10 miles from Phnom Penh, Cambodia: The Choeung Ek is the site of several mass graves containing the remains of nearly twenty thousand Cambodians killed under the Khmer Rouge. Thousands of bodies have been exhumed from these “killing fields”, though many more graves remain untouched. A memorial stands in the center of the field, an immense structure containing the battered skulls of eight thousand victims. Many of the skulls are cracked or spilt in half, a testament to the brutal nature in which they were killed, bludgeoned with shovels, logs, and pieces of bamboo. The clothes that the victims were wearing are also displayed and several levels of the museum are open to the public, enabling tourists to bear witness to the genocide of the past.
