Killing Fields by Danielle Cesar

Killing Fields

I started writing this as we drove away from the Killing Fields, just one of 20,000 mass grave sites in Cambodia. I choose to write this now because I wanted to accurately share the emotions of turmoil and immense sadness that coursed through me. I admit to being ignorant of Cambodia's genocidal history before adding it to my list of countries to visit. However upon arriving in Phnom Penh and a quick Google search of the sites I realized that this bloody history occurred less than 40 years ago. From the large population of orphans and high percentage of post traumatic symptoms in the population, the gruesome effects of the genocide carried out by the Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot are still felt today.

The first hand audio accounts of survivors tugged at my heart. Imagining the tortures and hearing the pain in the survivors’ voices as they recounted what occurred the filled me with sympathy and anger. “Hundreds of thousands were executed through drastic measures: pregnant women were cut open; plastic bags were tied over heads suffocating victims to death; and men, women and children were shot or buried alive. Others died of starvation and disease during forced urban evacuation and in brutal labor camps, where husbands, wives, and children were separated,” (Chung 2000). The “educated class” (doctors, lawyers, teacher, etc) anyone with an education that could read and write was housed and tortured in labor camps.

Security Prison 21

The torture primarily took place in a school that was renamed Security Prison 21, the classrooms were transformed into prison cells and torture chambers. Forms of torture included (but not limited to) drinking other inmates urine, electric shock, water boarding, rape, genital mutilation. Even on the brink of death prisoners were kept alive to be tortured more. Inhumane, vile and terrifying, I cannot begin to fathom how a person could perform such sadistic acts on another.

Skulls of victims found in mass graves

The killing fields brought me to tears. Hearing a survivor's account whilst walking through the mass graves I was no longer able to contain my emotions and sobbed with grief for the thousands that died.

Mass Grave Site

The killing fields are now described as a peaceful place to mourn the deaths of ancestors and the violent genocide but unfortunately I felt nothing but sorrow. It felt alive with all of the spirits of those murdered there. The babies who were held by their legs and heads smashed into trees, the women raped and bludgeoned to death, and the men beat over the head and throats slit.

The audio guide left you with a somber message. He said, “Never forget Cambia, Germany, Rwanda and even the genocide of the native Americans in America.” He urged us all learn from the mistakes of people who came before us and not to repeat their mistakes. In the wake of today's society I can only pray that the message reaches the masses and tolerance and acceptance is taught rather than revered.

Mass Grave Site

 When visiting Cambodia, stopping in Phnom Penh to visit Security Prison 21 and the Killing Fields is a necessity. Hire a “tuk tuk” driver for the morning and go to the prison first, the driver will wait for you and then take you to the Killing Fields (about 40min from the city) and finally bring you back to your hostel. This is the cheapest route and it costs about $11 USD, which can be split it amongst friends. Although depressing you begin to understand the turmoils that plague the nation today. Hopefully by learning about the history we can come together to continue the healing and rebuilding efforts in Cambodia.


To read more about the Cambodian Genocide:  http://www.ppu.org.uk/genocide g_cambodia1.html


Works Cited

Chung, Margaret. Intergenerational Effects of Genocidal Disaster among Cambodian Youth. National Association of Social Workers, Dec 2000. http://www.naswnyc.org/?339

An Amateur Traveler's Guide to Jakarta by Chris Lee

First off, incredibly excited to have this piece shared and to be supporting a great project from an even better friend!

Coming into Jakarta, I had no idea what to expect – a lot of friends had told me to try and avoid it because megacities never tend to have anything to do. So with a forty dollar flight ticket in hand and a close friend who was up for anything, we were practically looking for trouble in whatever corridor it may appear. With little plans and nothing to see in Jakarta, we made our way to Bogor, a city just a short ways away. It was there, at Hostel Bogor that the owner (who we affectionately called Mom) gave us an ultimatum; we could choose to see the regular museums around the area, or she could send us on a three day quest that she described as, “Impossibly confusing but really fun.” To us, this was taken directly as a challenge to our frail masculinity and was no longer a choice. Three days it is.

She drew out the instructions on the back of a crumpled piece of recycled paper – take three busses, hire a motorcycle to take you to the base, stay at the base camp, ascent the mountain and then do it in reverse. “An easy 6 hours” she laughed. That was a lie. Bags in hand and with little expectations, my friend and I walked out of the hostel feeling like Frodo and Sam in the Fellowship of the Ring.

Our first challenge was the busses. Out in rural Indonesia the concept of a bus is far different than in the West, anything can be a bus. If you slap a number on the back of your broken horse cart, you can officially operate as a bus driver and make some cash on the side. The only way we could identify which busses we needed to get to was via the three route numbers she had written – 3, 9, 6. Catching the first two busses was simple. We were able to deduce through Google Translate assisted conversations with locals where we should be getting on and off. But by the time we had reached our third bus, the language barrier and time was against us. We had overshot our bus stop riding the 9, the sun was setting and we had no way of getting back. Frantically, we came up with options – sleep in the local KFC, walk three or four hours back the opposite direction or ask the locals. Choosing the last option, we started asking around. After an hour of what felt like panhandling, someone finally responded to us – “stay at my house” he said. We knew for sure we were going to get kidnapped.

So there we were, riding on the back of a motorcycle of a man we had never met with complete trust that he wasn’t in the market for selling small immigrant boys. We arrived at his home and met his (incredibly lovely) family. We spoke few words past the initial “hellos” and soon he showed us to a room, a concrete floor with two single beds on it. Still better than a KFC washroom. Gratefully but cautiously, we fell asleep. To our surprise, we hadn’t gotten kidnapped at all, this man was just being incredibly nice to two foreigners he had never met before. In the morning, his wife was waiting with breakfast already cooked and we proceeded to ascend the mountain, hiring a guide to take us there. After seeing the incredible views, we made our way back through the rain to our salvation at Hostel Bogor. There, with bated breath we laid our bags down and went for some shut eye.

Reflecting back, what shocked me most about this trip wasn’t how crazy the circumstances were (and heaven knows how crazy they were). What shocked me the most is that we fully put our lives into the hands of five or six strangers and at the drop of a dime, any one of those people could have completely ruined us. For the most part, we were lost and had nobody understood what we were saying; we would have been in major trouble for sure. So apart from the memories, what I got from this was a lesson in humility and human kindness. The people with so little and so much more motivation to do us harm did quite the opposite and left an impression on me that I’ll never forget.