LIVING & TEACHING in CAMBODIA. A Letter from Phnom Penh.

08 March 2006

Dear Friends

As you know, I am in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, to teach various classes at the Royal University of Phnom Penh (RUPP), from January through June, and this is my first opportunity to give to all of you an update on these activities and some background about Cambodia. And, given the day, happy International Women’s Day.

My real job here is to teach “civil society” to 30 undergrads Monday and Wednesday morning from 10:00 until 11:30. On Thursday morning at 07:30 I teach a three hour class in “international relations” to about 25 undergraduate students, some of whom are in the other class as well. And during March I am leading a graduate seminar in “human rights” for fourteen M.A. students, most of whom are professors at RUPP, and some of whom are civil servants.

None of my undergraduate students, all born between 1980 and 1985, have ever been outside of Cambodia. The professors are much better travelled. None of my undergraduates read the newspaper or receive any international news broadcasts.

The campus is about 8 km from where I live: the New York Hotel on Monivong Blvd. So each day I walk north to the railroad station and stop near the 1912 steam engine on display near Russian Confederation Blvd to catch a ride on a moto. This is very easy, as it is not even necessary to stop in order to catch a moto. Moto drivers, desperate for money, solicit business even from people who are showing no intention of using a moto. Walking away does not stop the attempts, and the calling out of “Moto. Sir. Moto. Moto. Sir. Moto. Where you go? Moto” etc. The standard fare for just about anywhere in town is one dollar. After class the students are honoured, or so I am told, to drive me back downtown.

There are a number of obvious, explained, and even unexplained holidays throughout the year. For instance, the first day of class was a holiday, and I was the only one there. Within a week there was a Buddhist holiday which represented the celebration of the last lesson given by the Buddha. This week will see a holiday on Wednesday in celebration of International Women’s Day. In April we get two weeks off in celebration of Khmer New Year. This does play havoc with class schedules, but at least the students are telling me about holidays now. As I was writing this a funeral procession came down the street, with fifty young people dressed in white walking ahead of a truck carrying a coffin beside which sat two monks in orange robes. This is all before 08:00 am in downtown Phnom Penh.

Phnom Penh is a very interesting city to observe, but is a bit dull in terms of social and cultural life. A primary problem is the perpetual lack of constant electricity. We are just about guaranteed a couple of brief power outages in the downtown area every day. Most last only a few seconds, but some last quite a while. On the edge of the city, power is rationed, and goes on and off an a schedule which remains a mystery to even university professors. My afternoon seminar is held in a room sporting three air conditioners, but when the class began the power was out in the whole area. Half way through the three hour seminar the power came back on, and the room cooled. This was a very very very good thing, as the daytime high yesterday was 35 degrees. For the first month I was here the daily high was no more than 34 degrees, and averaged 32 degrees. Now that we are in March, it is about 34 to 25 degrees every day. April is the hottest month, and it will see highs of over 37 degrees.

DODGY COPIES

Cambodia has had its first ever (FIRST!) trademark violation prosecution resulting in a fine. A factory owner here made fake Marlboro and L&M brand ciggies near Phnom Penh for three months. He was fined $1710 in absentia.

Cambodia is usually below the radar for copyright and trademark violations, as the market is so small and so poor that no one pays much attention, as you can see from the fact that this is the first case ever to produce a fine. The lawyers for Altria Company demanded seizure and equipment and confiscation of the product, which Cambodian law does not seem to allow.

There are hardly any originals in the country. everything seems to be a knock-off. There are a lot of ""Rolex"" watches here: I am wearing one right now. There is a lot of Louis Vuitton luggage as well. All of the movies for sale on DVD, and I do mean ALL of them, are copies. Their copies of the DVDs are good, but the labels often misspell names, or forget them altogether. DVDs are $2 for new releases such as the new Pink Panther movie.

Last week I was watching a new film on the telly, and noticed that I could see people walking by at the bottom of the screen. This was a video tape of a screening in an actual theatre, and it was people going to an from their seats and the food stand. It was a very high quality copy, with good sound and all. But this was being broadcast on national TV. That is what it is like here in Cambodia.

A PLAY AND A THOUGHT

Recently I went to a local play produced in co-operation with a European author and company. Entitled "3 years, 8 months, 20 days", it is a series of memories told by three women assisted by two singers/musicians. It is the stories of how children born in 1966 remember the events of 1975 through 1979 (Khmer Rouge control of Cambodia). The three women wrote and act in the play, and it will soon tour some theatre festivals in Europe.

And this brings me to a truth. You may have heard that victors write history, and losers get war crimes trials. Now that I have read a lot of memoirs and seen this play and read much other material, a truth finally occurs to me: the stories of horror and atrocity are told almost exclusively by people from Phnom Penh (the capital city). These are the stories of the governing and economic elite, or at least elite in comparison with the vast majority of the rural peasants who made up the bulk (95%) of the population. The stories we hear of the crimes, horrors, atrocities, etc, are all stories from the people who lost their privileges after the revolution. There are not stories being told by peasants about how they finally got revenge on the city people and landlords. There are not stories being told by the rural poor of how they died in the massive carpet bombing campaigns from 1970 to 1975. Their stories are untold or unheard in the face of the city literate who could both tell and make heard their stories.

KHMER CODE OF FOREIGNERS

Cambodians think that every westerner/foreigner/white person is one or more of the following: 1. Deaf 2. Stupid 3. Mentally slow to make decisions

1. Since they think that westerners are deaf, they must scream words such as HELLO and MOTO repeatedly just so that the handicapped westerner will have a chance of hearing what the Khmer wants to tell them.

2. Since they think that westerners are stupid, they must make what must seem to them to be blindingly obvious observations, such as pointing at things at which the westerner is already looking, and declaring the name of the object: as in the passer-by who stopped to point at a computer and inform me "computer". It does make me wonder how many stunningly stupid foreigners used to be here that the vast bulk of the city population has determined that all westerners are thick as two planks.

3. Since they think that westerners are mentally slow in making decisions, they must continue to tell you the same thing over and over, as well as hover nearby (in your face) so that you do not forget the basic concept (see "stupid" above) and so that you have the time and concentration to make a decision. A good example of this would be the moto driver who continues to tell you moto moto moto moto moto from before you reach his area of pavement until well after you are far past him, even if you never even looked in his direction, or even if he was headed down the road in the opposite direction.

God I love these people, but they are so excruciatingly unsophisticated as to be painful. The poverty drives a desperate search for any money at all. Their helpfulness borders on molestation or assault.

One other interesting cultural titbit is that Khmer society has until recently (and perhaps even now) looked down upon wage work jobs. There was no word in Khmer for the concept of work/job which was not pejorative. The word for being in service (a servant) is a positive word in Khmer, so doing service jobs is fine but working at a wage job is negative. This leads to interesting notions of work in the city which benefit foreigners with disposable income, but do not help in the development of an economy.

KHMER ROUGE HISTORY DEBATE

There was an interesting debate in Cambodia in the 1970 over the date of the formation of the communist party in this region. The debate took place within the "Khmer Rouge" or Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK).

On one side was a group, generally from the eastern region of Cambodia, which said that the party was formed at an early date. This date coincided with the formation of the first full communist party in Viet Nam as the pan-Indochina communists. This faction was very old school communist (for the region), and outward looking.

The other side was generally from the southwest of Cambodia, and said the party was formed at a later date. This later date for the CPK is when it was re-formed as distinct from the pan-regional CP which had Vietnamese roots. This part of the CPK was headed by Saloth Sar, better known as Pol Pot.

By 1976 a civil war had begun in Cambodia between the two factions, and by 1977 the Southwest faction under Pol Pot was in a triumphal position as began a massive purge of the eastern sector fo the country. Any KR cadre or official, and anyone Vietnamese, was targeted for relocation, and all party members with eastern ties were killed. This was the great purge on 1977-78, and accounts for most of the direct killing during the "Democratic Kampuchea"period of 1975-1979. This is the Cambodian version of the Stalinist purges of Russia in the 1930s.

Now communist party history could be thought of as dull, but the ownership of history is clearly of some importance here. What I find most interesting is that the great purges of 1977-78, when most of the killing here took place, have been altered into something different: they have been altered by propaganda into the genocide of Cambodia.

The torture prison is shown to people, but the reality of the prisoners history is generally disguised in order to further a specific story. You will not hear that the vast majority were party prisoners being purged, but that they were regular ordinary civilians being wiped out. It is the same with the killing fields: they are not put in perspective as being the sites of the purges.

Now it is the Vietnamese who bear some responsibility for this, as it was VN who set up the first museums in the torture prison and killing field near Phnom Penh as a way of showing how bad the CPK rule had been. Intra-party conflict was wiped away, and a picture built on previous US-media stories of atrocities was adopted as the standard total view.

So history in Cambodia is a very interesting and not very enlightening story. The civil war is ignored because it contradicts the version of the story in which all parts of the CPK were evil and in which they killed up to a third of the population. The fact that these killings were party purges is totally ignored as this would make the wrong people into victims, while leaving the right people (affluent, urban, educated people) more or less alone or relatively unharmed.

That was probably much more than you wanted to know or needed to know, so feel free to delete it all.

07 April 2006

Hello from Cambodia and welcome to my second monthly report.

April and May are the hottest months, and every day is at or above body temperature. There are no rains until the end of May or beginning of June. So it is warm and dusty and filthy, but on the upside, I do sweat a lot and have lost some weight.

I also think that the Amoebic Dysentery caused some of the weight loss, but the treatments are going well! You can send a get well card to the new address. Thank goodness there is a western medical clinic and air evacuation facility here in Cambodia, and it is only a few blocks away.

Oh dear. This teaching assignment is proving to be a real challenge.

TEACHING TEACHERS

The first seminar papers in my human rights graduate seminar were presented a month ago just after I last wrote to you, and everyone has used the computer to make their presentations. This was probably a good thing as it masked the fact that they had nothing to say, said it badly, missed the point about the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and did not cover crucial aspects of the topics. Most of the papers were written only days before they were given, and it shows. Some of them referred to things I had said in the class the day before.

So we have a lot of work ahead in trying to get across the higher concepts of human rights. The first seminar was also an opportunity to talk about footnotes and sources and interviews and research, and how they have a week to update their papers before handing them in to me. It is month later and all fo the papers have finally been presented. The quality did not improve much over the weeks, and only two papers were handed in on time. I even wrote the drop-dead deadline on the board and explained it, and one person still missed it. I was not prepared for graduate students and professors being unable to write a standard footnote, or any kind of reference at all. One professor handed in a paper in which all of the material was taken from a brochure I found at a museum a week later. No wonder it all looked so familiar!

It occurs to me now that I was brought up steeped in the culture of human rights and political thought and ideas of others and respect for the individual as a human being (although I really dislike most people). There is little of this here in Cambodia, because the fact is that this is a very poor place which is trying to get food into people more than it is trying to protect their higher human rights. Eating is important. I cannot argue with that.

So it is not all bad, and a challenge is good for me. Without that I would wither. So this is a good thing. If it was too easy it would not be worth the effort.

However, trying to actually teach classes is a problem here as there is no academic discipline, and there are so many missed classes. I turn up to teach each day wondering if there will be any students. Two weeks ago I arrived to find only a stray dog and not a single other human being. It turns out that it was graduation day at the main campus and that all students had the day off. I tried to attend the ceremony, but was blocked as the guards said the prime minister was now inside the grounds. So I walked around to the next gate and attended the ceremony. The saddest part was that no part of the graduation ceremony was about the students. It was a 90 minute event in which the dictator spent 50 minutes rambling on about various subjects and then made another of his recent concerted attacks on human rights groups, and especially on the UN special representative for human rights in Cambodia. He told the graduating class that Cambodia had no need for such things and that these foreigners knew nothing and did nothing. What a great message to give to the upcoming leadership fo the country.

But the point here is that classes are held in an almost random fashion. This week was the last week of classes before the Khmer New Years holiday, and already students were few and far between. On Wednesday there were half the usual number, and on Thursday there were none at all.

NEW HOME

But now for some good news: I am living in a new apartment and it is quite wonderful. It is called Lotus Villa, and it is a serviced apartment. Maids come in and service it every day by cleaning everything, washing my clothes, and doing the dishes. I am now very very spoiled. It is also very quiet, and there is absolutely no street noise. Do consider sending me a letter or some books.

Although I no longer have a telephone, I do now have constant working unlimited access to the internet through a cable in my apartment. It is part of the service here in the building. We still get a lot of blackouts (at least three yesterday), but this place has a massive generator out back which starts up when the city power fails. So we are never without power for more than a minute. So email at any time, but also think about sending a real letter.

Now that I have an apartment, I have begun to cook again, and am trying Cambodian recipes. I am also considering attending a cooking class next week to learn about the ingredients and styles, and so that I have some skill when I leave here in three months. Cooking on a gas stove is great, and the apartment came with all the supplies such as a big steel wok.

There is very little chocolate here in Cambodia. It is simply to hot for chocolate to survive, and only a few stores (those with good air conditioning) carry any chocolate. It is very expensive.

KHMER vs CAMBODIAN

One of the things I have noticed here is that most Cambodians think that Khmer and Cambodian are the same thing. They have no idea of the distinction between the notion of an ethnic Khmer and a Cambodian citizen. Yes, the Khmer are the largest/majority group in Cambodia, and Khmer is the official language, but they are not the only citizens. However, they are, due to official discrimination, first class citizens while the ethnic minorities are clearly second class citizens. There are minority people who have been on this land longer than the Khmer, but most Khmer think these people are from other countries and should probably go back to those other countries. They have no idea that the Khmer are only the current dominant group, and that their arrival is fairly recent. This leads to both official and unofficial attacks on minorities as racial tensions rise and as the elites use the hatred to drive people off of valuable land in the hill country. As the population grows, and as the money from illegal logging flows, the corrupt government and military leaders (read all of them) have to force both Khmer peasants and minority people off of the land in order to strip it. There have recently been a lot of attacks against ethnic Viets who have lived here for hundreds of years. It is also difficult for the minority Cham people, who are Muslims, to practice their religion. In one of my classes a person who teaches religious studies asserted that Cambodians have freedom of religion, and that everyone should be forced to study Theraveda Buddhism (the local majority cult) in order that everyone thinks the same things and contributes to the stability of Cambodia. There is no room for “others” in this picture.

It occurs to me that the Khmer target the Viets and the Chams in. the same way that European societies used to target the jews. The Viets are accused of controlling business and the money supply, and the Chams are accused of practising a foreign religion. Together they are the jews of Cambodia, and it is no wonder that so many were killed in the Khmer peasant uprising in 1975-1978.

Another feature of this is that there is little sense of community in Cambodia. Although there is a state of Cambodia, and there is a dominant ethnic group (Khmer), there is very little in the way of a real community. The only group of any importance, and the one to which the only true allegiance is given, is the family. Even the Khmers next door mean nothing if they are outside the family circle. The only other group with some claim is the clan, a larger family grouping, and the basis for real village power. With this allegiance structure in mind, it is easy to see how the Khmer were willing and able to commit atrocities against each other in what has been described as the only recorded case of auto-genocide. You did not kill your family, but you would easily kill the Khmer next door.

This is not new. A thousand years of oppression have led to a situation ripe for violence and bloodshed. The rulers of the Angkorian empire a thousand years ago placed no value on the lives of the Khmer people, and a succession of rulers since then have had similar views. The ordinary Khmer peasant was a oxen with a human face and could easily be killed. With a power structure which placed no value on their lives, and no legal or moral protection from any part of society, the Khmer turned to the family as the only reliable unit. This worked, but now it means that the family and clan structure forms the basis of the way in which the elites form and exercise power. They have simply put a modern name on it and called it a political party, but it is the clan power of a handful of completely uber-dominant families which rule with an iron fist in a time-honoured way. There is no room for human rights or democracy.

CORRUPTION

The biggest problem Cambodia faces is corruption. It touches each and every part of the lives of these people, and it is crippling their economy and halting any hope of development. Economists estimate that 20 to 25% of every dollar is lost to corruption. The Japanese have even begun to add an extra 20% to their project budgets in Cambodia to cover the losses they know will occur. When you see officials, with a salary of $150.oo per month buying villas and hundreds of hectares of land valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars, you know they have been stealing from the treasury and aid projects. Every one of my students told me that they have faced corruption, and that they had even encountered it in the Royal University. They simply cannot imagine a life free of corruption.

KHMER ROUGE TRIBUNAL

Now on to my current pet interest, the semi-international tribunal for the trial of so-called Khmer Rouge criminals. Seven years of on-and-off negotiations resulted, in 2004, in Cambodia approving an agreement with the United Nations to establish an internationally-assisted tribunal under Cambodian law to bring Khmer Rouge leaders to justice. As of early 2006 the tribunal has not begun work, but is currently establishing itself in a former military base outside Phnom Penh. Donors are still being sought. Serious international observers do not think the tribunal will be fair or impartial, and doubt the capabilities of the Cambodian judicial system to handle the daunting task.

During the period from April 1975 through to the end of 1978 Cambodia was controlled by a group of people now considered to have committed grave crimes against humanity, including that of genocide. But since the fall of the regime in January 1979 there have not been credible trials. Now, 27 years later, Cambodia looks to be upon the cusp of holding actual trials with the assistance of the United Nations.

The basic problem for the court today, and the one which has kept the entire process on hold for so long, is that Cambodia lacks an independent and impartial judiciary properly trained to deal with these matters. There is little confidence in Cambodia or abroad that any process conducted inside Cambodia will be fair or will actually deliver justice to the people of Cambodia.

I do not think that there is more than a 50-50 chance of seeing the actual leaders tried and convicted, due to the astonishing levels of corruption in the government, and due to the protection offered to the prime suspects by various factions within Cambodia and in the international community.

The most problematic aspect of the DK years is the swirl of propaganda surrounding the events. Many of the events never took place; while there is hard evidence that many did in fact occur. At its base is both a long-term propaganda campaign against the DK by both the United States and Viet Nam (strange bedfellows indeed!), and the fact that memoirs of the period are told exclusively from the point of view of the educated, literate, urban elites. This limits the history of Cambodia to a history of people who could write and who generally lived in Phnom Penh and who benefited from the work of the peasants. Their stories, although usually well-meaning, suffer from all of the worst excesses of personal memory, especially when put together in the hot house of emigre politics or refugee camps on the Thai border. It is a well-recognized fact that interviews are not enough to establish an event, but that memories fail and are often embellished for social and political purposes.

In the end we can never know for certain exactly what happened in DK. This does not, however, mean that certain crimes cannot be shown to have been committed and then traced to specific perpetrators or commanders. The problem for any tribunal sitting in judgement in Cambodia is to separate fact from propaganda, and to understand that much of the standard story fo the DK years is nothing but a tissue of unprovable and unreliable stories from people who stand to gain from a negative portrayal of the CPK leadership and all DK policies.

The new Cambodian Law on the Establishment of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia for the Prosecution of Crimes Committed during the Period of Democratic Kampuchea, NS/RKM/0801/12, of 10 August 2001, sets up a Cambodian tribunal to try people for crimes committed during the DK period. Suspects can be tried for one or more of the following offenses: genocide; crimes against humanity such as murder, torture, enslavement, deportation, imprisonment, rape, persecution on political or racial or religious grounds, and other inhumane acts; for violation of the Geneva Convention of 12 August 1949; for destruction of cultural property; and for crimes against internationally protected persons (diplomatic staff, etc). It will be nearly impossible to prove these charges.

At this point the United Nations breaks off negotiations. On 08 February 2002 Hans Corell announces that the differences are so great that he doubts they could be overcome through more negotiations. The general feeling is that due to massive corruption and lack of solid legal training, the courts of Cambodia are not impartial, independent or objective.

In the past it had been proposed to hold the trials in the Chaktomouk Theatre in downtown Phnom Penh, but on 18 July 2005 the United Nations accepted the offer of a military base on the outskirts of Phnom Penh as the site for all tribunal activities. Soon after, the U.N. assigns Michelle Lee of China as their representative in Cambodia for all tribunal maters.

It was the task of the United Nations to come up with a list of at least seven international jurists for the five seats allowed for these judges. Two would sit on the trial courts bench, and a further three would sit on the Supreme Court Chamber bench within the tribunal system. So on 30 June 2005 the U.N sent a letter to member states asking for nominations for various juridical positions. The Legal Counsel of the U.N. then proposed a short list of jurists for these positions, and interviews were held in New York in December 2005.

The agreement calls for setting in place two chambers: the first a regular trial court, and the second as an appellate court of final ruling. The trial court or chamber has three Cambodian and two international judges, While the general rule is to require unanimity of decision, this is recognized as unfeasible. It was therefore agreed that a majority of four, including at least one international judge, is required for a conviction in the trial chamber.

The supreme court or appellate chamber will have four Cambodian and three international jurists, and will require five votes, including that of two of the international jurists, to uphold or strike down a decision made by the trial court. The cases will be presented by two co-prosecutors: one Cambodian and one international. It is expected that the two will agree on a case, but in the event this is not possible, a case can continue unless it is brought before the pre-trial court by one or both of the co-prosecutors.

With this legal structure in place, prospective cases can be placed before the investigating judges who can decide that the case should be prosecuted. The case is then referred to the co-prosecutors who prepare the evidence and arguments to be presented at trial. Any appeal of a decision would be heard by the Supreme or Appellate chamber. Any disagreement over the case or prosecution is to be referred earlier to the pre-trial court. At all times a super majority, including at least one international judge, is required for a conviction, thus providing a sort of veto over the Cambodian courts in case of incidents of corruption, political interference, or bad jurisprudence.

At the moment there are only two accused persons to be brought before the ECCC for crimes against humanity who are in captivity. Duch and Ta Mok are in prison awaiting trial. They have been held since 1999. But they were not the real leaders. There are several members of the CPK leadership still living in Cambodia who could theoretically be brought to trial, but who currently live free and unrestricted lives.

Ieng Sary, the DK foreign minister, lives in a mansion in Phnom Penh on the money he made from suspected lumber and gem smuggling. Khieu Samphan, the president of DK, lives in Pailin, a stronghold of Khmer Rouge support. Nuon Chea, Pol Pot’s chief ideologist and “Brother Number Two” in DK, also lives in the Pailin region and is protected by Khmer Rouge supporters.

Cambodians have suffered through decades of civil war, international war, and possibly even through what is sometimes described as auto-genocide. The task for the nation and the state is to heal the wounds left by these conflicts, and to bring those thought responsible to a fair and impartial trial.

But several problems beset Cambodia. The country is poor and cannot possibly afford to pay its costs for the tribunal. Instead, Cambodia is paying through a lend-lease system in which it provides the facilities and utilities and general support for the ECCC rather than direct payment to the United Nations. Another problem is that the youth of Cambodia are beginning to disbelieve that such crimes actually took place little more than one generation past. Without a truth commission or serious investigation into all DK activities, this history will soon be lost forever to Cambodians and the world community.

My final word of warning goes to the tribunal itself. It is easy in Cambodia to fall into the trap of believing all of the standard stories about the Khmer Rouge years and the myriad of tales about atrocities. But the hard evidence necessary in court will not be found for the majority of such tales, and attempting to find it would only waste the time and money of the tribunal and the patience of the Cambodian people.

The tribunal will work best when specific and tightly-defined charges of specific and identifiable crimes are brought against single individuals. The tribunal must at all costs not begin wide-ranging prosecutions based on easily-discredited stories and propaganda. To do so would be a disservice to Cambodians, and a disservice to the fight for the protection and dissemination of human rights.

Well, I guess I have said too much, as usual. But I hope that you get a feel for the complexities of life in Cambodia. I will write again in May after the New Year holiday, and will be back in Canada before Canada Day (01 July 2006).

Happy Khmer New Year

12 May 2006

Welcome to my third “Report from Phnom Penh”.

IT IS WORTH IT

Despite the difficulties in trying to teach students with little educational background and no culture of education, this has all been worth the effort. I am very happy that I am able to help build the skills of students and faculty in the national university. It has also taught me a lot about myself. I hope the students are actually benefiting, and that I am not just fooling myself.

DEATH DEATH DEATH

Cambodia has a very high death rate compared to the rest of the world. The life expectancy here is only about 53 years.

One of the biggest non-natural killers here is traffic accidents. Several people are killed each day in a country with very few cars. Most people die on motorcycles, and in the back of trucks when the trucks roll over and crush the passengers.

Let me tell you of three incidents.

On Saturday evening I was sitting on the riverbank wall in the middle of downtown enjoying the remains of the day when I saw four men carry a body up from the river’s edge. The body was strangely dry, and must have been picked out from the reeds and garbage by the side of the river. A large crowd gathered, and the men several times moved the body around to different places on the grass. Were they trying to Feng Shui the body? What were they doing? I never saw what happened to the body, but people soon faded away, and there was nothing to be seen. Strange.

The next day I was travelling south of Phnom Penh with the Sunday running group the Phnom Penh Hash House Harriers (www.bongthon.com/P2H3) when I saw the remains of a traffic accident. Three motorcycles had hit each other at high speeds and thrown at least four men across the road. There was one helmet involved: it was riding on the seat behind the driver. One of the victims was trying to get up; one was unclear to me; and two were probably dead. Those two were completely motionless and fluids were leaking from their bodies. Traffic simply went around them.

The third incident shows the lack of safety regulations and practices here. Yesterday as I was on my way to work the traffic came to a virtual standstill on the main western road out of the city. As we slowly crept along on a motorcycle (I own and use a helmet), we eventually came upon the accident site. A large truck travelling inbound on the other side of the road had hit the concrete centre median and broken the barrier and moved the concrete blocks before flipping over on to its side and blocking the road into Phnom Penh. So what? you ask. Well, what made this a little more than common accident was that the truck was fully loaded with full sealed containers of pressurized natural gas and propane for cooking. These were spilled all over the roadway, and a single rupture would have caused an explosion which would have killed at least a hundred people. I really wanted to get away from there quickly.

NO WONDER THEY ARE POISONED!

There is little in the way of hygienic food practices here in Cambodia, and sickness is often spread via tainted food. Since there is a lot of chicken, fish and pork here, you can see that this is a major problem. In addition to bird flu, Cambodia has very few refrigerators, and relies almost exclusively on ice as a coolant.

Now last month I was walking past a sidewalk eatery (they are all on the sidewalk), and noticed the ubiquitous ice chest. These are large orange plastic insulated containers with hinged lids. Ice arrived by wagon and is sold in metre-long blocks, or sawed into smaller pieces by the delivery guy. Of course the ice is not made with clean water, so sometimes it is a bit yellow or brownish, and it sits in a filthy cart and on filthy tables to be cut. But eventually it makes it into the relative safety of the ice chest. Now this ice is used for everything. And I saw an old lady come over to the ice chest to get a small block of ice which she proceeded to break apart so that she could fill an ice-bucket for drinks. Some of the ice went onto a plate of cut limes, but most would go into drink glasses. Now this is all well and fine, until I looked into the ice chest and saw that the blocks of ice were keeping raw uncooked unwrapped meat cold. Yes, the ice that kept the raw meat chilled was being used as ice for drinks and platters.

I though it was going to woof on the street.

Cambodia has recently begin a campaign to try and educate people about the dangers of contaminated food, and about hygienic food preparation practices, but the campaign is small and not well distributed. Viet Nam has a large programme meant to reach the entire population, but Cambodia has nothing and will easily fall victim to an outbreak of bird flu.

Oh, and they use the same uncleaned cutting surface to chop the cooked meat and the raw meat, so cooking it seems a bit redundant somehow.

I MUST BE IN NORTH KOREA!

Last week I went to a North Korean restaurant. Yes, there is such a thing as a North Korean restaurant. It is a strange experience. All of the staff is shipped in from the DPRK, and all are housed together and bussed to work together and bussed home together. The waitresses are the most beautiful women in all of Cambodia, and they all wear what look like stewardess uniforms from a western airline in 1962. They also speak very good English. Whether they speak Khmei or not I do not know. Now the food is very expensive by local standards, and the dinner cost US$10. But for that I got the dumplings and vegetables/pickles, and kimchi, and the main Pyongyang (buckwheat) Cold Noodle Soup. It was fantastic, and really did remind me of eating in North Korea. Strange.

Given the cult of personality which the dictator Hun Sen has built around himself and his party, it is not surprising that this place is a little like North Korea in some ways.

MY MONK

Many of you will know that I am friends with a senior monk from the Wat Damnak temple in Siem Reap, and that he is currently in the USA. He runs the food programme to which many of you donated rice last year. To find out more about him, and see a photo, please read the following website/article. http://www.qctimes.net/articles/2006/04/09/news/local/doc44389412bd997985113307.txt Somnieng will be back at the beginning of June, and I look forward to seeing him very soon.

I am still collecting money to buy rice and other food for his Life & Hope Association, so if you want to donate, just tell me and you can be part of the solution.

BERNADETTE PETERS DID NOT COME TO CAMBODIA

Last June the Ottawa newspaper ran an article stating that Bernadette Peters would perform at the National Arts Centre as part of their concert series. Tickets went on sale in September. I was fourth in line at the box office. I acquired two front-row-centre seats for opening night. Opening night was Thursday 27 April. I was not in Ottawa then, so Pam went with my friend Chris (with whom I attended King's College, and who is from Ottawa, more or less). The concert was apparently very good. Pam said she could see right up BP's nose. I asked if there was lots of cleavage. Pam said there was enough cleavage to cause the death of BP had I been in the audience looking at said cleavage. Pam's hobby is tracking down and killing BP due to my interest in this person whom I have never met and will probably never meet. She is also willing to hunt down and snuff out Helena Bonham Carter, who I have also never met.

At least someone enjoyed the fruit of the tickets.

VISAK BOCHEA, THE KING, AND THE ROYAL PLOUGHING CEREMONY

Today begins another in a series of long holidays, or holy days if you will. Officially the country is celebrating three holidays in a row: Visak Boachea Day notes the death fo the Buddha; the current King’s birthday is this weekend, and the Royal Ploughing Ceremony is being held on Tuesday. Offices and the university reopen on Thursday next week. I think that only India and certain muslim countries have more holidays.

Anyway, the most interesting to you is probably the Royal Ploughing Ceremony. The park in from of the National Museum has been prepared for the event which will take place very early on Tuesday morning. The King (Norodom Sihamoni) will witness several cows and oxen choose between various offerings of things like beer and rice and other common items. Whatever the cow chooses is a sign of the harvest for the next year. Now this is considered a big deal here, but is only recently started up again after more than 40 years without the ceremony. Many farming hamlets have small versions of this ceremony, and superstitious people seem to believe that it tells the future. However, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy if the cow says the harvest will be bad, and then the farmers do little to improve it, thinking that fate has pre-ordained a bad harvest.

So the wats (temples) are decorated for Visak Bochea Day, and the park beside the palace is decked out for the ploughing, and the city is festooned with pictures of the king and former king, and banners reading Long Live the King, etc.

STUDENT INTERESTS

My students have very little interest in the outside world. Although they can see it on foreign telly channels, the language barrier is huge, and people here watch the state or party-controlled telly channels (the only kind allowed here).

All of my graduate students (professors and civil servants) have been outside the country; but none of the undergraduates (average birth year: 1982) have ever been outside Cambodia: not even to Thailand or Viet Nam.

No one really shows any interest in going abroad. The costs are so high that their only real hope is a scholarship or a job involving travel. Also, Cambodians do not have an easy time getting visas, so travel is more difficult than usual.

In short, I have wondered about this and through questions and observations have begun to believe that my students think that everyplace else is just like Cambodia, only with different ethnic groups and more money. They have almost no conception that the bizarrely-high levels of corruption here is not usual everywhere else. They cannot imagine a government which does not control everything important in the country. They cannot imagine asking a question to a person far higher up in rank than themselves. They cannot imagine getting through university without paying bribes to get forms, classes, and even their final diplomas.

Yesterday I had the Canadian Ambassador visit to talk to the International Relations class. They were told that the ambassador instructed that they were allowed and encouraged to ask questions about anything they wanted. They were specifically allowed to talk to her and ask anything. Several students have already told me they are forbidden from even speaking to such a person. This is not much of a surprise. Here those with any power totally insulate themselves from real people. No one of rank would even speak to a student. They are told from birth of their place in the order.

No student here would dare to talk to such a person of rank, and no such person would ever speak to a student. It took a lot of prodding, but one of the better students finally spoke up, then many of the male students asked questions. But the women remained silent. This was even more frustrating than usual, as the ambassador is female. Finally one woman stood up to ask a question: a breakthrough which will not last.

However, all that side, the talk by the Ambassador went very well, and she was mobbed after the talk ended. Then I got a ride home in the official vehicle with the Cdn flag flying from the fender-mounted flagpole. The vehicle was air conditioned: something very appreciated when the air is body temperature.

Over the next few weeks I will be bringing in speakers from the World Bank and the European Union, as well as a local human rights NGO. These are people with whom my students would never make contact on their own, and who need to be heard by the future elite.

THE DK TRIBUNAL

On Monday the tribunal and government announced the names of the judges and others for the war crimes and crimes against humanity trials to be held for some select members of the former regime (DK, 1975-1979). And it was bad news. The Cambodian judges are such a hideous lot as to be beyond contempt. The trial track record of some has been little else but a series of assaults on basic rule of law and human rights. Most are also considered only a phone call away from the direction of the prime minister. Several have been involved in imprisoning people without charge or for breaking laws which do not actually exist on paper in this country at this time. They have also been largely implicated in taking bribes to release people or prevent trials from proceeding.

One piece of good news for the tribunal is that one Canadian was selected by the U.N. to be on the tribunal. Robert Petit from our war crimes division at Justice is the co-prosecutor for the entire ECCC.

16 May 2006

ROYAL PLOUGHING CEREMONY

The royal cows have spoken!

Yesterday (16 May 2006) I had the privilege to witness the recently-resurrected “Royal Ploughing Ceremony”. Called in Khmer “Bonn Chroat Preah Nongkoal”, the ancient ceremony is supposed to both foretell the harvest and to help protect the crops from evil spirits.

What is supposed to happen is that a representative of the king, called King Meakh, will three times circle the ceremonial field guiding a plough pulled by two royal oxen. King Meakh is followed by his wife, Queen Me Hour who scatters rice behind into and around the furrow. After ploughing a furrow three times around the field, the entire procession stops at a temple where senior clerics pray for the protection of the gods.

Now comes the fun part. At least one of the oxen is unhitched from the plough and led to a place where it is offered a choice of foods presented on seven silver or golden trays. These foods include rice, grass, corn, beans, beer, and some others I cannot name. The fortune tellers are supposed to be able to predict the state of the coming crops based on what the oxen eats and the order in which he eats it.

Now if you cannot wait to find out what the cows said, I will give you a hint. They forecast a plentiful harvest but paradoxically said farming will be hampered by a lack of rain.

It has been a very busy week here in Cambodia. Last Friday (12 May) was Visaka Bochea Day which commemorates the birth of the Buddha. It is certainly amongst the most significant of the Buddhist holidays. That was immediately followed by a three day celebration fo the 53rd birthday of the new king, Norodom Sihamoni. That finished with a great fireworks display over the palace and waterfront. And immediately following on that was Bonn Chroat Preah Nongkoal which marks the official beginning of the planting season.

And just as farming begins early in the day, so too does the Royal Ploughing Ceremony. I arrived at the ceremonial field at 06:45 to find it already crowed with participants, police, soldiers, school students, and onlookers. Then, like just about everywhere else in the world, it became a waiting game. King Sihamoni finally arrived after 08:00 and the show began.

After the arrival of the king, the giant procession began, with a couple hundred people walking to the park from the palace. There were the king’s ceremonial guards in slightly more modern versions of ancient costume. They wore fibreglass helmets painted orange, and walked in bare feet. There flanked the procession carrying King Meakh who is actually You Hockry, the second vice president of the national assembly, and a FUNCINPEC party member. His wife acted as Queen Me Hour. You Hockry was carried in an a throne, and his wife was carried in a chair hung beneath a pole.

They were followed by several women and men in traditional royal attendant dress bearing offering dishes.

Now while this was happening the royal cows were being brought in from a different part of Veal Men park in from of the national museum. Six oxen, dressed in royal finery and yoked to three ploughs, stood at the ready to plough!

Once the procession had entered and taken its place behind the oxen (do you really want to walk behind oxen?), the ceremony could really begin. Now was the time for extended chanting and invocation by high Buddhist priests. After a lot of this, the group moved forwards to be directly in front of the covered royal viewing dias. Then, on a signal imperceptible to me, as I was too far away, the ploughing began!

Starting with the colour party carrying the state flag, the royal banner, and some other flags, the procession started around the field. Next came the first team of oxen and. Then the second team of oxen which pulled the plough guided by King Meakh. Then a third plough was followed by Queen Me Hour. It was her job to scatter rice over the field behind the three new furrows. Following Queen Me Hour were men with swords, then women with red-coned offering plates, then men with carved wooden offering bowls.

By this time I had managed to get into the grounds instead of watching from across the street, and had taken an advantageous position at the fence line directly in front of the seven plates. So I was snapping digital photos like a madman as the ploughs came past.

Little did I know that I would have another chance. The ploughs would continue around for another go at the sandy soil fo the royal Veal Men park. After getting even more close-up shots of the oxen looking resigned to their fate, the ploughing party came around for a third pass. The procession was looking weary in the hot an unrelenting sun. But here it stopped. After three circuits the ploughing was over, and the human processioneers proceeded up the central path towards King Sihamoni. They were followed shortly by the last two oxen.

The lightest coloured oxen were unhitched from the intricate and ceremonial plough and lead across the grass toward the plates. Sensing a respite from ploughing, the two oxen immediately tucked into the offerings.

I know you are all wondering what the cows actually said. Well, here it is. The two royal oxen ate lots of rice, beans and corn, and this, royal court astrologer Kang Ken said, meant there was a very good chance of plentiful crops. However, the bad news was that the oxen were not in the mood to drink. When offered water and wine (not beer) the royal oxen refused to drink, leading to speculation that Cambodia would face another drought in some parts of the country.

Now the track record of the cows is not great. In Thailand last year the cows predicated great things and were rewarded with some of the worst harvests ever. But in Cambodia last year the cows predicted good harvests and Cambodia broke its own record for rice production with a bumper crop. So maybe the cows are just as good as the weatherman.

But the royal ploughing ceremony is about more than cows. It is also about peasants. So after the oxen had departed a small army of specially chosen peasants form all parts of the country were paraded onto the field to greet the king. Sihamoni immediately left the stage to talk to and meet all of the peasants who by this time were all kneeling on the ground in front of his majesty. Each peasant received a gift package from the king, consisting of a new head scarf called krama, and a blanket and some other textiles in a clear plastic container with a printed message from the king visible through the side. Later these people could be seen proudly displaying their gifts.

With the end of the official part of the ceremony, it was now time to review, in slow and painful detail, each of the displays. This was the famous walkabout in which the king actually gets out amongst some of the people and is shown the displays of agricultural prowess sponsored by each province and related government ministry. Since the king is expected to pay close attention, and to meet officials and be presented with gifts, this took nearly two hours.

By this time I had moved to a new spot, and an hour later the king was standing no more than 3 metres from me at the display sponsored by the city of Phnom Penh. It was an outstanding photo opportunity, and I used many frames of digital film. Security was tight but not oppressive. Strangely, security people seemed more concerned with pushing back the brown peasants than with wondering how it was that a tall white foreign gentleman was standing beside the royal path.

After seeing the subjects meet the king, I wandered off to photograph many of the soldiers and bandsmen waiting in the hot sun. I did not envy their steel helmets.

Before the king had even left the event the dias had been cleared and all the chairs taken away. Booths began to sell off their displays of fruit and vegetables and other agricultural products, and the event continues on Wednesday.

Long after dark the park was still thronged with visitors mobbing the booths and buying the produce.

I AM STILL HERE

I am still here for another 1.5 months. So do remember that you can still write to me via post, or send me an email. Both are preferred.

03 June 2006

This month I have a couple of stories about corruption to brighten your day. The first is a warm up, and did not happen to me.

CORRUPTION #1

"Hold it. Do not yet start the mobile phone services through which the callers can see each others' images. Maybe we can wait for another 10 years or so until we have done enough to strengthen the morality of our society." -- Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen, banning video mobile phones to curb pornography

Now you have read the quote and are wondering what the heck is going on in Cambodia. It is time for the context. Third generation cell phones, called "3G" can use the internet and send photos and movies and do just about everything. They are the current holy grail, and are being introduced around Asia. In Cambodia two companies were trying to win the right to deliver 3G technology. One company is owned a French-Cambodian, and the other company is owned by Madam BUN, the wife of the dictator, Prime Minister Samdec (Lord) Hun Sen. Now the 3G phones work very well, and lots of money has been invested.

Madam Bun got all of her company's money from the Chinese who for reasons unclear GAVE her several million dollars to get the whole thing going. But of course this is a society with buckets of corruption, and Madam Bun LOVES to shop, and so before her company had finished the 3G telephone system for Cambodia, she had already burned through ALL of the millions.

Meanwhile, the other company was ready to go and to show that they were ready to go gave 3G phones to all the cabinet ministers and important officials. At this point it is less than two weeks to the final moment. Cabinet ministers loved the things.

Well, the problem is that Madam Bun's company cannot possibly win the concession as her company never finished the project, so it will go to the other company. But this means that there will be no more trough for getting more and more millions out of the very lucrative 3G cell phone business for Madam Bun and her hubby the PM.

But think of the children!!!

So Madam Bun started a petition to stop 3G cell phones as being bad for the morality of the country. Yes, that's right, the woman who owns a 3G cell phone company started a petition to ban 3G cell phones all because her company would not get the concession and she would not be able to get her hands on several million more dollars. I guess all those shopping trips to Hong Kong and Paris costs a LOT of money. Madam Bun made certain that the wives of cabinet ministers hated the things.

Now maybe Cambodians really are concerned about the morality of the 3G technology. That must be why nine (9) people signed her petition. Yes, nine people signed it, and then she gave it to her husband.

And you see the result: 3G cell phones are banned as a danger to public morals. The company that was ready to roll with the 3G phones has been locked out of the country, and Madam Bun is free to start up her 3G company again when the time is right (and when she gets several million more dollars in gifts from China). Welcome to the land of the mystified and the home of the corrupt.

Now for the really annoying story.

CORRUPTION #2

As you recall I asked all of you friends and relatives to consider sending books to the university as a way of helping this impoverished society. Well, I thank Sandra at Sage Publishing in London for really coming through. She arranged for a shipment of eight cartons of new Sage books to be shipped by container from England through Singapore to Cambodia. And the container actually did arrive in Cambodia. Now for the bad part.

As you know by now, Cambodia has one of the most corrupt systems of government in the world, and nothing is left untouched. So when the books arrived in the port of Sihanoukville, the local port officials could almost taste the bribes. Within days I was told that it would cost up to US$1000 to get the eight boxes of books released by the officials.

The official story is that the books will have “duty” and “taxes” applied to them. Now this may sound strange to you, as the books are a donation for free from a publisher to the national university owned and run by the government department of education. It does not seem reasonable to have charges placed against books which are a gift to a library owned by the government. But this is Cambodia, and if no charges were assessed, then there could be no bribes.

The outcome is that the entire shipment is lost to us. We cannot pay the charges in Cambodia so the officials will not release the books to the Royal University of Phnom Penh. What will happen, and what happens quite often according to the English language press in Cambodia, is that the shipment will soon be seized by the port officials and sold or given to their friends for kickbacks, and the books will end up in the market.

What makes this even more galling is that the same thing happened last year when RUPP lost an entire shipment of new academic books sent by donors in the United States. The shipment was held for bribes which could not be paid, then it was seized and ended up going to a local businessman and into local market stalls instead of into the national university library.

Now I have tried writing to all sorts of officials, but not a single official inside Cambodia will respond to the issue. This is because to take action would probably cut out someone’s bribe-taking scam, and since most officials are on some sort of bribery programme, it hurts the entire system to correct a problem. So no one does anything because they all eventually benefit. The only ray of hope we have no comes from the British Ambassador who has personally written to the ministry to ask that the books be released to the university without charge. The Brits give a lot of aid money here, so there is a faint hope the government may respond positively to the pressure. We shall see, but I would not hold my breath on this one.

NEAK LEOUNG

It was my first trip alone outside of Phnom Penh. For reasons I cannot recall, I have not left this city for over four months. I finally bought a bus ticket for a whole $1.25 and fled to the countryside.

Neak Leoung is a medium-sized town south of the capital straddling the Mekong River. It is 62 km away, and takes 2 hours of Cambodian driving to reach. The bus does not travel 31km/h; it moves at close to 50km/h, but the first 45 minutes is Cambodian Lost Time (CLT) in which nothing happens on schedule and many people stop the bus to get on or off along the way on this non-stop route. Of course it is not as though you could drive all that fast on National Highway #1, as it is barely two lanes wide and in places little more than a series of connected potholes. It is no wonder people use speedboats to get between the two places if they can afford to do so.

The ride also reminded me that three (3) is the magic number in Cambodia. Three is the number of employees you have to do one job, or sometimes the number of extra employees you have to do one job. Our buss had four employees on board for half the journey with one driving and three staring at tickets. Most places have similar employment practices, with hordes of underemployed young men sitting doing almost nothing. Women are also employed in the same manner, but since most production in the factories and fields in Cambodia is done by women, they actually work harder in order to accomplish things. There are at least five men guarding the gate of my apartment building, and at night they sleep on wicker mats in the parking lot. There are also about five maids, but they have real work to do for much of the day, when they are not sleeping on top of the washing machine that is not used because all laundry is done by hand in wash tubs.

Going to Neak Leoung was a bit of a pilgrimage for me. In August 1973 a single US Air Force B-52 bomber dropped its entire load of bombs down the main street of the town, killing more than a hundred people, and injuring hundreds more. Much of the damage was incurred by a wedding party.

Now although this particular incident was ruled an accident, it was part of the second largest bombing campaign in history. In only six months in 1973 the USAF B-52 bombers dropped more tonnes of bombs on Cambodia than were dropped on Japan in all of World War II, including the atomic bombs. So Neak Leoung may have been an accident, but the bombing campaign purposely killed up to a half million people in Cambodia. Sadly, the US bombing campaign was the single largest recruiting tool given to the Khmer Rouge. Each bombed field and hamlet and village yielded more recruits to the revolution. Strangely, statisical analysis suggests that the Pol Pot regime directly caused the deaths of about a half million people. Now which is worse, killing by carpet bombing from the air, or killing with a knife and gun?

Anyway, there is really nothing much to see in Neak Leoung. It is a rather dull little ferry town, and the only reason to prospers at all si that Cambodian’s National Highway #1 crosses the Mekong River at this point. Since there are no bridges over the Mekong in Cambodia, the only way across is by ferry, so new modern ferries ply the waters constantly taking people, bikes, motos, cars, trucks, busses, semi-trailers, and anything else people drag onto the deck.

The highlight of the town were all the handpainted advertizing signs. These are glorious tacky and authentic representations of real local culture and artistry. Many of them feature teeth. In fact, I think the largest single group feature teeth. There must be more “dentists” per person in Cambodia than anyplace on earth.

But the best part of the day was spent in the local town market. I took many photos of sellers and their produce, and some cute child photos. Another great opportunity to see the commercial aspect of the town occurs every few minutes whenever a new vehicle pulls up to wait for the next ferry. Women with swaddled heads literally run towards the vehicle holding aloft foods of both a weird and a wonderful nature. Bread, drinks, deep-fried insects, baby birds, skinned headless boiled frogs, eggs, fruit, fruit, fruit, and of course water (some of it even clean).

And it is not just people in the vehicles. Oh no. It is pigs and chickens and ducks, oh my! Yes, I saw several trucks which on normal days are taxis, carrying several hundred chickens or ducks. I even saw two taxis full of full-grown pigs. I mean at least 10 full grown pigs. This was far more efficient a way to transport full grown pigs than was being used by the man who had simply strapped his two full-grown pigs on their backs on the back seat of his moto. On one van there was a terrible squealing, and I spotted a sack moving about. One of two pigs had hit upon the idea of escape, and was already part way out. The other little pig had only managed to stick the flat of his nose through a small hole. A man quickly hopped on the roof and re-tied the sack so that dinner did not get away. The ride back seemed quicker at first until the bus stopped to pick up two women who sat beside each otehr, behind me, and yelled at each other for almost the entire journey. It was not angry yelling, it was just a standard Cambodian conversation at maximum volume between two people less than a half metre apart. Now if only my students could do this.

CLASSES ARE ALMOST OVER

My real work here, as you know, is teaching undergraduate students political science. What it really turned into were a series of classes on basic skills which were almost totally lacking in my third and fourth year students. There was hardly a one who could write a footnote or properly quote a sources. So much time has been spent, instead of learning about Civil Society or International Relations, in working on reading and sources and research and how to write a term paper and how to take an exam, and how to think about problems and what si the real basis of the concept of history, human rights, corruption, and modern Cambodia.

Students are getting quieter for reasons I cannot determine. They are usually very quiet, but recently became even harder to hear. They speak barely above a whisper. A few weeks ago I had one student on the verge of tears as I could not hear her and every time I asked her to speak up she got quieter until only her lips were moving but there was no sound at all. Contrast this with any experience in Cambodia involving people. People here are constantly yelling at each other even if sitting next to each other. Every thing in Cambodia is at full volume except for my students.

The final papers were due by 20 May, which is nearly two weeks ago. As of 01 June not a single paper had been completed. In fact, only one had been started. This industrious chap had written his title on the page. Good start.

My students are afraid of anyone in what they perceive is a position of authority. This means that they will not, and have actually outright refused, to talk to anyone in Cambodia who knows about the subject of their term papers. They will not approach a local NGO for info about what that group does in Cambodia. They will not ask for an interview or even for a brochure. They will not go in person and they will not use the telephone. The culture has them so frightened and beaten down to respect authority that they are paralyzed. In fact, what authority figures want in not respect, but compete submission. Cambodians are very good at providing that.

PEASANTS

You all know that I do not particularly like peasants, but I have a certain respect for peasants in this country. As I said when talking about the students, the goal of society here is to produce spineless and obedient figures bent to the will of the elites, and who will never ask a question or embarrass an official.

The good news is that peasants in Cambodia do not always roll over when facing the guns. There are lots of mini peasant uprisings throughout the year, and all of them are over land issues. There is a sick trend here for the elites to steal land from peasants. Many of these land-grabs involve entire villages. A rich guy will get the local military commander and his units or police officials, or both, to raid the land and force the peasants off at gun-point. Many times the peasants have some title to the land and the rich guy will have a title still smudged with wet ink, and the fact is that the courts nearly always order the peasants to leave. Many peasants are ending up living in a collection of shelters in an around Phnom Penh. One such place, called Village #14, was recently razed to the ground by police. Last year the government simply burned down the entire slum. It is very common to see army trucks being loaded up with what passes for housing in the slums in order to drive it out to the countryside and dump it and the people on new land. New land in this context means non-arable land in tiny quantities unsuitable for supporting life.

Another tactic of the peasants is to move into the park beside the royal palace and across from the National Assembly building. They are never allowed to stay long and are usually removed at gunpoint. But burned out, moved out, or force out with guns, the problems do not go away and only get worse.

In fact, the number of landmine and unexploded bomb injuries and deaths is once again climbing in Cambodia due to the land claims issue. As peasants are forced off their land they make their way to the mountains and are entering uncleared areas usually unsuitable for standard Khmer agriculture. These are the places still loaded with explosives, so deaths are up again after years of decline.

There was an incident this past spring in which a small village or hamlet was forced off their land so that some chap could build a parking lot. Now you see why the peasants resist. Now you see why there are many here who think that Cambodia could be in line for another very violent peasant uprising directed at the city elites.

LIVING APART

I have the feeling that I live in a parallel world in Cambodia. There are, all around me, 13 000 000 Cambodians. I am afloat in a sea of Cambodians. Cambodians sell me my groceries; Cambodians clean my apartment and wash my dishes and wash my clothes; Cambodians drive me about on motos; Cambodians sit on my classes and stare at me in mild amusement and horror; yet I still live apart from Cambodians.

It is their country, and they are all around, yet there is no human interaction between myself and Cambodians. This is partly a result of the way ex-pats live anywhere in the world, and partly as a result of the structure and culture of Cambodian society. The small group, the ex-pats or small ethnic minority, usually band together out of a sense of common culture or at least in response to a massive other common culture. But I notice that the foreigners in Cambodia are not ever made to feel welcome.

You can hear them talking about you out loud as you approach. The calls of “Barang, barang” (foreigner, foreigner) precede you. It is akin to have “leper leper” called out. There is still leprosy in Cambodia, by the way. When you are noticed at all it is as a curiosity and for the purpose of ridicule. People will actually stare and point and talk loudly about how strange the foreigner is or looks. This really bothers the foreigners who speak and understand Khmei. You are made to feel distinctly sub-human in this society. Nothing will be sold to you in a Khmei is waiting behind you to buy something. People will not speak to you or answer questions unless there is money in it for them.

I should not complain as the ex-pats have it easy in comparison to the hated internal minorities. The Cambodian Khmers, the largest and dominant ethnic group, have a hate-on for the three major ethnic minorities in Cambodia; the Chams, the Viets and the Chinese. All social problems are blamed on one or more of the minorities no matter how ludicrous the claim. So being a white person can be tough here, but you are a foreigner and will eventually go home. But being a Viet for instance is very difficult; this is your home but you are unwelcome and attacked. The government not infrequently sends troops or police to harass Viet villagers. I had one student complain that the minorities made their own problems by refusing to live with Khmer people, but conveniently ignored that Khmer villagers and officials would force out any minorities who tried to move into a village. It is only the cities and larger towns that are at all mixed, and that is really only because the Viets and Chinese were in Phnom Penh before the Khmers (strange but true).

Not a single Cambodian has invited me to their home. I was invited to a wedding only to find that I was not invited to the actual wedding: that was for Khmer only. I was allowed to have some food at the reception the next day. The Cambodian professors do not talk to me. The only staff member at RUPP who talks to me is from Bolivia.

In 1975 when Pol Pot came to power his vision of a new Kampuchea was extremely xenophobic to the point of mass murder. Minorities were targeted for relocation or extermination. Only pure Khmers were allowed any rights at all. Most Viets were forced from the countryside towards Viet Nam, which incidently was not their country of birth and which was uninterested in having all these new people. Pol Pot believed that Cambodian would be a land for Khmer people only, and that the glories of the Angkor period a thousand years before could be repeated in a sealed society. All foreigners, even their friends, were distrusted completely and banned from the country. So the way the Cambodians act today is very much an extension of the xenophobia seen through their recent history.

You could make a movie about the lives of ex-pats here and barely ever mention the Cambodians except as servants and sellers. There is so little interaction, and you are definitely not invited to be part of Cambodian society.

16 June 2006

I hope you have all been enjoying the adventures of “lost white man up the Mekong without a paddle or a clue” these past many months. I have enjoyed writing them for you.

Classes are now all over and all papers have been marked. What a relief. What an experience.

FINAL PAPERS and CERTIFICATES

Well THAT was interesting. The whole thing: meeting everyone, teaching, lecturing, seminars, amazement at cell phones in class, writing, trying to get papers, the papers themselves, and of course the little gems which make it all the more bizarre.

It is amazing, given that the students have the syllabus and schedule with the due dates clearly written, that I had not received the majority of papers already due, and NOT ONE of the major papers (due in late May) had been handed in to me by the beginning of June. Not one had been written one week before the new deadline. They know, and have had to repeat out loud, that if they do not hand in the paper they will... "Fail". Correct. I suspect the failure rate will be about 33%.

They are very concerned about getting their certificates. They have been told that they will get certificates for completing the class. These are very valuable here as they prove foreign education. However, the message they seem to have received is that showing up is enough to get a certificate.

Near the end of classes I had one student almost in tears. She was answering a question, and I could not hear her. I asked her to speak up. I asked her to yell. I had someone translate the word Yell into Khmei. And each time she got quieter. I never did find out what she was saying, as it disappeared down the black hole of student whispers. In the end there was only lips moving but no sound at all.

This is strange as everything else in Cambodia involved people actually screaming at you and each other from great distances, and everything is set on volume 11 with ultra-low fidelity. Everything here is always loud, unless you are in a classroom, in which case you must whisper ever so silently.

On Thursday 08 June I collected the final papers from the International Relations class. Most were turned in. I had 22 named students in this IR class, and received final papers from 15. So the other 7 failed outright. This final major paper was also the final exam. No exam/final paper, no passing grade. On the other hand, 68% (15/22) is a good average, and much better than in the Civil Society class.

The Civil Society class of 25 students handed in 13 final papers/final exams: only 52% (13/25) of the total class showed up to finish the course.

I immediately marked the Civil Society final papers, and it was a grim, though sometimes humourous, task indeed. Of the 13 papers, four failed outright due to plagiarism. This was explained to them and written on the board, and the RUPP even has sort of a policy against it. I explained it several times, and made them repeat that any plagiarized papers would FAIL. How much effect that part of the class had on them in unclear to me.

Ready for it? Two students handed in the exact same paper. From the format to the title to the text to the "thank you professor" note at the end; it was the same paper. Now the first time I read it I gave it a D+ as it was marginally acceptable. When I found the second one, I had to go back and mark the first and the second one as an F.

Recently in the CS class I was handing back some previous papers and one student got quite indignant about his mark. I had circled the "F" on the top of the page, and he came rushing up to my desk to complain. He insisted this was not right and wanted it changed. I asked to what he wished it to be changed, and he insisted that it was wrong and he wanted it fixed. I said. "That is your mark. It is final and you are not getting another one". He was insistent and indignant. I repeated it was his final mark on the paper, at which point it became clear to both of us that he thought I had marked his sex/gender on the paper incorrectly as female instead of male. He seemed more relieved to not have been classified as female than troubled at the failing mark of "F". Somebody is worried about his sexuality!

In society where only men have any social value, but where women do the majority of farm and industrial work, and where age and sex are very important indicators of status, men are very anxious to show that they are higher up the food chain than women. When I received the class list for the graduate seminar in human rights, I discovered that all of the women in the class were identified with (F) written behind their names. Male names did not come with an (M).

I finished marking the International Relations papers without encountering any bizarre surprises or identical papers. However, I did get several papers copied straight from the internet. Two students submitted two papers each, and all four were total copies. Seven IR students submitted no work at all after the first month.

You may recall from a previous report that the Canadian Ambassador, Donica Pottie, was a guest speaker in my International Relations class in May. It was a great success, and as one student took many photographs, I was able to get a copy of the group picture. I then got all available students to sign the photo as a gift for the ambassador. Not one of my students had ever met an ambassador or even a senior government official from Cambodia. Such is the nature of the totally sealed and impenetrable hierarchical system in Cambodia.

Now here is where it gets tricky. Like in North America, the Cambodians have become very obsessed with certification and certificates. It was talked about at the earliest meetings, and repeated constantly by various officials and even by students: there will be certificates. So now I have to produce certificates showing something. The problem, as you can probably well imagine, is that the two classes have a combined failure rate of about 55 percent, based on the total of all students who handed in at least one assignment. And many handed in only one assignment!

In the Civil Society class only two students handed in all the assignments, and turned out to be the top two students in the class. In the International Relations class ten students handed in all three papers. This may be why more of the latter passed the course.

So what do I do? I can only give certificates showing completion of the course to students who actually completed the course by doing the work and handing in their own papers and showing up for class. The problem is that everyone who was registered or showed up a few times will want the certificate. This is made even harder by the fact that no matter how many times I tried, I was unable to get a class list from the department heads.

I have decided, despite the pressure to produce meaningless certificates, to limit the documents to only those students who worked and passed.. There will be the real certificates for the working students showing that they completed the course. The students who failed will get nothing. I suspect I will get a polite earful about this next week. But I will be leaving soon and will refuse to sign certificates for students who did not pass. This is going to be especially hard on a couple of students whoa re fourth year and ready to graduate. They needed the credit but did not do the work and will not get a credit from any of my courses. I guess it teaches responsibility.

Today I went to a conference at which the main guest speaker was David Chandler, the noted historian of things Cambodian and of Pol Pot. It was during the conference that two of my students came to see me as they wanted to know when they could get their final papers returned. Since I had everything with me I offered them immediate gratification, and was glad to note that neither had pulled an F.

The female had what turned out to be the A+ paper, on which I had written "this is probably the best paper of the entire class" at the bottom. She was more than delighted. He got a B+. They wanted to see their final overall marks, and I showed them. Her's had improved steadily all year, and his stayed roughly the same. Both were honours students based on their final mark. I guess than it was no surprise they were at the talk.

After the Chandler talk I went over to the office of the vice-rector, Dr. Neth Barom, to use the printer and their certificate templates to make up all the certificates for passing students. This went very well, but took far longer than anticipated. I also misspelled three names and had to re-write and print three more certificates. Then each had to be checked and signed and then rubber stamped. Nothing here happens without the rubber stamp of authority. So to ease this I went out a couple of weeks back and had my own rubber stamp of authority made with my name. This really works. With all done, I instructed the clerk as to the nature of the documents and their ultimate destinations, and with that had completed all of my promised tasks to the Royal University of Phnom Penh.

SIEM REAP

With classes over and papers out of the way I needed a short holiday, so I was off to Siem Reap (Victory over the Siamese) to visit my monk, Somnieng at the Wat Damnak pagoda; Noelene at Hotel de la Paix, and the ruins at Angkor.

I had no idea that I really needed this little holiday. The moment I got there it was a bit of a collapse and I realized that teaching is far harder mentally than I suspected. Also, these students really take it out of you in ways or quantities you would not expect in Canada. You teachers have it much harder than I suspected, and I am humbled by your work.

So the journey begins with a bus ride through purgatory or the sixth level of hell or Gehenna. To make matters worse, I forgot to bring the sandwiches so carefully made and wrapped and refrigerated for the trip. I booked a front row seat on the Sokha 9 Hour Bus Company 07:30 service from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap. This $7 ticket says they are not responsible if you miss the bus. So with this in mind we sat for another 12 minutes past departure time waiting for one person. The entire journey is 314km. It home this would take on average three hours. This journey lasted 37 years, or more precisely, six hours and ten minutes, with 14 random stops so that people could wander on and off the bus with one or more of the six motos or the entire hairdressing salon carried on board!

With less than 100km to go, we stopped for lunch at a roadside shack where people pissed right off of the edge of the open-air dining platform into the grass surrounding the place. With another half hour wasted in the home of unsanitary conditions, we all (not quite all) boarded the bus, then sat for another 10 minutes waiting for one person. The horn was tooted constantly, but the person never showed up again. Add to all of this the wondrous smells of the peasantry and their children and their livestock and their five motos and the hairdressing salon being transported to a village along the way, and you have a truly vile concoction. In all, we averaged 51km/h on the best highway in all of Cambodia. By “best highway” you have to imagine a two lane macadam surface with almost no shoulder and bits falling off either side into the brush, and covered in wandering children, bicycles, cattle, parked vehicles, and heavy transport trucks, often approaching you on your side of the road. The government has made little effort to build infrastructure which might encourage industrial or even basic economic development.

As the bus pulled into the station local moto and tuk-tuk drivers literally sprinted for the bus and formed an almost impenetrable clot at the door. The screamed MOTO MOTO TUK-TUK MOTO TUK-TUK and in order to get out of the bus I used by suitcase to push about five of them in the head. They tried to duck rather than move away from the door. I am not joking when I say it was a solid wall of drivers about a dense as a rush-hour Tokyo subway jam. The hotel had sent a moto, so there was a chap at the back holding a sign welcoming “Jone Clearwater”. My name is mangled quite a lot here. Various times it has been JON, or JONH of JHON, but is almost never John. Clearwater also comes in for abuse, and my students frequently write “Clear Water” on their papers. I made it a requirement that they spell and use my name correctly on the final papers, as it is typed on the handouts and the syllabus, yet a good quarter of them still got it wrong. How hard is it to copy? I mean, they copy from the internet all the time. Why not my name?

Anyway, I went straight to the hotel “Villa Siem Reap”, dropped off my baggage, and walked directly to a nearby travel agency to inquire about an air ticket back to Phnom Penh. It is a 35 minute air journey, and worth every penny when one considers the alternative! Then I went to see Noelene at Hotel de la Paix. Noelene was a gem and “forced” me to move into the HdlP for the following three nights. Yes, it took a lot of arm twisting and abuse to get me to say yes to the best hotel in Cambodia!

Then I was off to see my monk, Somnieng at Wat Damnak. I found him in his Life & Hope Association office at the back of the Wat compound. He still looks a bit tired after the six months in the USA and the recent long flight home. He and I sat in the outer office of the Life & Hope Association and spoke of his recent travels and studies.

Somnieng is relatively new to flying. His first air trip was in the early autumn when Noelene took him to Phnom Penh to be interviewed for a US visa. They sat in different rows, for as a monk he was seated in the front row, and Noelene ended up in the back. Somnieng used his cell phone to call her to describe what he could see from the aircraft window. I admit that on my recent flight I was glued to the window as the views of Cambodia and the Tonle Sap Lake and the Mekong and Tonle Sap rivers are amazing. Perhaps if I had a cell phone I would describe it to someone in real time. But not on an airplane.

On the eleventh it was a day of Angkorian architectural splendour for me and my camera. Some wag once said that B&W film was invented for Angkor. I disagree: sepia tint was invented for Angkor. So I took about 200 images in sepia, most of the rest in B&W, and a few in colour. I got a tuk-tuk for the entire day, but when I announced that we were going to Bantey Samre on the far eastern edge of the park, he said that was too far. I said someone else might be more interested in being paid, so off we went.

I also wanted to go to a temple off the main road on the way to Bantey Samre. He did not know where it was, despite my having a map of the area. He had a map too, but would not use it. I made him stop and ask some locals for directions. Still he would not go in the direction in which they pointed. Finally we were off down the road when he simply stopped and turned off the motor, announcing that he had never been there before. I told him that if he was not willing to work, I would get another driver and he would not get paid. That worked, and eventually, after a one km walk from the sand path, was rewarded by the ruins of my very own Angkorian temple. Some of the foundation was still visible, and there was still part of a single wall standing. This was great. It was surrounded by rice fields and water buffalo and cattle. Not a tourist or tourist bus in sight!

My regret is that I did not manage to get a group together to go to Beng Melea. That is the place 63km away from Angkor where it still all looks as it did when the french explorers found it over 100 years ago. This is also where the film “Two Brothers” was made. There is a lot of jungle and trees growing over the walls, etc. Heaps of atmosphere.

I made what seemed like an almost obligatory stop at the actual Angkor Wat, the largest religious structure in the world. But I never got inside the main temple, as I was waylaid by a gang of monks. One of them said “Would you please sit down?”, so I did so, and was told that they and their non-monk friend wanted to practice their English. So we did that, and it was much more rewarding than visiting a temple. The chap most needing the practice is 19 years old and wants to work in the hotel industry. He wants to make money to send to his parents so they can buy a moto and a better piece of land. His English, though unsteady, showed a substantial vocabulary and he and his friends definitely had a willingness to learn and practice. He will do well with his language, but whether he will geta job is another matter.

A huge problem in Cambodia now is the massive number of graduates from high schools as well as real and fake universities who far outnumber real employment opportunities. It was this same problem which in the 1960-1970 period saw Cambodia raise a generation of people with education but no hope of a job who would go on to oppose the king. The situation now is even worse. There are more than twice the number of people, but still very few real jobs. With corruption even worse than in the period before the DK revolution, it is even harder to get a job based on ability as opposed to connection. This is a key problem to be addressed by any con-corrupt and capable administration after the Hun Sen dictatorship and kleptocracy is wiped away.

On my last full day in Siem Reap I rented a bicycle from the White Bicycle organization. It costs $2 per day and half that goes to buying water purification units for villages. This means a lot here as fewer people now have access to clean safe water than did so 50 years ago. As I pedalled down the first street I came alongside a cart being pulled by a woman calling out to the residents. As she was speaking Khmei, I had no way of knowing exactly what she said, but I have a good idea. She was calling to the people to “Bring out your bed. Bring out your bed”, as her cart was piled with old and new mattresses and pillows.

So off I pedalled to the RCAF War Museum, which is the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces War Museum for those of you who think RCAF means something else. It is really little more than the rusted weapons park, but there is so much there, and so few people, that it can be a bit of a military buffs’ photo paradise. There are two aircraft, a thousand landmines, ten tanks, and many large calibre field guns and armoured cars. So I shot pictures of every single thing in the museum for later reference, should anyone be interested.

From there it was off to the landmine museum run by Aki Ra. This is a huge collection of every type of landmine and explosive bobby trap used in Cambodia. Although the whole thing is housed in a grass shack, it is very informative. Only Russia, China, North Korea, Cuba and the United States refuse to sign the Ottawa Convention AKA the landmine Ban Treaty. Many photos of landmines and of a sleeping cat and dog were shot. Then it was off to the far eastern side of Siem Reap to visit the real central market. This was more of a drive-by event, as it turned out.

It was during this trip that I took what may be the best photograph of my entire life. On my way around the town I biked through the not-aptly-named Olympic Stadium; one of three such structures in Cambodia. In it was a child’s airplane carousel ride. It looked very old due to the rust and dents and paint and general state of being. It had eight ride cars; four helicopters and four fighter aircraft. I used the B&W feature in the digital camera, and took some wonderful pictures. The thing was so wonderful, it spoke to me from 1971.

The last day eventually arrived, and I had to check out by 14:00, so took full advantage of the gorgeous breakfast facilities to have loads of fresh exotic fruit and my favourite: cold sliced salmon on bagels and cream cheese with capers and onions and pepper. Wow it was good. I also relaxed by the pool, my fourth visit to that great piece of architecture. On my first visit I fell asleep in my alcove near the pool. That bus journey was really exhausting to the mind and body!

I also took a final opportunity to visit Somnieng at Wat Damnak. I went in the hope of enticing him to a lunch outing, but arrived to see the entire group of monks just tucking in to the luncheon which must be finished before 12:00. So I sat with the head monks and talked to Somnieng while they all ate. Then we walked over to Khmer Kitchen, my favourite restaurant, so that I could have lunch. Then we went back to HdlP as I had offered him a chance to check his email on the hotel machine. He said he was not a guest, and I said I was a guest and he was my guest so he could use the machine. The strange thing was that I got the impression that he had either never been in an elevator, or had never been in an elevator alone before this visit.

The best news from this holiday was that I managed to talk to five couples about the charity programme “Connections” run by the hotel which helps visitors get in touch with and then aid local charities such as any of the many orphanages or the Life & Hope Association, etc. The first couple was actually looking for something of this nature, so I took them to meet Somneing at Wat Damnak. I think they will donate a few tonnes of rice or a couple hundred school uniforms all by themselves. This was very gratifying.

INNER HOOKER

I have just learned the most wondrous expression: "Inner Hooker". As in: learn to free your inner hooker, or, let your inner hooker decide. What great advice. I have discovered that I have an “Inner Hooker” which tells me what I really want to do and then makes me do it. This is a very good thing. It is extremely liberating. I encourage you to free-up your Inner Hooker. My Inner Hooker commanded me to take the plane and to stay at the de la Paix.

THE TELLTALE CLOCK

The strangest thing has just happened: I could hear a faint ticking, and discovered that the maid had pulled the clock down from on top of the wardrobe where I had stored it face up well out of reach. She then installed the battery which she also found on top of the wardrobe. How she got up there I will never know. Then she put the clock back on top of the wardrobe, totally out of sight. The clock is not visible at all from anywhere in the room. She had to hunt it down and climb up on the wardrobe to get it, then she hid it again. There is a clock (mine) on the counter, which is digital and does not tick loudly at all. Also, these people do not tell time. It does not matter what time it is. That is a very relaxing attitude, and one worth cultivating. Years from now I will thank the Cambodians for teaching me that time is a cruel mistress better left alone.

TRASH SHEEP

The centre of Phnom Penh is graced with a large lake, although now it is largely trash-filled and somewhat smelly. Last week a harsher told me that there are a bunch of sheep living around the lake area which he calls "Trash Sheep".

These sheep live on the garbage piles, and there is plenty of rotting garbage here, as there is almost no effective trash pickup system, and none at all in poor areas. The trash sheep literally live on top of the garbage piles. They root through the garbage piles seeking anything edible.

He described them as being appallingly foul and smelly and diseased and discoloured. He mentioned that the sheep were largely green coloured. I asked if they had mange. He replied there is no room left on these sheep for mange. So there you have the Trash Sheep of Phnom Penh.

TRYING TO GET A GUEST SPEAKER

A couple of weeks ago I went to the office of a local human rights NGO, and was presented with another example of how nothing here operates in a clear and efficient manner. I went in person to eliminate errors and misunderstandings, so was rewarded with errors and misunderstandings. Today I got an email which announced that they were not really keen on the idea of training all my students in the full range of their activities over an extended period of time. Now as I went in person and asked for and wrote down that I wanted one guest speaker for one hour next Monday to talk to a group of ten students about the work of the group, it is beyond me how this got transmuted intoa full-blown training course for all human rights issues. What it means is that they will bale out and I will have no guest speaker. The World Bank already pulled out. No one in this country, who is from this country, wants to get involved in anything they cannot absolutely and totally control. I can see why, there is no protection provided by society, so you have to cover your own ass in a very violent and repressive place. But this was just a short talk to a class of students only about the work of the NGO itself. Pity, as my civil society students really wanted a guest speaker. Pity Cambodia is not a hospitable place for such activities.

The day, date, time, and the topics of interest were ALL written down, and attached to my business card. They still got it wrong, whether for real or on purpose. I suppose it is a way to beg off something without looking like you are saying no to a reasonable request: you just say no to what is an unreasonable request. It was pretty clear during my visit to the organization that NO ONE had ever come in with such a request. They had no idea what to do at reception, and many people came to look at me, and there was a lot of discussion in Khmer. I really do not like this. One person can handle things. Eventually I was taken to a person who eyed me with great suspicion, and all the writing took place. But of course after I left it was against the subject of great discussions and misunderstandings, so now there is nothing. In the west organizations leap at the chance to get the word out about themselves to universities and any other groups. Here everything is a trap and not my concern and someone else’s problem/issue and outside my authority and not appropriate or not done in this culture. After all, these are only students: real professionals would not waste their time on students, who are by definition of low rank.

winge winge winge.

A RECENT DINNER

The store was selling perfect little identical chunks of pork, and 4x4x1.5cm in size. I sliced it thinner and then cut the squares in half to make little bricks about 4x2x0.7cm. It seems they have been able to breed pigs made of building blocks. This is a great invention and should be a competitive advantage item for Cambodia.

The dumplings were being made and cooked right on the street. I watched the little girls make each one. She rolled out the little lump of dough (D'oh!), cupped it in her hand, and dropped in something which looked somewhat veggy and then added a slice of hard boiled egg. Then she gathered the outer edge together at the top. Then it went into the wood-fired wok full of cooking oil previously used for doughnuts (or at least the local version of doughnutty snacks). I got for of them for 1000 riel ($0.25). She quoted no fewer than four different prices at me, but I just accepted my change of 3000 riel and four dumplings. I ate two hot, one warm, and the last I broke up to go in with the yellow noodles and pork bricks.

SHAME

Shame here seems very powerful, as so many people seem ashamed about any given thing at any given time. The act of losing face or self is very humiliating, BUT IT DOES NOT PRODUCE ANY ACTION. The shame is simply borne and the person moves on without correcting the problem or changing the activity or addressing the issue. So shame is not a cause which will produce a needed effect.

Sad really: all that shame going to waste.

CLOTHING AND DEVELOPMENT

Cambodia’s biggest factory sector is the garment industry. Now this is the traditional road to higher development, and Cambodia’s factories are dominated by countries which themselves only recently went through the garment phase. But there is a problem with this road today, though not for Cambodia, but rather for Africa.

The worldwide trade in used clothes is enormous. In fact, it is so big that it has interrupted the usual development path of the poorest countries. In the past countries developed by first manufacturing clothing. All countries did this, even the current great economic powers. This is because anyone can make clothing, and everyone wears it. As you get better at it, and as business grows, you can get machines. It is the start of industry. However, now there are so many used clothes around that small clothing manufacturing cannot start in the poorest regions as a way of starting a manufacturing base. Every year thousands of shipping containers full of used clothes circle the globe, and generally end up in Africa and the poor parts of Asia.

Strangely, this break in the progression of manufacturing is as a result of the way westerners buy, wear once, and dispose of clothing, and as a result of the dramatic drop in the price of manufactured clothes due to the low-wage economies of places like Cambodia.

WRITING REPORT

While I was here it became obvious to me that I needed to write a report on the recent state of human rights in Cambodia under the increasingly repressive rule of the dictator-for-life Hun Sen. So I have been working of a compendium of human rights issues and events in the country over the years since 1999. I tentatively call it HALF PAST FREEDOM. HUMAN RIGHTS IN CAMBODIA UNDER THE HUN SEN DICTATORSHIP. I suspect a publisher may be hard to find, but an international NGO concerned with human rights may very well be interested. The reason for the title is that the dictator is building a massive cult of personality for himself and his wife, and one of the key features is that his smiling face, and dressed in either civvies or a quasi-military uniform, graces the faces of watches and clocks around the country. Hun Sen watches are a very common item here. So it is always half past freedom, or quarter to repression, here in Cambodia under Hun Sen.

On an unrelated-to-Cambodia note, I also wrote a screenplay about the capture of the USS Pueblo by North Korea in 1968. Although the script is set in North Korea, it is really about how government torture foreign and domestic prisoners with impunity, and is an indictment of this cruel and sadistic behaviour. Was that subtle enough? Did you get that this is about secret prisons and rendition and Abu Graihb and Guantanamo and the current explosion in torture worldwide?

CORRUPTION AND BOOKS

There is still no word on the shipment of books. The Cambodian government officials have refused to take action and will not say anything to anyone. The British Ambassador has lobbied a minister about the donated books, but has had no response. I will be extremely very most surprised if any Cambodian official takes any action to free up the books. That is simply not done here.

The attitude here is so depressing. People are treated like sub-humans by the elites, and they treat each other the same way. Foreigners are beyond courtesy.

I really have no idea why I am here.

Strangely I do not and can not know if I did more good with the five months of teaching in Phnom Penh, or with the three days of fund-raising in Siem Reap. But I do know that it was a great experience.

MEKONG RIVER

Phnom Penh; the name itself is somehow exotic. It sounds even more remote and mysterious than Sai Gon, only 250 km away. It is a place of intrigue and bribery and shady deals. It is a place where the mighty Mekong River takes over vast tracks of land in cities and farms and turns them into lakes each and every year.

I have been here at the height of the waters in the rainy season and in the depths of the dry season, and by personal observation with a measuring stick, I estimate that the difference between the high water point last year and the low water point this year on the Mekong and Tonle Sap Rivers in central Phnom Penh to be about eight metres (8 m.). That is a stunning amount for anyone in North America. We do not have rivers in our cities which rise and fall 8m twice a year. Can you imagine how much would be flooded? In this region entire areas dissappear under water for a few months at a time. People here tend to build their houses on very tall posts.

The flooding this year in the city has been worse than previous years. Although the rainy season has just started we have experienced very severe flooding in the city streets. Even a rain of only 20 minutes floods whole avenues. The water is not draining away. And corruption and a lack of an control over the elites has a lot to do with this. The land-grabbing here has extended to the lakes in and around the city. These water bodies are being filled in to create new land for buildings, but the bodies were essentially storm reservoirs. With so many filled in there is no place for drainage of the wet season rainfall, so it can sit in the streets for hours, spreading garbage and human excrement far and wide. Sewers are perpetually plugged with garbage due to the unfortunate habit of locals to simply dump all trash in the street and hope god will collect it for them and take it up to heaven for all eternity. Sewers are also collapsing and not being repaired due to corruption in various departments and in contracts. Recently the World Bank asked for teh return of US$71 million in misspent contract money, to which the local dictator replied that the World Bank was defaming Cambodia. So the people here live ankle deep in human and animal waste every time there is a substantial rain for more than 20 minutes, and in the rainy season, that is quite often.

CREMATION

On one of my last days in the city I finally saw a cremation at Wat Ounalom, the main temple in Phnom Penh. The place was packed with people, and there were a lot of police. This was because the deceased was the wife of a cabinet minister. The young men in the family had shaved their heads, as is the tradition here.

In the case of the elites, the body is burned right there in the middle of the main square inside the temple grounds. So after the family and others had looked at the body it was placed in the oven under the temporary ceremonial pyramid. The ceremonial pyramid is a metal frame covered in decorated cloth. It does not burn.

Then came the real surprise, and this is definitely something we do not have at funerals in Canada: fireworks!

A very senior monk from the royal palace, using a long stick, lit a fuze and started a chain reaction of explosions.

The main square was criss-crossed with wires which went to all corners, and to several posts with bent wires lopped around. As the fuze hit the first rocket it shot off across the sqaure along the first wire, and in turn set off several other rockets which went back and forth to all areas, eventually ending at the many posts. The posts then exploded and each of the looped wires burst upward with a firework at the end. The square was filled with smoke form the fireworks, and the noise was quite a surprise.

This was also the signal to start the fire under and around the body, and within minutes there was the strong unmistakable smell of burning flesh. But by then almost everyone was gone. It was all over. In a few hours there would just be ashes. Now that is something you just do not see in the West.

CONCLUSION

This place needs a real revolution. Peasants are now worse off then they were 40 and 50 years ago. Although they have television, they have less access to clean and safe water and far less land overall and per farmer. There is a growing hatred against the urban elites and those who dispossess them of their lands and villages. There is a growing hatred of the userers and middlemen. And with every shooting of villagers by the military and police, there is another family who will definitely give their son to support an uprising.

Let us hope that the next uprising does not bring a new version of the Khmer Rouge to power.

Now when do I get to go home, and where will we go next?

John Clearwater

EPILOGUE

All good stories need an epilogue, and this one is no different.

Thanks to the good offices of Her Majesty's royal Brittanic diplomatic corps, the British ambassador to Cambodia, and his assistant Sian Martin, the books donated to the Royal University of Phnom Penh were finally released from bondage by the corrupt port officials and safely arrived at the university library in early July 2006. I am very grateful for the hard work done by the ambassador and Sian. Thank you.

This place still needs a good revolution.