Today was another jam packed day, apent in and around the capital city Phnom Penh. After a hearty hotel rooftop breakfast with 360 views around the city, we headed off to visit the offices of AFESIP and the Somaly Mam foundation, Somaly is behind both organisations, but AFESIP is locally registered NGO which supports the rescuing, rehabilitation and reintegration of the girls. The SM Foundation is the fundraising vehicle and is registered in the US. The office visit helped us understand how funds are put to work, supporting the clinic, counselling, training and operational aspects of the 2 entities. This was really great insight for us.
we then visited our 2nd shelter, the phnom Pemh Tomdy centre , which houses women primarily, and haas small daycare facility for the women with small children, thee are currently 9 kids int he daycare facility onsite. The women stay there for several months to a few years if required, depending on how long they need to upskill them NAND prepare them for reintegration either back into their communities (if possible) or into jobs in the city. skills such as hairdressingm make up artistry, sewing and weaving are taught, with programmes from 4-8 months, depending on which skill they have elected to learn. Some of the women have gone on to work in factories, work in small businesses and even get scholarships to attend university and study things like physiology,so they can come back to the centres and work as a counsellor and give back to the places that gave them a new lease on life and a chance at feeling hope again.
After a quick lunch(where a bit of shopping was snuck in) we went on a bus tour with a guide to see the Genocide Museum and the infamous Killing Fields. Brief history recap, Pol Pot the lunatic leader of the Khmer rouge in the late 70's ordered all educated people to be literally wiped out, exterminated. He felt that educated people, lawyers, doctors, teacher. Etc were tainted and corrupted by western society and thinking and were a threat to his regime, he ordered his army to kill all who they though were educated. Those with pale skins and soft hands were considered not labourers so therefore must be esucated, they were killed, same with those who wore glasses or sunglasses, must have western influence, they were killed. The entire family of someone educated was also killed, including babies and children, simply because later one ehen they grew up they might seek revenge, so they were all killed. It was a horrendous mass genocide and in total nearly 3 million of his own people were killed. he ordered a school to be converted into prison cells, turning classrooms into several small brick cells, torture chambers, and the children's outdoors exercise beams were turned into gaols for hanging prisoners. It was in use from 1975-1979.
at the Tuol Sleng genocide museum aka S21, we walked around, saw the cells, the gaols, the shackles and rows of photos of guards and prisoners. In the very very last prisoner executions at S21 a row of 20 or so prisoners were lined up to be shot by the guards. Prisoners 1-14 were shot one by one, when it came to prisoner 15 there were no more bullets and so they were spared death. Graves have since been built for the 14 last prisoners, the white tonbstones in today's' photos, and the prison has been turned into a museum. Only 2 prisoners from 15-20 are alive still today, one of which we had the privilege of meeting. He works at the museum, selling books, signing copies of his story, called Survivor, Mr Chum Mey is his name, he is 83 years old and he is prisoner 15.
We then returned to the tour bus and drover out of town, to visit one of the largest killing Fields. These fields are where the dead prisoners from S21 were taken to be thrown into mass graves, sometimes 100's of bodies in a single grave, with the fields filled with multiple graves all over. The one we visited today, the largest, was initially a Chinese burial ground, and Chinese graves were exhumed to make way for large pits for the prisoners dead bodies. After the prison started getting too full, they took prisoners/ the educated, straight to the fields, bound their hands from behind, killed them slowly and shoved them into the pits, en masse. All in all between the prison and the killing fields, all very movingand hard to stomach.
we finished off the day at a gorgeous restaurant called Friends, which supports street children initiatives. The highlight oft he'd inner was having some of the Somaly mam foundation, AFESIP and Voices for Change girls come an d join us for dinner, we'll got on brilliantly and it was warming to hear their success stories, eauh of them had either been at one of the 3 centres, some for a few years, some had been at the children's centre for 10 years (so would have arrived at a very young age) as most were in their 20s. They have all gone on to use their skills learnt at the centres (weaving, seeing etc) to work wit the foundations in some way, with some on university scholarships, which is just wonderful to see. a really wonderful end to a gut wrenching day! Tomorrow we ride 80kms and 100 the next day. feeling extremely nervous for both days, gonna be TOUGH!!!!!! We do stop for short breaks every 20 kms, but stil!!!!!!
