Happy? Happy.

The first full day in Phnom Penh proved to be a good one. We woke and decided to head to the local killing fields.

The Khmer Rouge, between 1975 and 1979, had massacred millions of Cambodians. In Phnom Penh, Danny and I first decided to visit S-21, a high-school turned torture center. Here, every educated person, every ex-government official, every person who was not for Pol Pot and his insanity came for reeducation. Unfortunately, not many survived. It is said that when the Vietnamese captured Phnom Penh (due, in part to the genocide and in part to a small-time war started on its borders) tortured and newly dead prisoners still laid with the fresh stink of death at this notorious site. Indeed, in every room there is a picture of its original state in 1979, bed, body, blood, and all. The 'museum' was insightful, unbiased, and unflinching. After a few hours, with a full sense of the gravity of the crimes, we head out to the killing fields.

It is about six dusty kilometers away from S-21 where the victims were killed. Finding it too expensive to use bullets, the Khmer Rouge simply used the shovels with which the prisoners had just dug their own graves with. Now, there remain only small watering holes and a littering of signs to mark the mass executions. That, and the three stories of skulls which were unearthed at the site. Piled on top of each other, the monument is a testament to how embarrassingly callous we have become to violence, a symptom of a hyper-stimulated culture. We stay for 15 minutes, and take not a second glance at the thousands of heads in a three-story glass case.

Of course, the next thing we decided to do was to go straight Duke Nukem. Cambodia, Vietnam, and SE Asia in general are pretty lax on rules governing fire arms. Taking full advantage of the situation, Danny and I make our way to the local Cambodian Special Forces Military Base. Here, for a small fee, we are able to take our turns with an AK-47 and an Uzi. Danny and I put on our headphones and walk into a small wooden shack that serves as the firing range for the AK. Our resident soldier, clad in all black fatigues, clicks in the magazine and thumbs the safety. Not wanting to lose a second, I step up to the gun and wrap myself around it. My first gun. An AK-47. Ridiculous. I line the sights. Slowly, I pull the trigger and the first bullet reaches out toward the target. I am blinded by the sheer violence. It is as if the anger and rage of humanity had been channeled through the muzzle, delivering their vengeance in 7.62mm fashion. The bullet finds its target at 2000 ft/s. I look over at Danny, and smile. We unload.

Finished shooting off our guns, we head toward the toxic lake in the middle of the city of lunch. Here, we find peace and the ceaseless waterfall of a construction pump emptying water into the murky pool. Whittling our lunch away while hiding from the sun was no small task, accomplished, alternatively, between mid-day beers and shakes. Eventually, we are fed up of moving to keep pace with our umbrella's shadow, and turn to leave. It is here where I spot a McCain supporter on television telling McCain in a hushed voice that Obama is a…a…'Arab'. I sigh, realize that this is the only picture some internationals will have of us Americans, and head out, nauseated from the filth.

We decide to walk our way back to the hotel. In the midst of being lost, we head to the top of a small hill, where it looks like there is a pagoda at the top. Upon reaching the summit, we encounter 7-8 men huddled around a small table and a case of beer. I buy something from the man's stand, and they invite us to sit down. Little do Danny and I know that our manhood was about to be challenged. The Cambodians, in their extremely gracious manner, decided it was time to get us drunk. Their tool, drinking competitions. In the span of the next few minutes we had drank 5 beers, and had left not more than 2 Cambodians puking in the bushes. The Shopowner, two cops on duty, Instigator, and a smattering of their friends had now become our comrades. I don't think we exchanged one complete sentence without misunderstanding. I did, however, come away with the knowledge of humanity's kindness and my own limits to beer consumption. We end our game, and they teach us only one word, to be repeated twice. Sab bay, sab bay. Happy, happy. Indeed.