Cambodia

I flew back to Hong Kong, picked True up and we flew to Phnom Penh for a few days.


I hadn't been to Cambodia since 1997.


I was exhausted from the travel so we stayed in the hotel the first day. True was happy to have a comfortable place to hang out in.


The hotel had a wonderful breakfast buffet.


We visited Tuol Sleng, the former middle school that the Khmer Rouge used as a prison.


It is a sobering place, though less raw and dramatic than when I was there almost 20 years ago.


We took a tuk tuk out to the mass grave site outside of town - one of the so-called killing fields.


The ride was nice ...

... but the graves were chilling. Later we watched the movie, "The Killing Fields," at a cinema cafe in town - so I felt I had done my duty educating True.


Camobida is still one of those old-style one-party dictatorships, despite it's claims of democracy. I spent some time with Hun Sen, the guy in the middle, when I was there as a reporter. He was in a power-sharing arrangement with the royal family at the time but staged a coup the morning I left. He has been in power ever since.


We visited the royal palace. But we otherwise just poked around town. Phnom Penh has become a backpacker and budget tourist backwater with a lot of sidewalk cafes along the Tonle Sap river. It's a pleasant place to sit and watch the world go by.