#37 – Riptide
The pride phenomenon
Sou Sdei Chnam Thmei! Welcome to Campuccino, your fortnightly dispatch of key headlines in Cambodia with a dash of opinion.
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I enjoyed hibernating at home in Phnom Penh while the rest of the country enjoyed the water fights and Khmer New Year celebrations. It feels like people are overcompensating for the past two years of zero celebration. I’m happy for them but one thing keeps nagging in my mind – Covid-19 hasn’t gone away yet. The sight of bodies against bodies packed neatly across Cambodia is an unsettling one for me to say the least. I guess we shall see in a week or two if there is no big price tag attached to this massive celebration.
- Darathtey
In this issue: Khmer New Year, construction workers, film and book reviews, and cultural rants.
Let’s talk about Khmer New Year 2022. According to the Office of the Cambodian PM, the three-day celebration attracted 4.5 million national and international visitors across the country with the most visited destinations being Battambang, Kampong Cham and Siem Reap, respectively. It does feel and look like Covid-19 is behind us. I hope it stays that way.
This year, even the angel ceremony got a major facelift with HD quality and drone shots. For those of you who don’t know what I’m talking about, the angel ceremony is a pre-recorded TV segment played when the new-year angel comes to replace the last year one. It is a cultural phenomenon watched by Cambodians all over the country. I couldn’t help but notice that the previous year’s Angel thanked the government for taking good care of the people ;) Also, for the year of Tiger, an astrologer predicted that the Angel would carry a gun in her left hand to protect the Cambodian borders. The astrologer couldn’t explain why the borders needed protection, however. Ahh…so many questions and so few answers.
During the long break, I went through some of the longer news reports that have been sitting in my to-read list. I tried to find a nice hook for this article but I couldn’t think of anything except that it is a great article by Andy Ball, Vutha Srey and Gerald Flynn. Go read it. I’m serious. The article tells a detailed story about terrible and dangerous working conditions for construction workers in Phnom Penh. Many of them live on-site with their families which is not safe or hygienic by any standard. Many construction workers toil under informal contractors which means that they are not properly equipped and usually underpaid.
Another title that caught my attention is a potential enforced gratitude attempt by the Kampot governor. It’s not groundbreaking news or anything, it’s just over the top and, therefore, deserves a mention. Here’s the tea: the Kampot governor Mao Thonin said that education in Kampot should instill a “culture of gratitude” by installing a photo of the PM in every classroom. Students then need to bow in front of the PM’s photo to give thanks for putting the roof over their heads for learning. I mean I love my parents but I was never asked to bow in front of their photos or anything. Unnecessary and a bit silly, don’t you think? 😅
Visually Pleasing
Arts & Culture
I finally got to see White Building by Kavich Neang. I love the slowness of the film which offers many scenes of simply beautiful cinematography and unique perspectives. I also admire the space that the film leaves for its audience to reflect and make their own judgment on certain issues. Simply put, the White Building doesn’t do a lot of handholding for its audience.
Let’s talk about a song that has been consuming my headspace last week - Cambodian Pride (alt. Youtube link here). So much pride that I couldn’t find a single thing to be proud of from this song. It is bad, very bad that I cringe every time she starts singing. The English part of the song is very hard to understand with grammatically incorrect sentences, and the Khmer part is pure patriotic (the video was posted straight out of the PM’s FB page. Ding Ding Ding!). There is a bit in Khmer that read “We are Khmer. We love Khmer and everything that Khmer has.” 🤦 Artistically, it’s also cringey. The MV is one of those I like to call heritage porn in which they cram in as many cultural heritage assets as possible. It’s like a cultural slap in your face. I’m glad I'm not the only one disapproving of this disaster. This guy reacted to this song in his own song (Disclaimer: Khmer and English with explicit language). I agree with most things he said and it’s kinda cool.
Along with the whole pride movement that has been going on in the country, I notice that there has been an active attempt to shift the grim reputation of Sihanouk province among Cambodians. Right now, it looks like a pride town instead of the shitty ville you read about in the news. Disclaimer: the last time I was there was in 2016, and I have no intention of returning any time soon. Hence, what I say here is based on what I see in the media and through social listening.
The massive “ខ្មែរធ្វើបាន” (“Khmer can do” in literal English translation) tagline installed at one of the curve roads to the province. I noticed this first on my Facebook newsfeed because people in my circle seem to enjoy taking photos in front of it. This tagline also appears in multiple music videos.
The recent installation of a ginormous Preah Thong and Neang Neak. The two figures are commonly known to be the foundation of Khmer culture and founders of the pre-Angkorian state of Funan. According to the PM, the statue is supposed to represent Cambodian identity. I’m still curious though, why place it there and not in any other province?
Exhibit 1 & 2. Photo courtesy PM’s Facebook page (screenshot of the inauguration video)
Worth Reading
I finally finished reading Troubling the Water by Abby Seiff. For non-fiction, the book is packed with information without compromising its beauty in the writing. At some parts, Abby’s writing feels very poetic to me, and I love that she chose to take a very detailed look at every person in the communities that she interacted with. Despite their struggles, I respect that they were given a dignifying perspective by the author.
Overheard on Twitter
Campuccino is a fortnightly dispatch of key headlines in Cambodia, written by @DarathteyDin from Word & Visual.
I’d love to hear from you. If you have feedback or content ideas, please reach out via tey@wordandvisualmedia.com
The construction story was well written. The slow transition from 'developing' to middle class societies is frustrating. It takes generational changes to mindsets, for the poor to rebel at starvation wages, for laws against corruption to be enforced at all levels, for human rights to be afforded to the working and poor classes.
It is good to see there are organizations supporting the workers, now they need to reach the workers. It appears the press has freedom to report, and cause the guilty to lose face and maybe gain jail time in Cambodia. A free press is the key to positive change.
Regarding the provincial governor, sounds more ominous as creating a cult of personality and even apotheosis (deification of a leader) than just silly. Yeah it's just in a school, for now...
Paraphrasing wikipedia, a cult of personality is the result of an effort to create an idealized and heroic image of a leader by a government, often through unquestioning flattery and praise, and often accompanies leaders of authoritarian countries. A few come to mind.