Cambodia oh Cambodia....

Alhamdulillah, we arrived in Phnom Penh International Airport safe and sound yesterday. This Airport, formerly known as Pochentong International Airport, is relatively very small, having just four gates with aerobridges and another 2 with bus access to board a flight.

MP Dr Mousine (he is one of the MPs here!), who is the president of Islamic Medical Association of Cambodia (IMAC) was willing enough to greet us with the transport to Puncak Hotel, the place in which we will stay for the first two days. This is a fomerly Malaysian owned Hotel, just near to River Tonle Sap.

This is an interesting fact about how Phnom Penh got it's name: Wat Phnom Daun Penh (known now as just the Wat Phnom or Hill Temple), built in 1373 to house five statues of Buddha on a man made hill 27 meters high. It was named after Daun Penh (Grandma Penh), a wealthy widow.

After we had a fruitful 2 hours meeting in the Malaysian Embassy, and also we had met several medical students from IMAC. There is one brother named Ali, and the thing that amazed me most is that he has the ability to speak a very good Arabic and French, apart from
English and his mother tongue, Khmer language.

I can't online too long, as Internet canm only be used from 7 pm to 7 am, and now it is already 6.37 local time. And inshaAllah today we make a respectful visit to The Killing Fields, a place which no stands as a symbol to the horrible Khmer Rouge regime which killed 1.7 to 2.3 million out of a population of around 7 million between 1975-1979.