Holiday in Cambodia

Hey all!

We have spent the last 2 days seeing the sights of Phnom Penh AKA Cambodia.  We started our day on Saturday with going to the Royal Palace/Silver Pagoda and the National Museum. The Royal Palace was beautiful but there was a lot of restricted area - I guess you have to do that when you live in a place that is also a tourist attraction.  Inside we were not allowed to take pictures which is too bad for you! lol.  There was a lot of red and gold and many many Buddha statues.  We then moved onto the Silver Pagoda which was cool as the floor is made of silver, again though it was mainly covered in carpet so you couldn't see the floor unless you looked at the edges of the floor.  Regardless, it was still beautiful.  Something that we learned very quickly was that Cambodia equals intricate design and detail - it is all so breathtaking.

Another thing that is breath taking is the fumes....NOBODY walks here as it is too hot so that equals a lot of vehicles (motos mainly) and A LOT of exhaust.

We then went to the National Musuem where there were many statues and archives that were of Hindu Gods and Goddesses.  Maria loved it but it sure put her knowledge to the test and it must be admitted that she has forgotten quite a bit....depressing!  The statues and archives were very cool to see and dated back to pre-Angkorian periods.  Shiva and Vishnu were the main depictions that we saw and they were pretty sweet, it must be said! 

Lunch was next on the agenda and we ate at Happy Herb Pizza.  No worries the herbs were mainly oregano.  We seem to be eating a lot of pizza here, but its super good.  Different sauce type, its sweeter as everything is including ketchup, but very good.

We spent the rest of the day at markets including the Central Market and the night market. The night market was really cool and very full.  We got to see a live band/karaoke thing - there were several pre determined people to perform and it was really funny!

Sunday we decided to have a depressing but necessay day and chose to go to the Genocide Museum and the Killing fields.  It's undescribable what happened during the Khmer Rouge regime and needless to say there were quite a few tears and just a general terrible feeling. We watched a documentary of a families experience under the Khmer Rouge rule.  It was good to hear an actual story as your senses are overloaded and its hard to imagine what happened.  The documentary helped us to get a better understanding and appreciation but it was very emotional.

We then headed to the Killing Fields and again were confronted with more emotion and awe.  The largest mass grave that they found held 450 people and these graves - the majority- are quite small.  In total 2 million people died during the reign.  We took pictures but when we went through them again we realized that we will not be looking at them often.

That's all for tonight, enjoy the pictures and don't be judging our sweaty mustaches!

Kelly and Maria
Travelers Abroad.