Cambodia has a tragic history and is probably best known for the genocide committed by the communist Khmer Rouge in the 1970s when approximately 1.5 million Cambodians were tortured and killed.

During our travels of the country we visited the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, which is a museum occupying the former grounds of a secondary school turned prison camp. One of the rooms is filled with the photographs of the 17,000 people who passed through this centre before they were taken to external sites and executed. Only ten of these people are known to have survived. The rooms in the museum where the torture occurred are largely untouched. The beds to which the victims were chained and beaten upon remain, as do many of the heavy iron torture implements. Most chillingly, the walls have photos of some of the victims in their final moments and the scratch marks of the victims can be still be seen in the paintwork.

We also visited the Killing Fields, where the victims of the Khmer Rouge were taken to be executed. We were told by our guide that the executions were carried out using hammers as the soldiers did not want to waste bullets by using their guns. The rawness of the Cambodian ordeal is made obvious by the fact that there are still scraps of the victims’ clothing on the mass graves. We also saw finger bones and teeth clearly visible in the dirt. The Fields’ most macabre reminder of the genocide is a glass walled tower which is pilled with the skulls of some of those murdered.

Sadly, 30 years on from the atrocities committed, the country is still reeling. Much of the countryside is out of limits as it remains heavily mined, and the effect of this is obvious with the amputees and burn victims who can often be seen begging in the main cities. The poverty in the aftermath of the communist regime also means that there are countless children, usually under the age of ten, who rely on begging and postcard selling to help support their families.

But despite all this, there is optimism and unshakeable camaraderie amongst Cambodians. We found the majority of the people we met to be friendly, open in talking about their past experiences and keen to practise their English. It is said that every Cambodian has at least one close family member who was killed by the Khmer Rouge, but self-pity is not a word that the Cambodian people understand!