Another Sobering Thought About Cambodia

The recent history of Cambodia is one of genocide by the Khmer Rouge. Our temple guide related how his grandfather had been tortured and killed by the Khmer Rouge, and how even the knowledge of a foreign language was enough to sentence someone to death. What really drives these stories home is the relative absence of elderly people here. In Vietnam, there were as many or more elderly people as there seemed to be children. Here, though, elderly Cambodians are very much the exception rather than the rule. The only elderly people we've really seen are tourists. While the U.S. has its Greatest Generation, Cambodia appears to have a Lost Generation.