Cambodians try to forget the horrible past and build a future

Text and photos by Graham Simmons

PHNOM PENH (JP): Yok Seng, a Phnom Penh taxi driver, tells a tragic story. Were it not so familiar, you would find his account difficult to believe.

With his wife and family of 10 children, Yok Seng was moved out to the countryside by the Khmer Rouge, and put to work. Starting in the fields at 4 a.m., the family were lucky if they finished by 10 at night. For this toil, the reward might be one bowl of thin soup per day.

Yok Seng lost eight of his 10 children during this period. He reckons that, in total, three million people were killed by the Khmer Rouge, a group that has been variously called the most murderous groups of thugs ever to presume to "govern" a nation, or an opposite-but-equal reaction to the horrific excesses of the war of the 70s.

As the great travel writer Norman Lewis said in his 1982 preface to A Dragon Apparent:

"South Vietnam was already a wasteland, deluged by high explosions, poisons and fire ... now it was the turn of Cambodia and Laos, delivered to the greatest holocaust ever to be visited on the East ... What could these people have suffered to transform them, formed (as they were) in the ambulatories of monasteries rather than on the barracks square, into those terrible and implacable warriors who flocked to the standards of the Khmer Rouge?"

However, despite memories that gnaw at the heart, Yok Seng (like most Cambodians) is now trying to forget the recent past, and build a future.

Maybe more than any other country, Cambodia has a glorious ancient history to which it can look. This backdrop, as epitomized in the temples of Angkor, is an anchor, a lynch-pin around which the country is slowly re-building itself.

Today the city of Phnom Penh is peaceful, and showing signs of marked progress. Particularly along the banks of the superbly landscaped Mekong and Tonle Sap rivers, the gracious temple architecture of this city rivals anything that Bangkok has to offer -- all in a vastly less hectic environment. Standing in pride of place is the Royal Palace of King Sihanouk: in this compound the palace proper, the Silver Pagoda, the royal treasury and the Napoleon III summer-house share a garden with many smaller shrines and temples.

Traveling in the main tourist areas of Cambodia (including Phnom Penh, Siem Reap/Angkor and the road from Vietnam to Phnom Penh) is at last safe. However, some areas, notably the Cardamom Mountains and Elephant Mountains of the south-west, are still notorious as Khmer Rouge strongholds. Roads from Phnom Penh to Kompong Thom, Kompong Cham and Battembang are also risky, due to dangers from mines or from bandit attacks.

Much is made of the presence of corruption in modern-day Cambodia. But I think any fair-minded observer would have to agree with Cambodia's Information Minister Ieng Mouly, who in response to criticism leveled against his government in The Economist, stated on Jan. 7, 1996, in a letter to the editor of that magazine: "Cambodia is like a person in convalescence after a prolonged illness. It is recovering. It needs to heal its wounds, and during this convalescence it needs peace, security, and stability. Without this environment its illness very much risks relapsing, which is good neither for Cambodia nor for the world."

I arrived in Phnom Penh in the dry season. My hosts (from the Australian Aid for Cambodia Fund -- AACF), who are helping to build a university in the east of the country, were unanimous on one thing. "See Angkor!" they said. "If there's one thing that will help you understand the mystique of Cambodia, it's this, the world's greatest temple complex."

I had a vague knowledge of Angkor, but no premonition of the dramatic effect this complex would have upon my whole way of relating to the world. This experience was yet to come; for the time being, I was content to tag along on a trip out to the new university, a joint project between AACF and the Cambodian Ministry of Education, at Kamchay Mea near the Vietnam border.

We set out on the main Phnom Penh-Ho Chi Minh City Highway. Restored Buddhist temples and Wats line the road, jostling for space with new high-rise buildings. It's as though Cambodia is determined to catch up on 20 years of lost opportunities.

At Neak Luong, we line up to board the vehicular ferry that crosses the Mekong here. "You like drink?" scream a hundred urchins peddling their wares: Cans of cold lychee juice with jelly, coconut juice, mango or orange drinks. In this heat, the offer is too good to refuse. Then comes a traipse of beggars: people with limbs blown off by mines, orphans, or simple opportunists. You give maybe a couple of hundred riel (10 U.S. cents) to the most obviously disfigured, and then wonder whether even this is just a sop to your conscience.

From Neak Luong, the road branches north and gently following the Mekong, reaches the provincial capital of Prey Veng. Prey Veng? Not a place name on everyone's lips: but maybe it should be. Situated on the banks of a picturesque lake, Le Petit Lac de Prey Veng, this town still has a full complement of superb temple architecture.

North of Prey Veng, the road gets worse. It's now fair to terrible, and every other shade of condition in between. But a road's a road, and in Cambodia any passable thoroughfare is something to grateful for.

Prey Veng province is one of the poorest in Cambodia, but thankfully escaped the worst ravages of the Khmer Rouge. The mono-culture ("rice only") mentality is something the government is trying to change, with extensive planting of sugar-palms, a tree that yields sugar, fiber, building materials and fuel. At Kamchay Mea, this drive is being augmented by the efforts of Frances Mowling, a gifted permaculture expert from Adelaide. Frances has established extensive food gardens, in an attempt to bring about greater crop diversity within the region.

At "downtown" Kamchay Mea, students are living it up at the local karaoke bar. Such diversions are rare, in an environment where the atmosphere is one of total dedication. Dedication on the part of the reaching staff, who have given their all to come and work here, and from the students, who are studying management, medicine and agriculture with a commitment that would put our own students to shame.

One of the aims of the AACF University is to revive in the students the memory of their ancient culture -- the same genius that built the temples of Angkor. The last great king of Angkor, Jayavarman VII, has only recently been to his rightful place in history. Not only did he construct the huge complex of Angkor Thom (which has four sides, each 12 kilometers long), but also built over a 100 rest-houses for travelers, and 102 fully- equipped hospitals specializing in herbal remedies.

The ancient Khmer knowledge of herbal medicine is being revived at Kamchay Mea. A team of doctors from Indonesia, led by the enthusiastic Dr. Vishwanath Hiremath, have come here as volunteers, and setting up groups that have scoured the countryside for medicinal plants. At the dispensary in Kamchay Mea, specialized grinding and crushing machinery reduces the dried plants to powder, which in turn is fashioned into little pills. The need for expensive western medicine is bypassed, and local industry is supported in the process.

But it's to Angkor itself that I was destined to travel next.

The fast boat to Siem Reap (the jumping-off for the Angkor temples -- see Fact File) leaves Phnom Penh at 7 a.m. every day. Heading north-east along the Tonle Sap River, our first stop is at Kampong Chhnang, a prosperous-looking riverine port. Many fishing vessels ply their trade along the river, and this port is an important market town.

Our boat picks up speed and soon enters the huge inland sea of Lake Tonle Sap. So vast is this lake that soon the shoreline disappears from sight, and you could be in the middle of the ocean. The only reminders that you're inland are the occasional floating beds of lotus-lilies.

The boat arrives at Siem Reap, from where it's a 12 km trip into town. Siem Reap has a mystique you find nowhere else in Cambodia. Patrician-looking gentlemen in while robes stroll the streets, while graceful ladies loiter under umbrellas. The houses, all constructed of teak or mahogany, could last a 1,000 years.

The Angkor temple complex covers an area of 310 square kilometers and comprises over 1,000 temples. Of these, many are in ruins, but there are still distinct sites open to visitors. Since the designation of Angkor as a world heritage site (as recently as 1993), a comprehensive restoration program has been put in place.

Around the Bayon, the centerpiece of the Angkor Thom compound, the jungle sings. The cicadas sound like bellbirds, while in the background a low mopoke-like shrill breaks the monotonous din.

The Bayon stuns. This huge 12th century complex of 54 towers, over 40 meters high, completely dominates the surrounding area. Inside, the cicada-hum becomes piercing, a throbbing rhythm of life. And from the towers overhead, over 200 smiling faces (of the Buddhist Bodhisattva figure Avalokitesvara) look down at you.

This place evokes an overwhelming feeling of complete bliss, and seems to speak directly to your heart, saying "no worries!"

Angkor Wat, which predates the Bayon by a full 100 years, is the most famous of all the Angkor temples. It seems to speak more to the mind than to the heart, with its precise architectural detail. Walk into the inner compound: the superb craftsmanship of the stone carving here almost defies description. Then climb the steep stairs and walk around the battlement surrounding the temple. Each side reveals a totally new panorama.

At sunset, the whole Angkor area is bathed in a soft ethereal light. For once, the mind and the heart are in rare unison.

Visiting Angkor today, you feel that here is the germ of a new civilization. But like Angkor, the Cambodian national spirit is in dire need of restoration. Hundreds of years of overgrowth need to be removed, so that the true genius of this civilization can once more shine through. At last, this goal seems to be within reach.