Singaporean Pub Hunting

Can't say I didn't see this coming, but I'm outta here a bit earlier than planned. Flight leaves tomorrow at 5:30 a.m. Bummer right?

A 5:30 departure means I need to be there by 3:30 and prolly leave for the airport at about 3 or earlier. I've decided to stay up all night - which is really only about another four hours. No big deal.

In the meantime I've decided to search for great beer in Singapore. Now let me put this into perspective. Finding even a good beer in most of Asia means turning toward the European and more known beers. The only exception I've found thus far in terms of Asian beers is Angkor in Cambodia.

Not shown in the ad above, but give that stout a try if you get a chance. It was surprisingly good till I met the head brewer. He left Cambodia to work for Guiness about 20 years ago. He returned in 1997 to start his own gig. Let's just say the stuff is pretty freakin' awesome. Careful - that stout I refer to is a whopping 8-percent alcohol. It'll getcha!

As for Singapore, I haven't found a local beer I really like yet. Tiger is the mainstay, but it's basically the Miller Lite of Asia. It's drinkable, but that's about it. And w/ what they charge for it, anywhere from $10-15 Sing, it's definitely not worth it.

Last but not least, I finally found great beer. Lucky for me it's in Little India - practically the only place in Singapore w/ authentic culture and any semblance of reality within this society based on pure and disgusting consumption. Here you'll find the Prince of Wales backpacker bar.

Even luckier for me, they don't really serve Asian beer. Bring on the Aussie stuff. The POW, as they call it, is the only bar outside Australia to serve this boutique microbrew beer. I feel doubly fortunate now being able to drink it fresh from the tap among the international backpacker crowd of the Swede beside me and the Aussies behind the bar. Good stuff w/ good times. Rather than cruise all the pubs I found on the websites, I luckily stumbled upon this place w/ clearly the best beer int the country - which is really a city on an island.

This hoppy pale ale is made by Grand Ridge Brewery, based out of Gippsland, Australia and somehow the owner of this place is friends of the owner of that place. Nonetheless, I highly recommend coming in here to this backpacker bar w/ attached hostel before paying the astronomical prices at the "breweries" along the waterfront. Keep in mind it's all about the adventure.

It's time for me to mosey on back to the hotel, grab my bags and head toward the airport. Sleeping in would be really nice, but so will waking up in Olympia, Washington. It's about time.

Welcome Back!

There's this whole thing about leaving something and coming back.

Think about the Champ being forced to leave the boxing world while his license was revoked till 1970. There was no welcome mat for him from his peers and that couldn't have been clearer when he was floored by his arch rival Joe Frazier just months after his reintroduction to the sport.

Touted as the Fight of the Century, you'd think this match was it. This would determine whether Ali would ever make it back again or not.

Truth be told, Ali hadn't lost a step at all. He was every bit as fierce and brilliant of a fighter as he ever was. But things had changed since his brand of ferocity and brilliance put him on the world stage as the best fighter on Earth. Matter of fact, the Ali Brand became the model for any successful fighter. That being said, not only had his opponents reverse engineered Ali's style, but they adopted and evolved it to a level he himself wouldn't recognize till it literally hit him in his own face.

The only welcome mat he found was the one he got knocked to and handed the first official boxing loss of his career.

"Welcome back Champ - we still don't fucking like you. And furthermore we see you've become soft and now you're a joke. Stand by to get eaten alive - you'll be outta here faster than it took you to book your first fight."

I can only imagine what was going through Ali's head as he watched the masses and fans turn their support and awe into doubt and disappointment. It would be fascinating to know how he truly felt, rather than studying what came out of his mouth.

I have a distinct feeling he felt the awakening of a spirit deep inside him - the spirit that truly made him the best fighter in history. It was the developing of the Ali Brand and style that made him great, it was the insight and intuition he had to self create that ability. That's how Ali became the Greatest.

And in the end, Ali wiped his feet w/out a welcome mat and adapted to be the best boxer in history.

Don't forget, if he'd have never come back, he'd have just been another great fighter - not The Greatest.

1.21 gigawatts? 1.21 gigawatts? Great Scott!

"This is it! This is the answer. It says here... that a bolt of lightning is going to strike the clock tower at precisely 10:04pm, next Saturday night! If... If we could somehow... *harness* this lightning... *channel* it... into the flux capacitor... it just might work. Next Saturday night, we're sending you back to the future!"

It's like the plane to Cambodia was packed w/ plutonium, a flux capacitor and 1.21 gigawats. Man - what a trip.

The ranks, the faces, the routines, the locations, the phrases, the uniforms, the mannerisms, the attitudes and demeanors, stresses and things we enjoy here - some things are so wonderfully familiar and comforting while at the same time aggravating. It's the Navy.

Imagine you could just time warp back to high school and be the person you once were. Well it's not possible to do it, but you could easily find yourself at a high-school reunion where you're in the same location w/ the same people or type of people you used to be around every day.

You'd probably immediately notice your change in perspective since that was your everyday life. And you'd probably notice just how much you've changed by reinserting yourself in that environment after a lot of personal evolution. Well that's pretty much what's going on w/ the Navy right now.

I've grown and changed a lot in the last six years. So putting on this uniform and going to work every day again is odd. It's almost like not knowing how to act in your own skin. The Navy changed a lot w/out me too. Now there's this readjustment period where I'm finding out who I am now in the Navy.

Good news is that I'm much better than I was - being more mature, educated and capable. But that doesn't stop me from sliding into an oddly familiar head space w/ oddly familiar habits and experiencing something so familiar with new senses.

My reflection of this time will be very interesting.

On a Lighter Note

Sometimes you just need to sit and do some poolside blogging about how you're roughing it 86 miles north of the Equator.

Well me too. And that's exactly what I'm doing this fine and beautiful evening at the Terror Club on base in Singapore. The kind folks at Commander Logistics Group Pacific are letting me use their camera equipment in addition to my own - which is a lot of fun. That's the Navy unit out here putting me up in their office and then daring make me work for this incredible trip. Bummer right?


In all honesty, there's a lot of re-familiarization going on. Something about working in the same office I used to and watching someone else do the exact same stuff I used to do is pretty odd. While I'm being honest - I'll admit I still love it.


Tomorrow should be good. I've got a 7:30 a.m. shoot at the Changi district - wherever that is. After that I process and edit my photos for release. After work, I'm gonna try to hit up that night safari. I think there are just way too many incredible photo opportunities. Stand by for more!

What Remains

They're everywhere - in the walkways, in and outside the graves, near the trees and structures. Only about half of the people murdered in these killing fields had enough remains to be identified or counted. Children were literally smashed against a tree and other objects, making their remains very difficult to find.

That is reality. And that is truly the most horrifying part of this whole experience.

Most of the souls I encountered face-to-face through photos and evidence of their terrifying existence at S-21 Prison in Phnom Penh were murdered here at Choeung Ek - one of many execution fields across the Cambodian country side from 1975-79.

My guide and friend Makara, spent the better portion of his teens and 20s guiding foreigners through the S-21 prison directly across from his house, through this and other killing fields and the legendary Angkor Wat up north in Siem Reap.

He knows just about everything there is to be known about these places - unlike many of his peers and the generation of young people growing up behind him and me. Mak voiced his disappointment and disgust at his government's practice of ignoring the genocide and not talking about it in school. In other words, most young Cambodians don't have any idea about the Khmer Rouge and wouldn't believe you if you told them.

His tour was both enlightening and chilling. I've never felt so somber in my life - right behind sailing into Pearl Harbor, manning the rails at 19 years old and rendering honors to every single ship sunk there. That was somber and chilling, but this is nearly indescribable - mostly because no one in our country did a damn thing about it. Taking American lives is definitely a worse crime in the eyes of our government.

First thing you see as you walk in to Choung Ek is the large stupa, built as a memorial to the people killed here. It's beautiful from afar. The closer you get you realize it's literally filled with skulls excavated from the graves all over the campus here.

Rather than go here first, Mak brought me to the graves. The only changes to this place are the excavation of some of the graves and roping some areas off out of respect for the graves. Ironically this was a Chinese cemetery before the Khmer Rouge turned it into a mass-execution factory.

Many of the graves are different. This one in particular stands out. All the victims here were beheaded. Mak says they were probably prominent figures like monks, doctors, educators and the educated.

I remember hearing about how the Khmer Rouge killed children - especially. They threw the children, usually babies, into the air and caught them on bayonets. This was also true for women in labor who had children. They were immediately caught on knives and bayonets as they were born.

Most other children were smashed into this tree. Mak notes many people say the tree is possessed as you can see a face in the tree on the black spot - which is directly from the number of children beat against it.

Most adults were killed in one of about five ways. This palm tree was the most surprising tool of murder. As you can see, these trees have very sharp edges and create a blade of sorts. In order to make the killing most efficient - both effort and cost wise - Khmer Rouge used the blades of these trees to cut throats. They felt bullets were too costly to waste on these people's lives.

The other common methods were to hit victims in the head w/ a hammer. This would usually puncture the skull and kill a person w/in minutes. They also used pointed hammers and gardening tools like hoes and shovels. Each of the skulls tells a story about how its life was taken. Many holes show hoe hits to the face, holes in the side or pointed impact holes.

Mak demonstrates how the victims were blindfolded, gagged and restrained with cloth around their wrists. Each was with put on their knees or simply stood while a Khmer Rouge soldier attacked them and pushed them into a mass grave. Not all victims immediately died. Many screamed and moaned as they were cut or hit and as they lay in the graves dying.

In order to keep the young teenage soldiers from being affected by the screams and moans of their work, leaders played loud and often happy music from speakers in this tree. Today all you can hear are the playful screams of children at recess in the school right next to this killing field. As stated before, they are absolutely unaware of what happened here.

Lastly, we visited the memorial stupa. I don't even know how I feel about this. On second thought I feel a lot about this - too much to get into right now. Ask me sometime and I'll expound.

As for my friends and blog readers in Washington, please visit the Killing Fields Museum right in downtown Seattle. Don't feel bad if you didn't already know about it. I didn't either. But now that you do know about it, don't put off visiting. Failing to do so makes you just as ignorant and responsible for the next genocide as the Cambodians who ignore their own history.

 Seattle Killing Field Museum

Do your part to make sure this NEVER happens again.

A Thing or Two About Genocide

"So it may never happen again."

Isn't that the idea of the Holocaust Museum? Wasn't that the idea behind the provisions of post WWII and the United Nations? Didn't we, as Americans, swear it wouldn't happen again? Don't we know better?

It's difficult to conceive how important the United States is on the world stage. Regardless of our economic problems and such, we're still the best place to live in the world. The easiest way to really get an idea of that is to leave our country for even a little bit and come to a country like this. One of the things we all seem to agree on is how we've got it better and we're definitely more educated.

Well how educated and better than anyone else are we when we let 2 million people get fucking massacred not 30 years after we promised we would never let it happen again?

War protests over our involvement in the Vietnam War were pretty spot on. What were we doing there aside from killing millions of our own (and Vietnamese) people? Put this in your pipe and smoke it:

We got what a good buddy of mine coined, "war fatigue." Basically the people in America got sick of losing American life in Vietnam so we wisely decided to leave and bring everyone home. Then we pulled everyone out of Asia completely even though our government and our citizens were aware of an impending situation here in Cambodia.

Within months of the US leaving Vietnam the Khmer Rouge move into Phnom Penh, literally just a few hundred miles away from where US forces were already fighting, and begin to murder 2 million people in about four years.

Where the fuck was our commitment then? Somehow we decided that because we had no business in Vietnam and losing life wasn't good we should leave. Meanwhile we turn the blind eye to more massacre. Sounds a lot to me like we only value American life. Interesting isn't it?

Oh yeah I almost forgot Guess who came to push out the Khmer Rouge?

Better yet you look it up if you don't know. And make that a habit in the future. Don't believe everything you hear. As an American, you have almost limitless access to information. That's a luxury most of the world doesn't have. Don't waste it.

That's my rant. Stop being fucking ignorant sheep. That's where doing something for humanity begins - making sure you're doing your due diligence.

S-21

I'm torn between, among many other emotions right now, whether to post something now or wait till I've digested my experience and my reaction to the most horrifying experience of my life - S-21 Prison here in Phnom Penh.


My boss, Lt. Mike Morley and I arrived back here late this a.m. to our hotel, A-1 Hotel in Phnom Penh after wrapping up the Cambodia phase of our training mission last night on board USS Tortuga. My schedule since before departing Olympia kept me busy enough to literally remain oblivious to what day it is. Today, Tuesday, June 15th will serve as the waypoint in time for which everything on this trip is relative to.

No more incredible 4-star beach resort and disgust from the port politics and economic depression along the Cambodian coast at Sihanoukville. Today was my introduction to genocide at the S-21 prison.

Millions were tortured and held captive as they passed through this former school-turned-detention/slaughter house.

Human remains and blood stains are still on the floors underneath the actual beds and you can tour the facility at your own pace to take in things on your own. We managed to hit S-21 w/ only four other people I could see and we hardly saw them at that. It's a very lonely and desolate place that still wreaks of horror caused by ignorance and manipulation and exploitation.

Room after room - for the first few I was fascinated by the realism and matter-of-fact presentation of the facility. One bed in a large room with shutters and a (most likely blood-stained) tile floor. The blood is just one of the staining fluids there after people were left to die and eventually rot. As their bodies began to decompose, their fluids leaked through the beds - staining the tiles.

I know this because a photographer was tasked to shoot the rooms as the Vietnamese found them - with a person whose tortured body was most likely cross-legged and shackled to a dowel of re-bar attached to a bed. The photos are blown up and hang on the wall depicting the very bed, shackles and re-bar (and often ammunition container they were forced to use as a toilet) beside you. Nothing has been removed beside the human remains which are now buried in front of that particular building. There are at least ten large rooms like this. I lost count as the whole immensity and horror made me feel a sense of vertigo and terrifyingly euphoric.

I find it incredible to now personally know witnessing just the 30-year-old remnants of genocide triggers my coping mechanism - and that was in the first 15 minutes. But as one coping mechanism kicked in so did another - my conscious commitment to take this in as a service to not just the victims of S-21 and the Khmer Rouge, but everyone I know. No matter how gruesome and disturbing it was, I dug into that place where I choose to push myself forward.

I don't know why but these people were deliberately kept away from the general population. I assume it was because they could hypothetically spread knowledge to the others and therefore posed a real risk to the Khmer Rouge. 

The next building is another three-story building completely wrapped in barbed wire. It was put there after a woman successfully committed suicide from the third story. Mike told me that story and I felt a sense of respect for her - whose face is likely one of the faces defiantly staring into your eyes among the thousands of photos now filling that building and as if telling you, "we are dignified."

And they are dignified - hopefully by me. And that's why I chose to continue on through the much smaller individual chambers and cells. Most likely there were 12 to a room. Some were divided by wood and others clearly thrown together with brick and mortar. The windows obviously had bars layered with barbed wire and shutters to keep the light out - which they successfully did.

I don't know how many people lived and died in that place. Young, old, men, women, mothers with their new-borns in hand, soldiers, scholars, doctors, politicians - they were all murdered. Even the term murder and the basic idea we associate w/ murder would have been an easy way out for them.

Lastly, I deliberately avoided any kind of warning about what I wrote and the photos I shot. That's my way of using what these people taught me today. That's a part of my education someone (Meaghan at the Fish Tale) shared with me. It was enough to spark my interest and go there. It was enough to make me connect with the victims of S-21 and give them dignity somehow. Tricking you into reading and experiencing this in some way is a service to them and humanity. Come see this place and share the truth and horror humans can conjure up. After all, you and me, the Khmer Rouge and victims are all just people. Kind of makes you think doesn't it?

Please see more of the photos in this gallery - http://gallery.me.com/ghorst10#100195

The Lower Wat

I just wanted to take a few minutes before I pass out here to sleep to highlight probably the coolest day I've had here yet in Cambodia.



The day began super early with my favorite server at the Independence Hotel - Mary. Just like CARAT staffers Admiral Tyson and Maj. Turnbull, it was Mary's birthday yesterday. But rather than go party it up at the Angkor brewery like the rest of us, the newly turned 18-year-old woman stayed home making a very special bracelet for Hannah. She's making one similar for my that has my name written in Khmer. How cool right?

Breakfast was wonderful and I departed for Village d'Enfant - another local orphanage near the hotel. Yet again - Sailors and Marines played together long enough to get a couple rooms painted for the kids and get the asses handed to them in soccer. Pretty cool to see everyone's energy over here about soccer right now w/ the World Cup going on. The best part was a traditional Khmer dance the kids performed to kick things off. I mean - it's really beautiful.

After getting the photos edited and captioned, I borrowed someone's driver and went pagoda hunting around the area and ended at the lower Sihanoukville Pagoda. It's also a monk school w/ about 300 monks living and studying on site. My driver and fill-in translator, Zhee, and I toured the temple and campus where we found Thai Rin, a high-school graduate monk pursuing college right now. Thai Rin spoke very good English like most of the monks who live there. I'll have to write about each of these experiences tomorrow morning.

I'm having trouble uploading more photos, but rest assured I'll make it happen.

Found It

Right underneath my nose - it's been right here at the Independence Hotel.

Unlike the better portion of my time in Thailand last summer, I'm not feeling the adventure bug quite yet. There's this part of me that craves solace and relaxation. I'd willingly forgo the relaxation for some cultural exploration. However, this town (Sihanoukville) isn't much for cultural exporation - unless you get off on seeing poverty, dirt and hardship mixed with more western societies capitalizing on both Cambodia's tragic past and subsequent lack of understanding of cut-throat business and general western society.

I know that sounds grim, but it is what it is. Just an hour in Sihanoukville wreaks of garbage, deception and exploitation. There's certainly no shortage of bars, bar girls, the million tuk-tuk and motorbike pests or expats who flock to these places. Everything I've read is true. The one exception, lucky for me, is this hotel and its property.

It's literally a beach-front resort where no one wants to go. There are no bar girls, expats or garbage. While that certainly isn't the accurate depiction of Cambodian life, it's just what I've been looking for. I'll save the cultural exploration for Angkor Wat, the temples, nature and very recent horrors of S-21 Prison and other fresh wounds from the Khmer Rouge.

Poverty and corporate greed are not something I came here to study - no matter how blatant it is.

I look forward to sitting right here in this chair or that one over there on the beach w/ the hut over it.

I'm Gonna Remember to Enjoy It

That's what I told Admiral Tyson last year when she asked me what I'll do differently this time around in the Navy. She was surprised I had to force myself to enjoy it. That's what happens when you get too wrapped up in work.

Well this evening is going to be my first opportunity to practice my preaching. I spent the better portion of this trip talking about life, torture and horror of the Khmer Rouge, photographing more people talking about Khmer Rouge and then the second half of my day at an orphanage.

Suffice to say this trip is already turning into another experience of a lifetime - now I'm headed out to make it another very enjoyable one.

I put up a bunch of photos up on Facebook from the orphanage today. Head on over and check them out HERE

"Because I Hate You Trebek?"

There's nothing I can do to make my travel through Suvarnumbuhi International Airport in Bangkok anything less than a debacle. I swear I can hear this place laughing at me as I frantically rush through the massive walkways amidst Farang and locals alike. Anyone but me can see both the humor and relation to my favorite SNL skit - Celebrity Jeopardy. No one but me is taking it seriously and it's funny as hell.

This place is obviously both an engineering and architectural masterpiece, but it's the under-the-hood things that kill me. There are certainly worse places to be stuck, like Kim Williams in Nicaragua right now. Luckily I did some quick thinking and pleading and am headed to Phnom Penh in an hour. What an experience thus far.


Here's a link to some of the photos I've taken thus far along the trip.

Departure

And the adventure begins – not far from my house in Lacey, Wash. I poked my head in to grab some last-minute items from the pharmacy area. I mentioned travel in association with the items I was purchasing.

I had a feeling the woman ringing up my purchases was herself from Southeast Asia, but didn’t expect her to be from Phnom Penh. The irony was striking and I could see the excitement across her face. She seemed to know I was going to experience something wonderful as had as a child there.

She reiterated (several times) how safe and different Cambodia is today. In fact, she went back last year and had the time of her life. My best guess puts her at about 20-years-old, surely not old enough to have experienced the direct horrors of Khmer Rouge.

It’s the indirect effect Pol Pot and his regime played in her life that most likely was the catalyst for her family to move her to the US. Her enthusiasm for Cambodia, beyond her personal relationship to the area, only further excites me for this journey.

Next stop – airport.