Phnom Penh

Had a great flight from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh, 35 minutes, not a bump and had a fantastic view of Tonle Sap lake as the plane flew right along the edge, even managed to pick out the flooded forest and floating village that we visited a day or so before. And then saw the Tonle Sap river merge with the Melkong at Phnom Penh, was fantastic to see it from the air and exactly how big the Mekong is.
Plane was packed with Koreans, the Americans of the Orient, honestly they have no idea about anything other than themselves, they're loud, selfish but they are the biggest visitors to Cambodia, so they are good for something.

But now back into the city, roads are chaos and it took Mr. Ben Wee, my driver and guide here, 45 minutes to drive us the 10km to the hotel, scooters going everywhere, absolute chaos.
Checked into the hotel, very nice I must say with a top floor river view looking at the 2 merging rivers.
Went to the Foreign Correspondents Club (FCC) on Sunday night and had a few drink with a couple of Kiwi's who where shooting documentaries in Thailand and had just ducked over for the weekend. Then all hell broke loose and it pelted down and around 20-25 degrees to the ground and all the rain blew straight into the FCC, floor was awash, but quite funny none the less, the FCC is a second floor balcony room, quite and a rooftop garden as well, those guys flew down the stairs absolutely sodden. But had a great night anyway.
Monday Mr Ben took me to S21 which is a genocide interrogation prison (photo attached) of the Khamer Rouge (KR), which is pretty stark and bloody depressing, it used to be a high school but then Pol Pot's cronies turned it into a gulag. Then drove around checking out the city sites, glad Ben was driving as I wouldn't have coped AT ALL!
Then we headed off to one of the 438 killing fields (photo attached), again bloody depressing realising that 2 million people were executed by their own people at these various places all over Cambodia.
Well that was enough death and disaster for me for the day so back to the FCC for happy hour then Ben took me to a couple of bars and pubs, fun night to make up for the morbid day.
Today we went to the Russian Market to have a look around and then over to the lake (photo attached), which isn't going to exist for much longer as the Government have just sold it to land developers. Heaps of watercress growing that is sold to the restaurants and tons of little bars jutting out over the edge of the lake. Had lunch at the FCC then walked past the Royal Palace (photo attached) and now I'm back in the hotel and watching the daily afternoon thunderstorms, it's black everywhere.
Nothing on tonight as I have a very early start in the morning for the flight to Bangkok, where I'll try to send more correspondence.
Weiry