Man's Inhumanity To Man

We have just returned from the rather appropriately titled Death Railway Museum in Kanchanaburi, a museum dedicated to the history of the Thailand-Burma railway.

The museum rather effectively told the story of the construction of the railway at the cost of the lives of tens thousands of forced labourers, many of them allied POWs.

Visiting the museum was a humbling experience, in a "there but for the grace of God" sort of a way. We also visited the cemetery next door:

6,318 of those who died were British and many of their graves could be found in the cemetary. One thing that I didn't realise was that most of the labourers who were forced to work on the railway weren't alllied POWs but were Malay and Burmese. Of the 180,000 Asian labourers who worked on the railway, 90,000 died, which rather puts things into perspective. They don't even get an immactulately kept cemetary; most of the dead were never even identified.

Kanchanaburi doesn't feel like party central any more.