DAY 7: Southeast Asia: Wonders of Cambodia, Vietnam & the Mekong
“Rabbit, rabbit.” A new month, and we began the day quietly. I slept soundly and woke a bit earlier than usual, still before the alarm, but missed the sunrise this time. The extra sleep was welcomed.
Today carried weight. We visited the Killing Fields and the Tuol Sleng (S-21) Genocide Museum, places that hold some of the darkest chapters in Cambodia’s history. The Killing Fields at Choeung Ek are an open, peaceful landscape now, yet nearly 20,000 people were murdered there, part of an estimated 1.5-2 million Cambodians killed under the Khmer Rouge regime led by Pol Pot.
Pol Pot’s story is chilling in its contradictions. A Cambodian who once studied abroad in Paris on his country’s scholarship, he was originally a Buddhist monk before encountering Communism overseas and later visiting China and Russia. What followed was devastating: a regime obsessed with “purifying” its people, dismantling families, targeting the educated and destroying entire communities. If you wore glasses or had soft hands you had a good chance of being exterminated since you were not a pure person of the land, according to Pol Pot.
At Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum (a former school turned main prison and torture headquarters during the Khmer Rouge regime), we met one of the seven remaining survivors of S-21. Now 95 years old, he survived because the regime deemed him useful, his skill was repairing typewriters. His parents, siblings, wife and children were all murdered. He later remarried and had six children with his second wife. Today, he comes to the museum every day to sell his book [Survivor: Chum Mey (S-21) The Triumph of an Ordinary Man in the Khmer Rouge Genocide] and share his story with the world. We bought his book. Though his life has known unimaginable loss, his presence is a testament to resilience and hope.
After such a heavy morning, we returned to the ship for lunch, where the mood gently shifted. The meal featured Cambodian street fair, including some adventurous offerings — deep-fried tarantulas, silkworms and crickets. Chris and I decided to try the spider and the cricket. We each ate half of a cricket; Chris also managed half of the spider, while I could only take a tiny bite. Crunchy, surprisingly not awful. Chris preferred the spider while I happily preferred the cricket. The lunch felt lighthearted, a necessary release after the emotional weight of the morning.
In the afternoon, I joined the Royal Palace tour (with its French-inspired gardens) while Chris opted out and instead took a four-mile walk through the city. He wandered through markets and along the river, watching daily life unfold, and bought a dress shirt from an elderly woman at a stall, paying $10, though later realizing he probably could have paid half. He also encountered a woman carrying a scale offering weigh-ins for a dollar. His weight remained the same.
That evening, the ship hosted a children’s performance on deck. The performers, children from local orphanages and part of the Cambodian Students and Children’s Organisation, sang and danced in elaborate traditional gold-sequined costumes, sharing local music and movement. It was joyful.
The night concluded with a gala dinner. We dressed-up and enjoyed a beautifully prepared six-course meal.
It was a day of contrasts: grief and laughter, memory and celebration, sorrow and hope. We are now sailing towards the Vietnam border.