Our second full day here in Cambodia, and it has certainly been a very sobering one, so you’ll excuse the lack of comedy one-liners in this instalment.

After breakfast we headed to the Toul Sleng Genocide Museum, the former security office / prison known as S21. This facility was created on orders of Khmer Rouge dictator Pol Pot on April 17, 1975 and was designed for the detention, interrogation, torture and, ultimately, murder of all detainees held there.

When Pol Pot came to power he systematically eradicated the educated classes and murdered approximately three million people, and Tuol Sleng became notorious for its history of mass killing.

Sreyneang, our guide, was an expert on the prison and the very dark period of Cambodian history it represents – and no wonder. As we visited the cells, the tiled floors still stained with the blood of the 20,000 people who were detained there and eventually executed, she revealed that she too – like arguably every single Cambodian national – not only lost family members to the regime, but was forced to work for the Khmer Rouge from the age of 10.

Sreyneang admitted it was very painful for her to relive the memories of her childhood every day as she carried out her job as guide, but it is important to her – and to all Cambodians, we could tell – that the story is told and never forgotten.

Of the 20,000 prisoners held at Tuol Sleng, only seven survived. Two of them – Chum Mey and Bou Meng – were present at the museum this morning – and I must say it was a proud moment to shake the hands of two men who somehow survived the atrocities they were subjected to during their detention. As expected, Gaby started crying and Bou Meng’s assistant was ready to offer some Kleenex. Evidently, Gaby wasn’t the first to shed a tear here.

If that experience wasn’t sobering enough, we then went to the Choeung Ek Genocidal Centre – The Killing Fields. Located approximately 15km from Phnom Penh this memorial site is a highly emotional tribute to the hundreds of thousands of men, women and children, including babies, who died the most unspeakable deaths there and in the 300 or so killing fields around the country. The Khmer slogan that it is better to kill one innocent by mistake than to allow an enemy to survive by mistake was taken literally by the teenage soldiers who carried out most of the brutal killings.

The lush green landscaped lawns, the soft sound of birdsong coming from high up in the trees, the myriad colourful butterflies and the general sense of peace belie the horror of the drama that unfolds as we walked through the fields. In a factual and almost detached manner, the audio guide gives a detailed account of the indescribable atrocities that went on there including a recording of a guard who describes how systematic, efficient and terrifyingly cold-blooded the killing machine was.

The deep wounds of this genocide will be felt for a very long time to come in this otherwise beautiful South-east Asian paradise, and is primarily the reason of the abject poverty that we see around us. In spite of this the people remain warm and positive and extremely welcoming.

It was a quiet and subdued group of us that drove back to our accommodation. After a delicious lunch, the mood lightened somewhat as we sat down for a lesson in Khmer. It is a beautiful language, but pretty darned hard to grasp. As our futile attempts to say such basic things as “Hello” (“sur-sdey)” and “goodbye” (“choom-reab-lear”) destroyed the language, we wondered whether we were witnessing the demise of diplomatic relations between Malta and Cambodia.

We now need to settle down and work on our lesson plans! First day of teaching tomorrow – and we are all thoroughly geared up and raring to go.

So, Choom-reab-lear from us all in Phnom Penh.

Drama Outreach Project is a voluntary organisation made up of professionals from the arts scene in Malta. Together we are determined to make a sustainable difference to underprivileged children in developing countries teaching drama and English through music and drama. The members of DO are Alan Montanaro, Chiara Hyzler, Paula Fleri-Soler, Matthew Gatt, Anika Gatt Seretny, Gaby Montanaro and Katherine Brown Our first project has brought us to Cambodia and this blog is a day-by-day account of our experiences there.

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