Why Cambodia?

Whenever I tell people I am going to Cambodia, at least fifty percent of the time the response is: "Wow, Cambodia. That's intense. So, why Cambodia?" This occurs nearly twice a day, so one would think by now I'd have a solid stock reply. However, I usually fumble over my words and end up rambling awkwardly about anime and war until the unfortunate inquisitor nods politely and abandons the conversation. And as the trip draws closer and I become more and more anxious about leaving my friends, family, and Justin behind, I find myself pondering the same question. Why Cambodia?

First, let me confess it is not entirely selfless and noble. I admit I get the slightest glee with every awe-filled "Wow" I hear. It's exotic; it's clear on the other side of the globe; it's beyond what many Westerners imagine; it's even a bit original. How many undergraduates boast traveling to France or Italy--not that I'm bad-mouthing them: Everyone should study abroad, explore the world, and expand their world view--but how many get to claim Cambodia. Most of my friends can tell you about my rather unflattering obstinance towards all-things trendy. The more people who like something, the more I tend to shun it. (Although in my collegiate years I have made great strives to overcome this disposition. For example, I read and finished and even enjoyed all the Harry Potter Books.) Thusly, Cambodia appeals to my taste for the original and uncommon. Yet, there are tons of other places that warrant such a description and would earn the same "Wow"s. This doesn't answer the question, it just lets you know I am human and unfortunately suffer the some vanity as most--though I crave the original, I am quite ordinary in my struggles.

The source of my zeal for South East Asia, I can most easily trace back to my middle-school career. Junior high school has two instances that stand out as defining points, the trickling tributaries that lead me to the South China Sea. First, Gundam Wing. Now as far as anime experts go, it's not the best mecha-drama, but good kid's stuff for the after-hours programing on Cartoon Network's Toonami. My friend Meg and I sort of discovered it simultaneously and instantly became addicted. The story, and I will try my best to summarize and keep it simple, is this: 5 Mechas from a third party rebel group take on the the conflicting sides of an epic war between Earth and the Space colonies. The details of the plot are not nearly as relevant as the interwoven theme holding the ridiculous story together: Peace. The series is beautifully and hauntingly anti-war, and it's message so resounded in me that from it I learned of the value of human life and the inhumanity of war. I became a self-professed pacifist and wouldn't harm anything so much as a spider, a trademark characteristic that I donned all the way through high school. Gundam Wing unlocked the reality of war and the world of Japanese culture to me.

The second movement bore itself in the form of an oral report, one to prepare me and my peers for high school. In our general Reading and Language Arts class, our bubbly and very pregnant teacher, whose name has slipped away from me in time, assigned us to give a comprehensive 5-8 minute report on any topic we so desired to research. We spent an entire nine weeks, leafing through encyclopedias in the library, plugging in names and page numbers in bibliographies, and rehearsing our masterpieces of rhetoric. I chose to do the 1960s (and a little bit of the 70s). My teacher informed me I had to narrow my subject. Therefore, I chose 1) The Civil Rights Movement-MLK Jr, Malcolm X, Rosa Parks, sit-ins and marches 2) Woodstock-Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix's Star-spangled Banner, Love Ins and mud and 3) The Vietnam War. My mother earns the blame for my desire to be hippie and both my parent's love for folk music, Simon and Garfunkel and Judy Collins, for my inherited intrigue in the tumultuous years in America's History. Through this oral report, I discovered that the Vietnam War wasn't actually a war (but a "Police Action") and the rules of war were set aside. I had my first encounter with the strange and exotic name, Cambodia, and how the US dropped more bombs upon neutral Cambodia than we had the Japanese in WWII, and how this small country suffered at the hands of the Viet Cong and the US and the French. My report lasted for 15 minutes and blew the other kids discussions of hockey and Ancient Roman culture out of the water. It also left me with dozens of unanswered questions about who, what, and more importantly how-how could things so terrible happen and how on earth do people move on. Turns out, that the 1960s and early '70s bombings and raids on Cambodia were just a prelude to what the next decade would bring.

I can't recall the specific moment when chills climbed my spine at the hushed mention of the "Killing Fields." I do remember picking up a small brochure at the "green shirt" Youth Missions Conference Re:mix and mouthing as read "Cambodia", a short term mission to Cambodia and knowing I had to go. My best friend Anne and I decided that the following summer we find ourselves in Cambodia. I remember Whis telling me it would be expensive and very far away and I not caring one bit if the cost or the distance. I only knew the desire to go. And I vividly recall my parents saying absolutely not. "Do you know what happened there?" my father demanded. I had no idea. It was probably in that conversation he referenced the movie, starring a young Sam Waterson, called the "Killing Fields" If I was so fascinated with Vietnam and Cambodia, I should try watching that film and the "Deer-Hunter" and see how much I wanted to go then. Then, there was the visit to the hospital to see my dad, the TV muted so we could talk. Nevertheless, the flashes of rifles going off, the frantic movements of people fleeing, and the bodies racking up couldn't be ignored. "The Killing Fields" just so happened to be on the TV. It was turned off. Later I accidentally bought it from Blockbuster; it sits on a shelf unopened here in the apartment. Yet, I didn't have to watch it to find out what my dad was talking about.

In the fall of 2007, for my Languages of the World class, I decided to do my research project on the Tampuan, a hill-tribe from northwestern Cambodia. Sitting surrounded by other students cramming for finals, I stared, mouth agaped, at my laptop. I read for the first time detailed history on the Khmer Rouge. The name had arisen before in my readings of Cambodia here and there. Likewise, "genocide" appeared. But not before this past October had I truly learned what occurred in Cambodia.

After the US back Lon Nol coup in 1970, communists throughout the country started to rebel and grow momentum. Disenfranchised peasants rallied to the Communists aid, the Khmer Rouge. By 1975, they had swept the country and seize the capital, Phnom Penh. Immediately after taking control, they evacuated the cities, forced the people to work as peasants, systematically killed suspected traitors, the Muslim Cham, the Chinese, the Vietnamese, and in the end 25% of the population. I sat in the middle of the Cathedral of Learning Commons room bawling, tears falling a great number onto my lap, as the disrupted studiers stared at me.

I decided to come to Cambodia because I want to understand how a country can rebuild after such atrocities, how they can begin again despite the horror that has taken place. I come to Cambodia to understand how life goes on. Here I take 2 classes: 1) The history of Cambodia until the present and 2) Poli-Sci Modern-nation building in the wake of genocide. Perhaps I will find some answers to the questions that first struck me in middle school.