Karma Chameleons.

I recently touched on the subject of my uncultivated English school life back in 1975, aged 8. Sharing my concerns of the distinct lack of education I received on Cambodian politics and current affairs and I mentioned about my love of a certain western heart throb, few were available to me at the time but looking back the options were limited - The Osmonds, more Donny, due to being similar in age, very polite said please and thank you all the time, well dressed, kinder music to the ears and religious, so my mother really approved. David Cassidy ohh EVERYONE's dream boat but I preferred Shaun. Rod Stewart... ummm.... NO never, because from behind and on the radio I always got him mixed up with Bonnie Tyler. Bay City Rollers, slightly glam rocky, I thought they were different at the time, I didnt need to wear platforms as I already stood out amongst the crowd at 5ft 9 by the age of 10.



Elvis... yes a true legend, whom I appreciate now, but back then I hated him, he ruined my first and last ever family holiday at Butlin's holiday camp in Skegness, August holiday week 1977, when I was 10. Hands up, I am solely to blame for bringing the tragic news to my temperamental mother via skipping to the campas paper shop and picking up 'The Mirror' newspaper, then running back to our chalet in super speed time because it was raining buckets not because Elvis was dead. The soggy paper told my mum that Elvis had died by heart attack, they lied, as he died by lethal colon explosion or something weird which only caused mass hysteria on a pandemic level that had never been seen before on planet earth. Butlins was a wash with weeping house wives and aging teddy boy dads, this badly timed tragedy (for me) just so happen to fall on the one Tuesday of our 7 day holiday, we had only been there two sodden days, we had to all go home straight away as my mother was inconsolable to continue, the family was in mourning for years after that, but this was the actual dawning of my travel itch that didn't get scratched at all back then. I have needed to finish that holiday.



The point to all this is that we were allowed to enjoy listening to who ever we choose too, to wear what ever we wanted to, (well some times!) to voice our opinions (well again in the right circles) we had creative, expressive freedom. So when I wrote that last blog I didn't think Cambodia had any such Idol, but I was very wrong, Cambodia had a massive heart throb, singer songwriter ingenious genius who was all theirs and from Battambang itself.



His name was SIN SISAMOTH, originally a medical student from Battambang City, this man was the first person to introduce western pop music into Cambodian ears around the early 1960's through to 1975. His songs were naturally about sorrow, gravity, the pains and pleasures of romance, desperation and social situations of the time, but with a certain kind of up beatness to them all. He wrote new verses of western songs in to Khmer, Sanskrit and Pali language, such as 'The House Of The Rising Sun' as 'I'm still waiting for you'. I have just downloaded his stuff and currently listening to his version of lally Stott's 'chirpy chirpy cheap cheap song' called 'Nery Samay' in very funky Khmer language but it is melodically slightly different to the original, please help revive this man's memory and check him out for yourself. He was crowned king of Khmer music where young girls and older women drooled over him and all young and grown men wanted to be like him. He became a Battambang hero, the song "Champa Batdambang" won him musical acclaim across the country and soon the pop scene in Phnom Penh grew, he helped blend rock and roll, rhythm and blues, he was beyond his time in so many ways as he also experimented with Latin music then his Khmer traditional music changed and was influenced by a new westernised sound.



He sounds to me like a gentle mix of Elvis, Johnny Cash, Yusif Islam (Cat Stevens) Buddy Holly, and a hint of the original-original teen spirit of Nirvana. He was a true artist, as he could blend in sounds and recreate himself like no one of his time especially in this continent, a Cambodian chameleon weaving good karma. Unfortunately, when Prince Norodom Sihanouk was over thrown by the Khmer he began to publically sing propaganda songs during the early 1970's in support of the falling Khmer Republic. He appeared on public TV wearing military fatigue and sung pro republican and anti monarchy songs in defiance of the weak monarchy at the time. When the Khmer Rough took over Phnom Penh on April 17th 1975 he was forced to leave the city, but they took him to the Killing Fields which is in Phnom Pehn. Despite his rebellious actions the Pol Pot regime were killing thousands of people who were musically, artistically and academically inclined. It is claimed that just before he was about to be shot at The Killing Fields he asked to sing a last song, it is not known which song he sang but after he finished the communist soldiers looked blankly at each other then shot him anyway. The People today still swoon about his name and memory, they go all dreamy in the eyes when you ask them about him, all telling the same wonderful and yet sad story, many I spoke to have a photo of him framed at home, next to the Buddha. Similar to the Elvis generations of the west.




Its funny what you don't learn at school you can learn from music. I learnt about the world through songs like Enola Gay by Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark 1980, which was about USAAF B-29 Superfortress that dropped the "Little Boy" atomic bomb on the Japanese City of Hiroshima on 6 August 1945, seemingly to bring an end to the Second World War. Then there was Bob Geldolfs Feed the world, do they know its Christmas time about the draughts and starvation in Africa. Sunday Bloody Sunday..U2 1983, which is about the troubles in Northern Ireland. Even Billy Joel sang 1989 - We didn't start the fire, A list of whose who in the modern 'baby boomer' world between 1949-89, with such verses as 'Begin.. Reagan, Palestine, terror on the airline, Ayatollah's in Iran, Russians in Afghanistan' which did happen, what education and it was free. But the one great song of that time hurled its way in to my rebellious awareness, I of course refer to that Dead Kennedy's 'A Holiday In Cambodia' 1980, which is now 28 years old, this song was banned everywhere and I had no clue what it was about, that is until I was nearly 15 and still playing it religiously every day. Luckily for me a far more experienced older angelic (to me) punk boy named Paul was also living at the same state run children's home that I lived at during my teens, he had the best damn record collection and fanned bleached bright pink mohican id ever seen in my life, he took the time one afternoon after school to go through the lyrics with me line by line, then the penny dropped.




How ironic the first few lines of the song goes...So you been to school for a year or two and you know you've seen it all..but this next verse used to upset me...Well you'll work harder with a gun in your back for a bowl of rice a day slave for soldiers till you starve then your head is skewered on a stake I will never forget how I felt back then, in fact I didn't really want to believe it was a true situation, now i can see for my self the sad reality of it all. Since the age of 15 I have always wanted to come to Cambodia, now I am here, finally finishing off my holiday from 1977. I do believe I have time threaded again! (Ref to Shaman school blog) .



A child educated only at school is an uneducated child.”
George Santayana



The Killing Cave is in Battambang at Phnom Sampeau is the main thing to see while here, the road to get there is long and dusty, all the trees, houses, markets and people were covered in thick copper dust, a face mask is necessary to breath forget bad fashion, also if you have any hair be sure to wear a hat as mine looked like it had been moulded by a beginner arts and crafts person into a strange fruit basket when I returned home. It is best to go early morning or very late afternoon as the sun is painful. We walked up the steep hill and entered the site. I first met the monk pictured with the interesting face, the Khmer had broken every bone in his face and beaten him within an inch of his life, but his spirit proved stronger. Let me tell you, when you stand next to him his energy is God like, he had the softest eyes and I just loved him. He took money donations to renovate the temple, the long road leading up to the caves, the big gold Buddha or the cave itself and he lists your name so they can paint it in white on a plaque to say thank you.



The small temple was formally used to hold all the Battambang people including women, children and the elderly awaiting to be killed. I sat inside and found myself in a small mediation, this was due it being too hot to really move about much, it was the first time I felt a wave of absolute peace, you would think id feel the residual energies of aggression, fear, anger, rage...but I didn't. The short walk to the cave is where I felt anxious, my stomach started to churn, then you see where and how the people were killed, they were either bludgeoned to death or their throats were cut then all thrown down into a deep cave on top of each other. Today their sculls are piled upon each other in a glass shrine, its eerie in there. Island was our tuk tuk driver and all his grandparents died here, this is when it becomes real.


I am reading Autobiography Of A Yogi right now and when I returned back from this day and picked up my book this jumped out the page at me..

He who would find the deathless essence must not be dismayed by a few unadorned skulls. Human inadequacy becomes clear in the gloomy abode of miscellaneous bones.....Paramahanda Yogananda




Ek Phnom We arrived at Ek Phnom hungry and in need of food, we ordered chicken fried rice from a very basic shack that in hindsight had no ice cooler! After a few minutes I saw a featherless chicken swinging for its life from a young boys hand. Its feathers were making their way to the floor beneath. I was soon distracted by a young girl reading English from the English Grammar book so I helped her out, she was thrilled by this, a real English person reading to her in English. We got to the bit about 'is the car purple or blue, is the apple red or green?' Important stuff to know in life.....I was practising my Khmer on her too with...”Joom reeup soua, Sok sabai tay?, Bantop dtuk no ai na? Awkun”. (Hello, how are you? where is the bathroom? Thank you) Just the simple stuff for now. I suddenly heard the most almighty squawking and flapping, the chicken bit of the chicken fried rice order was being slaughtered right then. Lunch arrived one hour later and the meat was very brown and full of freshly pimpled looking plucked skin, God then sent me a very skinny starving hungry dog who slipped in by my knees out of view from the chief, I felt a bit Judas but the dog was gratefully scoffing down the fresh meat.



We passed the young monk playing with his monkey. The same small girl escorted me up the many steps to the top of this lovely 11th century temple. Her English was great and she didn't hassle me for money at all, I bought her a drink and we both sat and hung out together talking English phrases and laughing at pronunciations like we were both graduates from Oxford. I showed her the photos on my camera, she saw the monk with the broken face, who was now miles away in the opposite direction, she shouted his name, so he must be well know and respected around here. When we left she stood clutching the empty green tea bottle of juice that id bought her 4 hours ago and waved goodbye until our tuk tuk was just a spot of dust in the distance.




NORI-The Bamboo Train This is like being in an original St. Trinians film, a bamboo train is the more novelty way of seeing some sights in Battambang like some cows and a bit of flat country land leading to know where special but more ruralness. It is made from two sets of railway wheels, a mat, cushions, and a generator. The young Flash Harry steers this thing at 100 mph (it seemed like this when on board..see video for proof...!) along a flat line. When another Bamboo train approaches one of them stops suddenly, dismantles gets out of the way, the train passes, they get back on the tracks, re-build the Bamboo Nori train again and carry on up the track. I'm not sure who has right of way especially when a real train comes along which they do, they close their eyes tight and pray to the God of bamboo trains.



Lastly, when ever has a decision to do something different or take a job offer changed not only you but a whole nation. Everywhere you go here Lara Croft is mentioned, the star herself decided to do this film in 2001, she fell in love with this country and decided to adopt Maddox her eldest son. But people don't really know how involved with Cambodia she really is. She set up Maddox Jolie Pitt foundation (MJP) In the North western Samlaut district of Battambang, she has invested millions to rehabilitate the post war areas, get eco systems in place, wildlife protection, tree deforestation and watershed conservations. 52% of Battambangs rapidly growing population of 1,250,695 are women. This is mainly because a lot of the men were killed over these last thirty years, they are still re adjusting. Samlaut district in Battambang province was the worst effected war zone during this time, the most amount of land mine victims and poor live there today and many women still run the households alone, leaving a complete breakdown of traditional family values. During the next few years the foundation plans to build schools, construct public toilets and roads and build health care centres giving training to health workers. What she gives is out amazing, karmic coins all round for the next life, the Cambodian people dont really see her as the film star, they see her as another kind of heroine, the one who is doing something for them and reviving the Battambang area and its people. But it seems all this good is being siphoned out in other ways by the greed of some foolish others.



I read this public comment left on a Cambodian issues forum generally about Ms. A J's ongoing commitment to this country in comparison to continuous corruption issues by lesser spirited others:



"Someone has told me that Hun Sen (prime minister of Cambodia) is now 3 billions dollars man. I said where he got all these monies. They said, he sold all trees in Cambodia, lands to Vietnam, sky to airline( charge all airlines by seat), oil to American, permits to all criminals and foreign aids. Wow. He can consume so much? Where all those monies? They said in Hong Kong Bank, Singapore Bank, In Switzaland Bank and Australia in different names. They said he is a great robber in this 21 century !”

But remember its the meek that shall

Buddhas at killing caves

inherit this earth!

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