Student Trip to S-21

(Two pictures above: "The Gallows"; used for torturing prisoners)

Map of Pol Pot Regime take over of Cambodia

Students reactions to photos of victims

Chains used for prisoners

Eerily beautiful school grounds

Description of S-21

Students posing in front of barbed wire

Floor descriptions

Writing on wall (not sure if original considering most people spoke Khmer)

Torture bed

Torture roomIllustration of "The Gallows"

Pictures of victims

Student

One of the many rooms full of victims' pictures

Skulls

Floor chains

Normal looking school with a barbed wire front. I read a sign that said this was done so that prisoners could not commit suicide.

Student looking at torture weapons

Skull

dark prisoner cell

Skulls found

Student behind the wire

I brought a group of students from my village to Phnom Penh to see some Universities and visit some popular areas around the city. Applying for college in Cambodia is not done until the final National Exam is taken by students in Grade 12 in July. The students then go off to college in August. That leaves one month for them to figure out where they are going to school. I remember worrying about that for at least two years of high school.

Many students have never been to the capital and have no idea what schools, scholarships, and housing types are out there. As far as I know most schools don't have a website, (if they do they are very basic) and no one in my town offers Internet service. There is no way for students to see or talk to administration at the schools they wish to apply to. Many students end up going where their older brothers and sisters have gone.

The first day of the trip we went to a University to talk to school administration and professors about what life is really like for students there. They explained scholarships, facilities, schedules, etc. to the students. The school was very well organized and efficient with their tour. I was really happy that the students seemed to get a lot out of it.

Day two we stopped by the Tuol Sleng Museum in the center of the city. I had not been there yet but it was a good thing to do with my students because many people of the younger generation are forgetting what happened to the Cambodian people during the Khmer Rouge.

S-21 used to be a school that the Khmer Rouge took over and made into their own jail/torture chamber for prisoners. It showed me a different side of Cambodia that I am glad to have started to explore more recently. I think if I would have gone there earlier in my service it would not have meant as much. Going to this place made me physically ill, but I know it is an important part of my journey here.

According to wikipedia:
"The Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum is a museum in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. The site is a former high school which was used as the notorious Security Prison 21 (S-21) by the Khmer Rouge communist regime from its rise to power in 1975 to its fall in 1979. Tuol Sleng (Khmer [tuəl slaeŋ]) means "Hill of the Poisonous Trees" or "Strychnine Hill"."