where cider meets condensed milk: S-21 and Killing Fields

where cider meets condensed milk

Wednesday, May 09, 2007

S-21 and Killing Fields

This Cambodia trip was again with PEPY, which is an NGO founded by Daniela, the lady in red. In a nutshell: she began with an idea to bike across Cambodia to fundraise for a new school, and that happened. And people wanted to come and help with the new school, so they came. And more people wanted to come and see Cambodia and volunteer at the same time, so they did. And along the way, PEPY was established as an NGO and lots more things have been happening, with tons of trips, lots of biking, and so much joy traveling all over the world from everyone involved.

Our first morning in Phnom Penh was of sadness, and our first afternoon was of music. The Killing Fields are very tranquil, with a stupa towering up from a meadow to house several thousand skulls recovered by villagers after the Khmer Rouge regime. The skulls are organized by age and gender, shelf by shelf by shelf by shelf to the clouds. The glass doors are open and dusty, but the air is still. Only spiders weave through the bones: silent librarians of lives forced into anonymous and violent death. Many of the bodies are untouched, unclaimed, uncounted, in the mass pits outside.

From there we visited the Genocide Museum, also called S-21, which is the former high school where victims were held, interrogated, and tortured before being sent to their deaths. Everything hit me harder this year, to the point of physical illness, yet there is nowhere else I would have wanted to be that morning than right where I was, amongst new and old friends.

To say that these places represent something horrible and sad is an obvious statement. But it is easier to process the sadness when you're with wonderful people who are actively doing good in the world. PEPY love.

posted by Raychaa @ 9:20 PM

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