A Brief History of Life in Cambodia

Written by Lynn

When the horrific word "genocide" is used, most people will think of the internment and incineration of European Jews by the Nazis in WWII, or of the slaughter of the Tutsis by Rwandan Hutus. While these events are heart wrenching, and inspire a deep despair in one faced with the depravation of the human spirit, somehow what happened in Cambodia cuts deeper. Somehow, the thought of a country destroying 20% of its own population makes an already horrendous word seem worse. We're not talking about an ethnic minority being ruthlessly cut from a conquered country's land or even soldiers caught up in a religious zeal. This was about neighbours killing neighbours because they had worked for the government, or drove a fancy car, or even just because they wore glasses. This was children being tortured into confessing that their parents had spoken against the ruling class, then being forced to execute them. This was simply a tragedy.

Perhaps one of the hardest things I had to face here was the fact that this had happened in my lifetime and that I knew NOTHING about it. I had heard of the Killing Fields, I think I may have even seen the movie of the same title. But I didn't really understand or comprehend what had happened in Cambodia until I came here to see it for myself.

Even with the benefit of hindsight and the clarity of time it is hard to peice together the "when", the "how" and, most importantly, the "why". So what I write here is a attempt to understand what I have gathered together from the information and books I have read. I realize it is just part of the puzzle, so I apologize for any inaccuracies or questions I leave unanswered.

The fervour of the Cambodian people to be completely self reliant is likely rooted in the French occupation of their country for over 100 years starting in 1863, and the constant incursions by Vietnamese and Thai military forces. Except for a brief period when it was occupied by the Japanese Imperial troops during WWII, Cambodia remained as a French colony and suffered under their rule, constantly concerned over the loss of their country's identity.

In 1953, with UN support, Cambodia officially declared independance and became a monarchy under the rule of King Norodom Sihanouk. For the next few decades King Sihanouk walked a fine line of neutrality, not willing to side and accept aid from either communist China and the Soviet Union, or the United States. He struggled to maintain the independance of his country while trying to establish a stable economy, not an easy task in the boiling cauldron of what would become the second Indochina War and that would eventually escalate into the Vietnam War.

Then in 1970, while King Sihanouk was in England, he was overthrown in a military coup by General Lol Nol and Prince Sirik Matak. The new government was openly pro-American and anti-communist, allowing US troops to station in southern Cambodia to make forays into neighbouring Vietnam. From his exile in Bejing, King Sihanouk aligned himself with the communist Khmer Rouge party, which automatically gained the political group a lot of support from the lower castes in Cambodian society. Civil war had come to Cambodia.

Pol Pot (french for "politique potentielle") was the leader of the Khmer Rouge. In the territories he controlled he began instituting small changes that would eventually snowball into a genocide of unimaginable proportions. He declared that the working class was the lifeblood of the revolution and that Cambodia's "bourgeois enemies" would have to be cut out of society in order to purify the people. His army consisted mainly of young men and women from peasant families and his goal was to reduce the people in "liberated" areas to feudal peasant equality.

By 1973 he controlled over 2/3 of the country side and enjoyed significant support in much of the remaining territories. In these areas he instigated restrictive policies, such as forbidding the ethnic Cham minorities from wearing traditional dress. He also started moving the population of conquered urban areas into the country side as an attempt to achieve enforced socialism. Pol Pot wanted the "parasitism of urban life" uprooted. Land reform was instituted, and all large properties confiscated then redistributed with the goal of making all holdings of similar size. All means of private transportation were reallocated for military use.

On April 17, 1975 the troops of the Khmer Rouge rolled into Phnom Pehn, capital of Cambodia, with barely a whisper of resistance. The populace celebrated in the streets, cheering the conquering army and the end of war. The Khmer Rouge had finally achieved power.

Under the guise of the threat of American bombings, the Khmer Rouge immediately emptied the entire city of Phnom Pehn, some 2.5 million people. They were allowed to take only what they could carry and abandoned the rest, being promised they could retrieve their possessions once things were safe. Even seriously ill patients in the local hospitals were forced to leave. It is estimated some 3000 citizens died in this evacuation alone. The population from urban centres were termed "new people" (as opposed to the "old people", or rural peasants) and subject to the harshest treatment by the Khmer Rouge as their political inclinations and professions of patriotism were not to be trusted.

People sent to the country began enforced labour for the good of Cambodia. All forms of outside aid were refused, for fear of becoming indebted to another super power (the reason for the original occupation of Cambodia by France). Religion was abolished and a rule of communal property was instituted. Families were seperated, males and females living apart, their children taken from them. The children were instead raised by dedicated members of the Khmer Rouge, and indoctrinated into their way of thinking. They were considered the "pure souls", the only ones without past sins against the ruling government, whether by thought or deed.

Pol Pot developed an ideal of ruling that combined Marxist and Maoist principles. His goal was to return Cambodia to an agrarian society, based on agriculture and completely self reliant. His ministers once boasted to King Sihanouk "we will be the first nation to create a completely communist society without wasting time on intermdiate steps". The Khmer Rouge banned all modern technological contrivances and ordered the people to begin the back breaking labour of establishing dike and transport systems that would increase production and distribution efficiency within the country. All of this was done by hand. Many people spent 16 hours a day in hard labour. The food was limited as war had managed to destroy or prevent production on arable land, and no foreign aid was accepted. Medical supplies, and those trained to use them, were not only in short supply, but considered unpatriotic to use. Use of traditional therapies was encouraged, though none of the required material was provided. People began to die in the thousands from malnutrition and disease, but the government seemed to not care. If anything, they seemed to encourage the wanton destruction of the populace. People were executed for such minor infractions as not cheering revolutionary slogans loud enough, or not having developed callouses on their hands (indications of "soft lifestyles"). Killings were done with hammers, axe handles and spades in order to save on bullets.

Pol Pot estimated that only 1-2 million people would be required to build his utopia. Based on this his decisions regarding how to deal with dissenters within the country seemed to be influenced. As he stated "To keep you is no benefit, to destroy you is no loss." He began a campaign to weed out all "undesirables" from his new envisaged community. Former government workers, educated professionals, intellects, ethnic Vietnamese and Chams, Cambodian christians and Buddhist monks became the dregs of society in the new Cambodia, renamed the Democratic Kampuchea. "Re-education" of these selected groups began in earnest. Many were forced through torture to confess to pre-revolutionary lifestyles and crimes. Any previous contact with foreign agencies, such as missionaries, international relief organizations or even tourists was grounds for execution. Starting in 1976 people began to be classified as either those with "full rights", "candidates" or "depositees". Depositees were marked for destruction, and had their rations cut even further, down to a mere 2 bowls of rice soup a day.

While life for the average Cambodian continued to deteriorate, war with Vietnam continued. Thousands of refugees fled to the Thai border with their horror stories of torture, abuse and starvation. In January 1979 the Khmer Rouge was finally defeated by the Vietnamese army. Pol Pot fled with his supporters to hide out along the Thai border and continue their resistance. Vietnam used this as an excuse to leave a military force within the Cambodian territory. As a result the UN refused to recognize the new government, which was under Vietnamese control. This left Pol Pot as the leader of Cambodia who was officially recognized on the world stage, meaning the country could not begin the process of rebuilding itself. It was not until Pol Pot's death in April 1998 that the Khmer Rouge army was finally declared defunct, leaving an opportunity for the renewal of life in Cambodia.

From 1975 to 1979 the Khmer Rouge, with Pol Pot as their leader, ruled Cambodia with an iron fist, attempting to create their vision of a perfect, independant, socialist country. In their fervour to acheive this goal, they slaughtered untold millions. Official estimates place the number dead somewhere between 1.5 to 3 million people, in a country with a population of a mere 7 million at the beginning of the 1970's. Pol Pot himself admits that his Khmer Rouge party was resposible for about 1 million deaths, an obviously grossly low estimate.

So with this as a barely understood history, we flew into Phnom Pehn to visit the "killing fields". The first question that should be asked from a pure interest perspective for future travellers, is "why fly". We were coming from Bangkok with our purpose of going to Cambodia two-fold. We wanted to visit Angkor Wat, a mere 7 hour bus ride east from Bangkok, then head south to Phnom Pehn. But the border crossing into Cambodia at this point is notorious in South East Asia for how incredibly common it is for tourists to get extorted. Hark and Tod, from Jakarta, had crossed here just a few weeks before and they strongly advised against it. The bus trip was delayed by 5 hours at the border while they negotiated with the Cambodian "taxi mafia" who insisted they would have to pay extra for another bus as the one they had booked was "delayed". The visa prices are doubled and the border guards insist that you must change your Thai baht into US dollars there, giving extortionist rates of exchange. The road from the border to Siem Reip/Angkor Wat is hellishly maintained, some say at the insistence of Bangkok Air, the only airline that has flights in and out of Siem Riep (hmm, interesting, and the cost of this flight just happens to be double or even triple any other in Asia). All in all, way too much trouble. Instead we caught a cheap flight into Phnom Pehn, with the plan of getting a bus ride to Siem Riep afterwards.

One thing to understand about Cambodia is that it is NOT Thailand. Up until 1999 there was minimal to no economic growth in this country that suffered from continual cival wars, internal strife and government corruption. Since then they have had a steady increase in general prosperity, their main sources of income being textile exports and tourism. Over half of the tourist who go to Cambodia go only to Angkor Wat, then leave as quickly as possible. People here are poor, and on a scale we haven't seen since Bolivia. This means that the rich white tourists are prime targets for beggars and schemes designed to wrest their precious dollars from them. The touts will appear in an almost constant stream to harass you when you are sitting at restaurants. Many of the beggars are children dressed in dirty rags, carrying babies and begging for change. As heart wrenching as they can be, NGO's working in the area strongly recommend not encouraging them by adding change to their begging bowls. Children who are successful beggars often become a family's only source of income, meaning they will not go to school and be educated, thus perpetuating their impoverished state. Other, more subtle ways of making money involving overcharging tourists for EVERYTHING, usually meaning there may be two different menus at small local restaurants, one for Cambodians, one for others. Hotels will ask for one price, which is usually grossly inflated, and you then have to bargain downwards. People wander the streets selling everything, common items being post cards, jewellry and photocopied books. What they charge depends on whether or not you look like you just stumbled off the bus. Sounds cruel, to complain about being overcharged what would amount to $2 or $3, when that money goes to someone who is desperately poor, and there were many times when we just didn't worry about it too much. But it does become a big struggle here, having to constantly be on your guard and wondering how much you should be paying. Gilles did overpay by about 500% for a book on Angkor Wat to these three girls who were the smartest, funniest group of teenagers we had encountered in a long time (their french was better than mine, and they got an extra dollar out of Gilles when they beat him at tic-tac-toe).

Phnom Pehn itself is not a city that inspires you to linger. It does have the Royal Palace and the National Museum, which are interesting, but brief stop overs. What people are really here for, and what they want to try to understand, is the Killing Fields.

Choeung Ek, the most well known of the killing fields in Cambodia, sits 15 km outside of Phnom Pehn. Here, between 1975 and 1979, the Khmer Rouge executed 17,000 Cambodians. Some 8,900 of the bodies were discovered in mass graves after the fall of Pol Pot from power. A Buddhist stupa was built on the spot to commemorate the tragedy. In it there is a fibreglass case containing some 5,000 skulls from the victims found here. You can also walk through the back fields, where large pits bearing signs that indicate the number of bodies each contained cover an area almost 1 acre big. On the dirt paths that traverse this area you can still see the occasional shin bone or scrap of shirt poking out of the dirt. Near by I could hear the singing of children at a local school, making the experience all the more surreal.

After Choeung Ek, most will move on to Tuol Sleng, also called S-21. This former highschool was converted into a dentention and interrogation centre in 1975. It was used mainly to hold former Khmer Rouge members and soldiers who were suspected of treason. Often high ranking officials that Pot Pol feared were fomenting plans for a coup were detained here and occasionally their whole families would be brought in to be executed. There were also about 79 foreigners executed here, most of them of Thai and Vietnamese descent. However, 11 of the victims were western, being from the UK, France, Australia, New Zealand and the States, most of them journalists in Cambodia to investigate the rumours of what was happening.

Upon arrival at the prison, all prisoners were photographed and forced to give a biography of their lives, which was closely examined for evidence of a lifestyle deemed undesirable. The prisoners were often interrogated over and over, in an attempt to find descrepancies in what they had originally writen. It was not uncommon for torture, such as partial drownings and beatings to be employed. Should evidence against them be produced (and it almost always eventually was), the unfortunate prisoner would then be shipped to Choeung Ek for disposal.

When you first walk into the prison you encounter row after row of black and white photographs of the prisoners. Some appear afraid, some resigned, occasionally one or two is actually smiling. There are photographs of the emaciated bodies found by the conquering Vietnamese army, as well as the corpses of people still chained to beds. Other pictures taken at the time of discovery show corpses with flies collecting on their eyes, or with head wounds from large caliber guns. Some of the bodies had had their throats slit, others were covered with bruises from beatings, all were skeletal in thier appearance. Small, windowless, wooden cells line the rooms that used to hold students, each only big enough for a person to lie down in and have a bucket in the corner. The following sign is posted, which outlines the rules a prisoner had to obey, or face execution, upon being brought to S-21

1. You must answer accordingly to my question. Don’t turn them away.

2. Don’t try to hide the facts by making pretexts this and that, you are strictly prohibited to contest me.

3. Don’t be a fool for you are a chap who dare to thwart the revolution.

4. You must immediately answer my questions without wasting time to reflect.

5. Don’t tell me either about your immoralities or the essence of the revolution.

6. While getting lashes or electrification you must not cry at all.

7. Do nothing, sit still and wait for my orders. If there is no order, keep quiet. When I ask you to do something, you must do it right away without protesting.

8. Don’t make pretext in order to hide your secret or traitor.

9. If you don’t follow all the above rules, you shall get many many lashes of electric wire.

10. If you disobey any point of my regulations you shall get either ten lashes or five shocks of electric discharge.

Of the 17,000 prisoners who entered S-21, only 7 survived.

It was a hard, heart wrenching day, trying to put yourself in the place of these people. While it seemed awful to me that the only reason that Phonm Pehn was a stop on the backpacker trail was this tragedy, I think skipping it and remaining ignorant of the facts would be worse. After our visit here, suddenly we viewed the people begging for our spare change in a new light. These people, many of them our own age, deserved our respect because they had survived through something we never could and are now struggling to make themselves a place in a world that can quickly forget that this ever happened. Once again, I am humbled by how lucky I am to live the life I do.

Ayutthaya

Written by Lynn

Ayutthaya was the capital of Thailand for over 400 years starting in the 1300's. It sits a mere 2 hour bus ride from downtown Bangkok (or 1 hour if you are squashed in a sardine can-like minibus). It was named a UNESCO world heritage site in 1981 because of its unsurpassed collection of ancient Thai wats.

Here there is evidence of the creativity and beauty seen in ancient Thai architecture. It seems that every king that ruled ancient Siam was determined to leave his mark in the capital with a series of ever more impressive Royal Palaces and temples. Most of these buldings were constructed somewhere between the 14th and 17th centuries. Considering the time that has passed, the wats are in amazing condition. Several are in the process of being restored, while others need little to any work on them.

Jose Santen, a Dutch trader, was one of the first European's to visit the capital of ancient Siam in the 1400's. In correspondance home he wrote the following description:

"Pra Nakorn Sri Ayutthaya is the capital city in which the king lives, and so do the nobles, officials, and all administrators. The capital city is situated on a small island in Chao Praya River. Its surrounding area is a flat field. The stone wall was constructed to surround the city with 2 Dutch miles circumference. So it is a very big capital city. Its vicinity consists of many immediate Buddhist monasteries. The population is dense in the capital. There are long, wide and straight aligned roads. There are canals that are converted from Chao Praya River to the capital. So it is very convenient for transportation. Besides the roads and canals, there are also small ditches and alleyways. So, in the rainy season, people can easily travel to houses. The houses are built in Indian styles but roofed with tiles. Ayutthaya is therefore a luxurious city packed with over 300 Buddhist monasteries exquisitely built. There many are pagodas, topes, molded figures, and statues that are coated with gold brightening the whole area. The capital city situates on the riverbank and the city plan was orderly planned, so it is a very beautiful city. Its location is good, its population is dense, and it is a good trading area both domestic and foreign trade. As far as I am aware, there has not been any king in this region has ever reigned the beautiful and prosperous city as Ayutthaya. The city is on a very good location, regarding the militarily strategies, so it is very difficult for the enemy to impregnate because the surrounding area will be flooded for 6 months annually in the rainy season. The enemy cannot stay for a long time, so they will eventually retreat."

The first ruler of Ayutthaya, King Ramathibodi I, made the official religion of Siam Theravada Buddhism. This choice influenced many of the building structures, and as a result, shows a wide variation from the temples built by the neighbouring Hindu Angkor kingdom (see later posting regarding this).

The history of the royal family that ruled Ayutthaya is long and complex. It involves delicious intrigues of assassinations, military coups, and fraternal bickering. The shortest reign was a mere 7 days before Prince Thong Lun was killed by his prodigal brother. In total 33 kings ruled in Ayutthaya. During these 4 centuries there were a number of wars fought with neighbouring Burma, Vietnam and Cambodia. Many of the altars are dedicated to the brave elephants that the warriors and kings used as war steeds, fighting hand-to-hand from their backs. Finally, in 1767 the last of the great kings of Ayutthaya was overthrown by a Burmese army consisting of 1,500,000 soldiers and 6,000 of these elephants. He fled the city and died a mere 10 days later of starvation.

Many of the temples, statues and other irreplaceable artwork were destroyed by the conquering Burmese army. The victorious Burmese king was so appalled by the wanton destruction created by his soldiers that it is said he wept in sadness and had an enormous temple built as an act of contrition. Still, in spite of being partially demolished many amazing structures remain and are open to the public for viewing.

There's nothing quite like the feeling of wandering through these ancient temples, meandering between the dilapidated structures and staring in wonder at the imposing buddha statues, where many people still worship. Somehow the crumbling stone makes it all the more impressive, especially in comparison to some of the relatively new wats we had visited in Bangkok. But this was just a taste of what was to come. Our next destination - Cambodia and Angkor Wat.

Bride Over the River Kwai...........oh, and tigers!

Written by Lynn

From Bangkok we caught a bus to the town of Kanchanaburi. This area has been immortalized in the 1960-ish movie "Bridge over the River Kwai". The real deal is here.

The actually story is a lot less romantic than the movie makes it out. During WWII, the Japanese Imperial Army needed to have a railway built to link Thailand and Burma. Previously they had taken supplies from the east to the north of Asia through the Straits of Malacca, but this route was now vulnerable to attack by allied forces. In 1943 they began the construction of the Burma Railway to connect Bangkok and Ragoon. It was over 400 km long and it was scheduled to be built in just over 12 months at the cost of thousands of lives. They used pieces from a disassembled railway in Java and forced labour consisting of Asian workers and Allied POW's. In total it is estimated that anywhere between 110,000 to 160,000 prisoners and civilian labourers died during the construction of this "Death Railway", the large majority of them Asian. Exact numbers are impossible to obtain as the Japanese did not bother to record the deaths of the "coolies", many from Indonesia, China, Malaysia and Burma.

Today it is possible to visit the reconstructed site of the bridge (which is actually built over a tributary of the River Kwai) and the Kanchanaburi graveyard where 6,982 POW's remain buried, their bodies having been dug up and relocated from the mass graves randomly dug beside the tracks they died building.

The real story here is about the treatment of the POW's and the Asian labourers during the years it took to build the bridge. Many who survived the ordeal and have seen the movie say that it doesn't even begin to bring home the cruel reality of the camps. Over 25% of the POW's who died did so as a result of malnutrition and diseases such as malaria, diptheria and cholera. Building this railway meant hacking through dense jungle by hand and breaking apart rocky cliffs and hills with sledgehammers. Food was limited and the work unrelenting. As one survivor put it.................

"The only food available from the jungle was wild bananas, about the size of your finger and full of black seeds, the young leaves of the banana palms, the red banana flowers and bamboo shoots. Our rations per day for the month of May 1943 were 537 grams rice, 12grams onion, 1 gram towgay, 1 gram dried whitebait and 1 gram of beef per man. Hardly sufficient to maintain anyone let alone men working up to 16 hours a day."

In addition to the unrelenting hunger, the unsanitary conditions and the threat of disease, many of the POW's recall vicious treatment and punishment meted out by the Japanese guards for minor infractions. One sign in the museum we visited posted just such an example. As punishment for stealing a tin of fruit from a red cross package, and that therefore theoretically belonged to the prisoners:

"I was propped against the tree, my arms pulled back and tied together with barbed wire and secured to the tree trunk. After a few more punches in the face they left me alone. The pain lashes your body after awhile. I must leave it to your imagination. When morning broke they put a bucket filled to the brim with water in front of me and left me to it. A sophisticated torture if ever there was one."

The bridge itself is rather unremarkable, you can take a short ride over it in an open aired tourist train. Afterwards the best thing to do is take yourself over to the JEATH war museum to have a look around at this quirky collection. JEATH stands for Japanese, England, Australia/America, Thailand, and Holland, the 6 countries who participated in the building of the railway. Here they have several first hand accounts of the experience of the POW's as well as collections of everything from guns and artillery used in WWII, to stamps and currency of Thailand dating back to the early 1900's. They is also an elephant skull and a monument containing several human skulls found alongside the railway, identity unknown. Several descriptions and displays outline the various torture and punishment methods that were used on the POW's in the camps. Most moving are the photographs, paintings done by the POW's and hand written letters to loved ones on scraps of paper. Many articles in the museum have been donated by the POW's or their families.

We, through pure unplanned timing, landed in Kanchanaburi on April 25th, the Austrlian ANZAC day. ANZAC stands for Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, and this is the day they celebrate the bravery of their fallen comrades. Because of the large number of Aussies buried in the Kanchanaburi cemetary, this day is also commemorated here. There were many families and members of ANZAC in town while we were there and on the morning of the 25th several ceremonies were held in their honour.

Our other reason for being here was to visit a temple, Wat Pha Luang. This temple is infamous for its work done rescuing tigers. Since 1999 the abott, Phra Acharn Phusit, has been saving abandoned tigers. Many of them come from private homes, where people who adopted a cute little kitten soon realized that having a full grown, 800lb tiger in your backyard was not conducive to quiet living. Others were young ones brought in after their mothers were killed by poachers. In total the temple houses 11 tigers, all of whom are imprinted on humans and non releasable. Some of them were born here.

The temple does have in the works an ambitious project. They are presently building a "Tiger Island" that will be surrounded by a moat. There they will raise the tigers born at the temple with little to no interaction between them and humans, in the hope of eventually being able to release them back into the wild. Perhaps a bit unrealistic, but never the less, lofty goal. More importantly this island will provide a place for the tigers to spend their days and nights when not on "display" in a fairly natural environment, rather than the sad little pens they are now housed in.

There has been some recent criticism of this temple, fearing that they are "commercializing". They have moved from the realm of asking for a donation to help feed the tigers to charging an entrance fee of 300 baht (about $9). When you get to the temple the first thing you have to do after paying is sign a waiver that says you won't hold the temple responsible if you get eaten, though they are quick to point out that no visitor has ever been injured. The next thing you have to do, if you're Gilles anyways, is buy a new t-shirt. This is because he forgot the warning we had read when looking up the temple that says you are not allowed to wear red for fear of inciting the wrath of the apparently red hating cats.

After changing you go through the gates into a large compound that houses all sorts of beasts from water buffalo to pigs of all ages and sizes to some stray dogs, peacocks and chickens thrown in for fun. Apparently they all live here, or in the land surrounding, and have free rein to come and go. Everyday at 4:30 the monks and volunteers will feed the animals, rolling out a big truck filled with squash and other vegetables that they throw on the ground in order to break them open. A friendly feeding frenzy results, and as you weave between cows and pigs on your way back to the parking lot you can see the monks going around the helping to open up unbroken gourds for the animals. It makes it hard to begrudge them the few dollars you donated, and I truly believe they are doing good work here. As of now it is a fairly "off the beaten track" tourist spot, but I have a feeling this will change quickly as word gets out (we heard of it when watching a Lonely Planet episode on Thailand, though it wasn't mentioned in our guide book).

But back to the tigers. After a short walk through a dusty field you head down a hill into a canyon, where about 10 tigers are lounging about. All of them are leashed and have at least one handler with them at all times. You can give your camera to one of the volunteers and another one leads you over to a tiger, making sure to approach from the rear. You can then sit or crouch down and have your picture taken. As an added bonus, if you stay until 4:30, the tigers are then taken back to their pens and you may get a chance to help walk them there.

The down side to this little adventure is that the temple was about 40 km from our hostel. We had rented a scooter and set out just after lunch (1:30-4:30 is the best time to be there as the tigers are out relaxing in the canyon, and playing in the water, all under the very close supervision of their handlers). Unfortunately, it was likely over 40 degrees and zooming down the black asphalt was hot work. Even more unfortunately, our gas gauge didn't work, so when we turned down the dirt road leading to the temple and the scooter stuttered to a stop, we knew we were in trouble. But as a testament as to why we love the people here, a guy stopped his scooter when he drove by about 10 minutes later and saw us pushing ours back towards the highway. Unable to speak a work of English, he managed to quickly understand out problem. First he tried to figure out how to get some gas out of his own scooter, but was unable to accomplish this. So instead he abandoned his plans, turned his scooter around and rode back into town to get us a pop bottle full of gas. We managed to get him to accept money for the gas plus a little extra for his time, though I'm sure he would never had asked if we hadn't insisted.

Overall, Kanchanaburi is a worthwhile side trip from Bangkok. Not only the sobering history is here, but also a chance to touch a live tiger. As well there are caves, temples, and waterfalls to see. All in all, never a dull moment here.

Soi Dog Revisited

Written by Lynn

My last trip to Thailand was planned around a stint volunteering at a spay/neuter clinic run by the Soi Dog Foundation, on the island of Phuket, Thailand. There were a total of 5 vets, 4 of them from England, and myself, as well as 1 RVT. We were travelling around to different villages to set up our "hospital" where ever possible, school auditoriums being a popular choice. We'd then "surgerize" everything we could get our hands on. Stray dogs were darted, feral cats from the local shops absconded in burlap sacks and the locals cajoled into bringing in their own pets. Soi Dog's ultimate goal was to sterilize 75% of the local strays, a magic number at which the population would actually start to fall.

A day of down and dirty surgery in barely sterile conditions would follow. The animals were kept under with topped up injectable anesthetic, the instruments were scrubbed quickly then briefly dunked in rubbing alcohol before being used on the next patient, and hands were washed with diluted betadine in buckets of blood tinged water.

This time back I found that things have changed for Soi Dog. First off, about two months after we left the island, Phuket was slammed by the tsunami. The small hotel where I had stayed in 2004, then again this year, was devestated, but has been mostly rebuilt since then (though you can see from the picture how badly the huts had been damaged).

As a side note, after leaving Phuket the last time we headed up north to the town of Kho Lak in order to stay at a beautiful resort. This was probably one of the nicest places I've EVER stayed at. It had a pool that was over 4000 square metres big and stretched for more than a kilometre around the entire hotel. Since then we had heard this resort was no more, though we had a hard time understanding how a concrete building could be completely destroyed. Turns out Kho Lak was one of the hardest hit areas in Thailand. Talking to one of the locals, John, he explained that he had gone up to Kho Lak just after the tsunami to help with body retrieval. He knew exactly the resort we were talking about, based on the description of the pool. Apparently when the first wave hit the sand under the hotel was ripped out, causing the foundation to crack. The power of the water then pushed several people under the hotel. The second wave buried them by refilling the hole with debris and sand. According to John, you could smell the decay all over the hotel, but just couldn't get to the corpses........

With the world's social consciousness raised by the unrelenting images of people being swept away in the waves, money poured into areas like Phuket. Donations to organizations like Soi Dog increased by a hundred fold. The government of Thailand was understandably overwhelmed by the humanitarian crisis, and had no time to deal with the numerous stray animals that had previously been fed and cared for by the local populace (interestingly, almost no animals were killed in the tsunami, some sixth sense telling them to get out of the way long before the first wave hit).

So Soi Dog Foundation took over the island's dog pound. They worked in conjucntion with the local government employees and a barrage of foreign vets who showed up to volunteer. Together, amongst many other amazing stories, they managed to spay and neuter the feral cat population (as in every single one) of PhiPhi Island, whose entire human populace was either deceased or relocated. They distributed over 2000 pounds of dog food a week to various volunteers who fed the local strays. By the end of 2006, Soi Dog had managed to sterilize over 15,000 dogs and cats in less than 3 years. For its efforts in the tsunami, Soi Dog Foundation was honoured by the Humane Society International.

Even driving into town I could see the difference. There were no longer the obvoius numbers of mangy looking strays on every street corner, but rather several well cared for, contented dogs hanging out in much smaller numbers.

This time Soi Dog was housed in a permenant location, having taken over the care of the local dog pound for good. The present compound houses over 400 dogs in various stages of health. But the tsunami funding was running out, and the last time they had a volunteer vet was over 2 months before I showed up.

Theoretically I was there for the week to sterilize dogs. The reality is that my time was more valuable to them trying to get things organized. Recently they had been having several dogs die suddenly of unknown causes. My first day there saw four deaths.

Several dogs had runny noses and eyes, coughing and were having problems breathing. A lot of the pups and older dogs had bad diarrhea. The worst though was the ticks. A very wet year meant a population explosion. Bad enough these buggers are so gross, but they also carry lots of nasty diseases. Several of the dogs were anemic looking, some running fevers, others just wasting away.

Without a staff vet, the people running Soi Dog do their best. Any dog with pale gums or general ill thrift was put on doxycycline for "blood parasites". Any one with diarrhea or weight loss was dewormed with Drontal. If they managed to catch the really sick dogs before they passed away, they would take them into the local vet for treatment. But this not only costs money, it was at times unrealistic as the number of animals meant that a dog had to be pretty far gone before anyone realized it was sick.

So on my first day the first order of business was to do an autopsy on one of the recently deceased dogs to try and determine a cause of death. An otherwise healthy 8 month old, he had been found collapsed that morning, having looked perfectly fine the previous day to the best of anyone's knowledge. On post mortem (PM) the only problem was the poor pup's lungs, but what a mess! Of the 6 lung lobes, 4 were an unappetizing meaty texture (rather than squishy like they should be) and obviously bruised looking.

Next we randomly chose three sick dogs and sent off blood work on them to the local laboratory to try and figure out what was happening. I also begged and pleaded for more money from the coffers of Soi Dog to have the lungs of the autopsied dog sent for histopathology (meaning they would be fixed in wax and examined under a microscope) and to have some fecal samples sent off.

While waiting for results we went through the pens and pulled out any of the 400 dogs that seemed to have anything wrong with them. Some were truly sick and were placed on medications. Others, who had been losing weight, we decided were doing so because they were unable to survive in a high stress pack situation where they had to compete with other, more dominant dogs for food and shelter. These ones we made better just by feeding them seperately and assigning them extra people cuddling time.

With the help of my 16 year old "nurse", Nong Malee, we also managed to get a few surgeries done. We did a couple tumour removals, including one maggoty one, which those of you who have worked with me will realize didn't go over well as I have trouble being around maggots without feeling nauseated. We spayed one very pregnant dog that accidently got mated to a male much bigger than her. We neutered a few escape artists in an attempt to curb their enthusiasm, and even did a bit of a cosmetic surgery on a dog with a droopy eyelid (severe entropion complicated by distichiasis).

The facilities were certainly better than last time around, with an autoclave to sterilize equipment and even an inhalant anesthetic machine. But (as you can see) my recovery area still left something to be desired.

We made sure to run some distemper tests on various dogs as well. Fortunately they all came back negative. Soi Dog can only afford to vaccinate the puppies for distemper, so it is a constant fear that this virulent virus will get into the population. There was a bit of a time crunch to get the distemper tests and run them as soon as possible. We had all agreed that should the tests come back positive that we would cull ALL the sick dogs (possibly as many as 100 of them on initial estimates). Being a buddhist society the local vets would be very reluctant to do such a deed, meaning the task would be left to me and Ena, Soi Dog's manager who hailed from Germany and would have to be done before the end of the week when I left. Happily this turned out to be unnecessary, but it was a source of major stress for us for a couple of days.

Other laboratory tests came back and it was discovered that the dogs were suffering from a variety of diseases. The pneumonia seemed to be bacterial in origin and many of the dogs were doing quite well after only a few days of antibiotics by the time we got the results. Diarrhea seemed to be being caused by Giardia present in the unsanitary water. And finally, perhaps most importantly, we found out that there was blood parasite, called Babesia sp., being transmitted by the ticks. This was particularly important because the parasite was not sensitive to doxycycline, which they had been treating dogs with. Happily, the treatment effective against Babesia was both available in Thailand and not too expensive.

By the end of the week, things were a little more under control. We had lost a few of the very weak puppies, but everyone else seemed to be back on track. We sorted through the medications and instruments that Soi Dog accumulated over the years from various volunteer vets and dumped a bunch of stuff that was outdated or even down right dangerous (like the big box of Ibuprofen they had been using for pain relief!!). And we had figured out a lot of what was going on in the compound. Tick control and closer monitoring of the dogs was going to be the new game plan.

Final note - what can you do? If you're interested, check out www.soidog.org . These guys are doing good work with what little resources they have. They are actively working to find homes for adoptable dogs. They have volunteers that come in to work daily with the dogs in obedience and to give them a little one on one time, attention that they soak up. They've even managed to build an agility course for the dogs that the local employees use daily with several of the enthusastic ones.

They desperately need, well, everything. Money would help, long term corporate sponsors would be better (any ideas out there?!). Any vets who want to spend a few days working their asses off while their travel companions relax on the beach, feel free to sign up. And you don't have to be a vet to volunteer. While I was there a girl from Sweden was just finishing up a month long stint and had proved herself invaluable to them.

While I was stressing and returning grimy every night to the bungalow, Gilles had rented a scooter and was bombing around the island (the first day he had dropped by the compound and due to his real distress over seeing dogs sick I suggested he might not want to hang out there). He wandered from beach to beach, with little forays into the towns of Phuket and Patong in between (ie. by the end of the week he was pretty bored). So after a week in "paradise" we headed back to Bangkok.

Bangkok, one night is never enough

Written by Lynn

Having previously visited Bangkok in the fall of 2004, we knew we were heading for a city that we really enjoyed. Many people have expressed concern about the recent political upheaval in Thailand, and it's true that there are problems. But by and large these problems are confined to a small region in the south where there is presently a militant separatist group that is causing significant upheaval. The military coup in September 2006 which saw the then Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra ousted was apparently all very low key, and barely caused a ripple in the lives of the average person living in Bangkok (except, of course, for the tanks in the street that they had to drive around).

It is hard to define what makes this such a great city. It's certainly easy to get around for such a big place. There's the Sky Train, the underground Metro, the cabs, the river taxis and the ever present tuk-tuks drivers. All of them competing for an opportunity to take you where ever you want. Then there is the food - whether its a street vendor, a high end restaurant, or a small family run place, the food in Thailand is unbeatable.

Incredibly, one of our new favourite places to eat this time round was a mall food court, which sounds horrible, but theis place has to be seen to be believed. Located in the basement of an upper class mall, Siam Paragon, the food court must cover 5 acres (seriously!) and contains about 100 different food stalls and restaurants. There was everything from mango and sticky rice, to penang chicken curry, to spicy satays and delicious spring rolls. And of course, if you wanted, you could go for the usual assortment of Starbuck's and Subway, or choose from many of the international restaurants if your hankering was for Vietnamese pho, Japanese sushi or Indian vindaloo. The vast choice meant we could eat there almost every day and never have the same thing twice. And the other upside - it was cheap the average supper being less than $6 including drinks and dessert!

Of course for price we couldn't beat the little Indian restaurant we found on a back street by one of the canals, where for less than $4 two couples could eat a incredibly delicious meal. Sadly, in spite of trying numerous times since we have not been able to find an Indian place that comes even close to the food produced in this rather scungy looking alley way.

We passed back and forth through Bangkok a few times, it being a great central hub for all of Thailand. On our first stop we spent the better part of a week there. The first few days were on our own, and then we were joined by Harkiran and Tod, who were just finishing up a three week holiday before returning to Jakarta.

While here we made the obligatory tours of some of the wats and temples, including the Standing Buddha, which was built in 1867 AD and stands 32 metres tall. Apparently bringing the head of a mackeral, a boiled egg and a lei of flowers to the temple will ensure a blessing of success on your ventures. Sadly we couldn't find a fish head, so will have to continue to rely on dumb luck!!

We also saw the Black Buddha and the Reclining Buddha. Like dumb tourists (you'd think we'd know better by now) we fell for a scam. we were told that because it was a national holiday, the tuk tuk drivers were obligated to offer a special deal on the tour of all the important sites. For a mere 20 baht (about $0.60) we would be ferried around all day if necessary. What the trick is, is that between all these beautiful and ancient temples, the tuk tuk driver will take you to various stores - a tailor, a travel agent, a jewelry store - where he gets money for getting you in the door. Once inside you will be exposed to high pressure sales. Luckily most of these stores quickly recognized us as a lost cause. Getting a bit peeved about all the stops and the massive traffic jams (an endemic problem in Bangkok, but hard to handle when stuck in a tuk tuk exposed to the toxic deisel fumes), we aborted the mission and insisted our driver drop us off at the guest house we were staying at. Without tipping. This is unusual for us as we're happy to tip, sometimes very generously in a relative sense, though giving someone who charges you a buck a whole extra fifty cents doesn't seem like that much. But we'll only do so if we feel our driver has been friendly AND honest with us, a situation more rare than you'd wish. So it was back to relying on our usual mode of travel, our own two feet.

While here we also managed to take in a few of the markets, including the Lumphini night market, the MBK and the awe inspiring Chatachuk weekend market.

Held every Saturday and Sunday, this massive market covers 35 acres and houses over 9000 (!) booths. Here you can purchase everything from t-shirts for less than a dollar to exotic hand woven silk bed coverings, to hand carved wooden statues and even small fluffy puppies (I don't THINK they were for eating?!). Bargaining has been raised to an art form here, and is carried out in a friendly, competative fashion with lots of sad head shaking on the part of the shop owners as they let you get away with "much too little price". Sadly, the size of our packs, combined with the emptiness of our wallets, meant that the massive shopping spree we had embarked on our last time in Bangkok was not to be repeated. It was, however, a good time to replace well worn t-shirts and shorts with new stuff.

We were also lucky to land in Bangkok for the annual Songkran Festival, the Thai New Year. For this festival, local Thai people will clean their entire houses from top to bottom, to remove the previous year's bad actions so that they can start over with a clean state. Traditionally water is poured over a family member or friend as bad luck will flow away with the water. What it boils down to here is a three day water fight involving thousands of people. Woe the person that is foolish enough to ride in a tuk tuk on these days, they are guaranteed to be assaulted with bucket fulls of water from locals camped out beside the road.

We tried to sneak down Kho San Road (backpacker heaven) without getting wet, but had to give in after about 100 metres once we realized it was a lost cause. Not only do you get SOAKED, you are also blessed by the local populace as they spread a muddy mixture of talculm powder all over you face and wish you "best luck in new year" with a big grin on their faces (they love getting the farang.....that's a foreigner to all you whiteys out there).

We also celebrated Gilles' 36th (!!) birthday with Harkiran and Tod. After a dinner out we took him to a cafe where he managed to consume the largest brownie sunday I've ever seen.

Otherwise, one of the highlights was the Jim Thompson house. Jim Thompson is singlehandedly responsible for resurrecting the silk trade in Thailand and creating a world wide demand for the product. For his services to the kingdom he was awarded the Order of the White Elephant, an honour reserved for foreigners who have rendered an exceptional service to Thailand. While residing in Bangkok he built a house that was made up of 6 traditional Thai huts joined with a unique hallway. The grounds are a lush garden full of tropical plants and orchids, as well as a friendly Koi, called Oscar, who actually seems to enjoy being petted.

As well, when in Bangkok we visited a snake farm where they raised the snakes in order to milk them for the production of anti-venom. We happened to get there on the 114th anniversary of the founding of the Red Cross in Thailand, which meant, not only was it free to get in (always a good thing), they had some interesting demonstrations on showing us the various snakes and how to extract venom from them.

A lot of our time here was spent basically doing nothing - sitting in cafes, reading books, going to a few movies. As mentioned, we used Bangkok as a rest stop between many other places we visited in the rest of Thailand...............

Singapore, It's a "Fine" City

Written by Lynn


Great food but don't spit in the street! Oh, and chewing gum is illegal to sell here too.



Hey, what do you want, we only spent one night here.......................

Sepang Formula 1

Written by Gilles

With just missing out on the Australian GP in Melbourne by a week I wasn't about to let the Malaysian GP slip through my hands when we were so physically close to it. All it took was a quick phone call to the ticket agent and short Air Asia flight from Borneo to Kuala Lumpur to achieve it. We arrived at the airport in Sepang at 8:30 Sunday morning of the GP, Lynn headed directly to KL and I went straight to the track to pick up my tickets for the day's races. I split a cab with some big fella from Holland and after some searching we got our tickets. The ticket I bought was 50$ Can for a covered hilltop section, I was happy to pay it since in Canada you can't get the single day passes anymore and the tickets are quite a few more dollars. I arrived at the track in full admiration of the size of the complex. I've watched the F1 and MotoGP from Sepang before on television so I had some previous knowledge of the track but being there obviously is much different and the size of it all is intimidating.

The F1 circus as it's called was in full swing leaving you wanting for nothing, T-shirts, headsets for listening to the race, die cast cars and the the all important Ferrari Flags! I didn't buy anything. I took a shuttle bus from the F1 village to my ticketed area and to be honest for 50 dollars I wasn't expecting much in terms of viewing or comfort as anyone who has purchased general admission tickets before knows they usually leave you stuck in a corner without seeing or hearing whatever event you paid for. But the surprise was on me since the viewpoint from my area was outsanding, allowing me to see almost half the track and get very close to it as well. I was pretty happy about the whole situation, I had purchased a small chair the day before that came in handy and had plenty of snacks to last me the full day, the only problem was that it was 10 am and the race didn't start until 3! It was going to be a long day but with the Porshe 911 Cup at 12:30 and then the F1 parade of vintage cars it helped kill the time.

Most of the people started to arrive at the track at around 1pm and my area started to fill up with both foreigners and locals. The stadium style seating on the grass gave you a good look at the race from no matter where you sat or however many people sat in front of you, and the big screen across the way was sure to keep you in the loop of what was going on. It doesn't take long to get excited when you hear the F1 cars finally light up there engines, even from the other side of the track you can hear them clearly. You can also follow the TV helicopters in the air to gauge where they are on the track. They come around for an opening warm up lap and the crowd goes nuts and the tension starts to build, then the drivers lineup in the grid positions that they qualified the day before to start the race.

Once the race starts it's easy to follow what's goin on for the first couple of laps but once that first set of pit stops come you really do start to loose track, and if not for the TV monitors I really wouldn't know what the hell is goin on. Being at an F1 race for me is more about the noise, the smells and the crowds then the actually race itself anyway, so not really knowing what's goin on doesn't bother me the least. One of the other benefits of my ticket was that during the race I was able to walk around the huge section I was in and get photos from different areas and get closer and closer to the track to where you can actualy feel the awesome power of the 1000 plus horsepower cars( insert Tim "the tool man" Tailor grunt, arrrgh, arrgh, arrgh!).

(Scottish accent required)
It's eh grrrreat day forr motorrr carr rracing- Jackie Stewart always says and in Malaysia on this day it certainly was, cheap ticket, beautiful sunny day and 100 000 of my closest F1 friends, you really can't ask for more. And oh yeah, the winner was Fernando Alonso with Team McLaren.