The Killing Fields
June, 2005Cambodia
The headquarters for the Khmer Rogue is a grade school in Phnom Penh. Picked with the full intention of making a mockery of the people, their school, a safe haven for children, this school was the center for torture for intellects.
Even though so much of the torture took place here, I am a little numb to my surrounds as I roam from room to room. I sort of block it out of my mind, just to cope. I try not to look at anything with too much thought as it is too much to comprehend.
But when we step outside and go to the Killing Fields, I look up and see the monument that reaches to the skies. It is filled with the skulls of hundreds and hundreds of victims, and at that moment, life just becomes too real. And when I think it can’t get any more gruesome, I look down at my shoes and see splinters of bones protruding from the soil and I feel bombarded with inhumanity. Thousands of people are buried beneath my feet and I am walking on them with no clear understanding of how massive this gravesite is.
