Verite, Liberte...

New York

I left SE Asia exactly 25 days ago. And since my return, I have had time to reflect on the experience and its impact on me, what I learned from the time there.

One of the things that I came across again and again, was an attitude toward human life that was assaultive to my western spirit. Just to set the record straight for those of you who think this will be a nationalistic commentary on how great American freedom and justice are, it is not. Amnesty International, among other groups, has made it clear that there are violations of human rights in the U.S. We are not without sin in this regard.

However, the sheer quantity of suffering, inhuman conditions, crazy people running countries like North Korea and Myanmar, make the canvas much brighter and much uglier in Asia, in my view. In Thailand, I visited the refugee center in Bangkok and watched the process as Sri Lankan refugees, Tamil people, who fled for their lives, try to get either food or an apartment for one month from a local aid organization. One father, around 40, sat at a picnic table during the interview, his three children, ages 6 months, 4 years and 6 years of age, sitting there, too, watching while their destiny was being decided by strangers.

This is how it works in Thailand, or more precisely, in Bangkok . The borders are very porous, so it is easy to get into the country. The trick is staying there. If the police pick you up and you don't have papers, they can jail you ( unless, of course, you have a bribe handy..but that implies that you might actually have some money and most of these folks are poor--not America poor, but In the meantime, while you're trying not to get picked up, you go to the UN and demonstrate why you should be considered for political asylum. That process can take up to 18 months. And even with that documentation, there is always the possibility that the police will try to take you in anyway--and a bribe. Money is the currency of freedom in Bangkok.

Back to the Sri Lankan family. The social workers talk about what they can do for this family with the limited amount of money they have available to help several families on this particular day. The discussion goes something like this: "Well, they don't have a place to stay, and they don't have food. And we only have enough money for either food or shelter this month, so it should probably be the rent--at least they will not be on the street." That conversation is translated to the family. The Sri Lankan mother, holding the youngest child, asks: " Could we have some powdered milk for the baby?"

And that is just one family.

But this is simply the backdrop for my story today, the story of Pol Pot and his regime--the impact of which continues to reverberate in Cambodia. Pol Pot, as I have mentioned in previous postings, believed that a Utopian society built on an agrarian model was the answer to governance in the country. in 1975-79, his regime displaced the entire population of Pnom Penh, sending the urbanites to work on farms in the countryside. Brother #1, as he was known, was a dictator--and not a benevolent one, either.

In Phnom Penh, nearly empty, he established a prison, S21, where Cambodians were incarcerated. The prison, a converted school, soon became the macabre home of physicians, intellectuals, political dissidents--anyone who was considered any kind of threat to the regime. The commandant of the prison was a man called Duch ( pronounced DOIK ) who signed the orders for every torture session ( they were held in three hour intervals 8-11am; 2-5pm; 7-10pm.)--and participated along with is guards.

After the regime ended, Duch along with other Khmer Rouge leaders, disappeared. 20 years later, in 1999, a journalist found him. He was living in a small Cambodian village doing aid work with villagers. He had allegedly become "born again" and regretted his part in the Khmer death camp he directed. He was arrested soon after.

Just this past few months, 10 years after his arrest, he is being tried in Phnom Penh by a tribunal of five judges after major dragging-of-feet by Cambodian authorities for years. This week, Duch testified. He talked about the types of torture he authorized which included electric shock, beatings, tearing nails out of fingers and toes. And added that he was "only following orders."

It is estimated that 14,000 people from S21 either died there, or were trucked to a field outside of town, coined the Killing Fields by the movie of the same name, where while blindfolded and bound, they were led to an open pit, and one by one bludgeoned with a steel rod in the back of the head. After they were killed, they were thrown into the hole, lifeless.

I'm not a big fan of using the word "evil". But this is an exception. This is the same kind of disregard for life that can be found countless other places in the world -- and was certainly true in WWII war atrocities in Nazi death camps.

Cambodia, 30 years later, seems to be still reeling from the horrors of the past. 20% of the approximately 8million were exterminated by the Khmer. And it would probably be safe to say that many of those who are old enough to have lived through the regime either knew what was going on or in some way might have been complicit.

About 1/3 of my monk students were Cambodian. One of them remembers the Khmer coming into his village when he was 10 years old. They asked the monks to disrobe. They refused. They were taken to the edge of town and shot. The local school teacher was shot. The parents of village children were sent to work in the fields, and their children were housed communally in the remains of the village Buddhist temple where they were fed basically watered down rice. My student, Kim Yi, lived in a refugee camp for three years after the war. His family lost their farm.

So, I am watching the Duch trial with great interest. There are still Khmer in Cambodia, in fact, the prime minister was Khmer. And, I'm told that the Khmer who still fight near the border are fierce warriors and feared by other SE Asian soldiers.

I wish I could wrap this up with some one liner, or wise words. But I don't have any. Except to say that perhaps what I have learned from my time in SE Asia is that human life is more precious to me than ever before. And freedom? I think I have a deepening of its power for humankind and a renewed appreciation of the responsibility it implies to preserve and protect it.

MC