fields.

Yesterday was one of those days spent immersed in culture and history instead of white sand and surfboards. The killing fields, where the Khmer Rouge bused hundreds of thousands of Cambodians from all over the nation to be killed in mass graves, are only about 10 clicks outside of the capital of Phnom Penh. As we hop in our tuk tuk and head out everyone is smiling and waving as we pass by through the city, I wonder how such seemingly happy people could smile so much with such a horrendous past. It was a mere thirty years ago that the Khmer Rouge savagely executed close to 2 million Cambodians at a time when Cambodia only numbered about 8 million. These people were imprisoned then executed for reasons that are still unclear to so many. The feeling of seeing mass graves with bits of bones and clothes still in them will stay we me forever and to think the people of Cambodia live each day knowing someone involved, whether executed or executioner. I am not sure what else to say except it makes whatever problems I have in my life seem so trivial compared to such atrocities like this and so many others that have happened and continue to happen.