King Norodom Sihanouk has died

[Sam Lord]

I have never understood the adulation of privelage. It is one of those things, like the virgin birth, that my mind has never been able to process.

[Kev Bar]

I have never understood the adulation of privelage. It is one of those things, like the virgin birth, that my mind has never been able to process.

Well Sam, it seems you are so far from it, you can't even spell it.

But what else am I here for, if not to help you understand.

At least you don't dismiss its somewhat baffling existence.

Like the fool one encounters elsewhere on this thread.

I need a little exotica myself as a booster.

Buckingham leaves me cold.

[Sam Lord]

Well Sam, it seems you are so far from it, you can't even spell it.

Typo. I swear.

[Kev Bar]

Typo. I swear.

Be careful...we would have picked you up at the gates.

Us pampered elites are always on the look out for threats to our privileged existence.

However, on behalf of my noble class and as a sign of our largesse, I bequeath a pardon.

[Kev Bar]

Here's D. Gordon Longmuir
former Ambassador of Canada
to the Kingdom of Cambodia

In a prelude he tells Nate Thayer:

I actually liked the old rascal, though -- on the whole, he served his country well, but, as you say, it's complicated...

Please convey my sincere personal cond
olences, and those of my wife, to Her Majesty the Queen Mother, to the Royal Family and to the people of Cambodia on the passing of His Majesty the King Father, who was truly the father of his country and the legendary figure we meet only once in our lifetimes. I have the temerity to have considered him my friend; we met many times and had many discussions of issues both vital and trivial. He was unfailing courteous, hospitable and curious, displaying a fine sense of humour with myself and with Canadian visitors who had the honour of an audience with him. One never felt ill at ease with His Majesty and I always knew I could broach the most sensitive questions with a good chance of receiving a substantive and thoughtful response. I was a devoted follower of the Bulletin Mensuel.

His Majesty was at his best when something excited his passions, for example, when he put Cambodia back on the road to a democratic process in 1998: he consulted closely with his Ministers, of course, but also with the foreign diplomatic corps, of which I had the honour to be a part. Even in the decade or so after I retired from the Canadian foreign service, I always found His Majesty willing to meet me if he happened to be in Phnom Penh or Siem Reap when I was visiting, the last time about three years ago. I particularly recall bringing my daughter to meet him in Siem Reap some years ago; she was charmed and deeply moved by the opportunity. One of the indisputably great figures of the 20th century, and a champion of his people always, His Majesty will be deeply mourned and greatly honoured by all Cambodians and the many friends of the Kingdom abroad.

[Sam Lord]

However, on behalf of my noble class and as a sign of our largesse, I bequeath a pardon.

It's very kind of you and a clear improvement on the attitude displayed in much of your posting on this thread which, to be frank, I have found very disappointing and beneath you. It was my understanding that individuals of your class background were brought up to be gentlemen but instead with regard to a fellow member of the site you have been displaying qualities I would normally associate with the Australian cricket team. You can be better than that Kev, I'm sure.

I won't bother pursuing the affinity with royalty.

[Kev Bar]

It's very kind of you and a clear improvement on the attitude displayed in much of your posting on this thread which, to be frank, I have found very disappointing and beneath you. It was my understanding that individuals of your class background were brought up to be gentlemen but instead with regard to a fellow member of the site you have been displaying qualities I would normally associate with the Australian cricket team. You can be better than that Kev, I'm sure.

I won't bother pursuing the affinity with royalty.

We all have weaknesses...how else would you justify the execution?

Re cricket.

Sadly I can neither be contrite - nor more potently offensive - as the gobdaw in question has disappeared.

But surely as an afficiando of the game, you realise you can't give the run of the field to any given idiot to promulgate falsehood.

The Christian Brothers, however, may not have left me with the most accurate undertstanding of the game.

[Kev Bar]

Well it seems this was not cricket.

The privileged manager inspires poor workers to near riot by act of lese majeste...disrespect for photos of Sihanouk.

http://www.bangkokpost.com/breakingn...ihanouk-photos

[Kev Bar]

It's very kind of you and a clear improvement on the attitude displayed in much of your posting on this thread which, to be frank, I have found very disappointing and beneath you. It was my understanding that individuals of your class background were brought up to be gentlemen but instead with regard to a fellow member of the site you have been displaying qualities I would normally associate with the Australian cricket team. You can be better than that Kev, I'm sure.

I won't bother pursuing the affinity with royalty.

Hmmm.
A similar critique just came in from elsewhere.
Like you Sam, it was a well-wishing based concern.

It was suggested I rework the initial post in response to something more substanital than the accusation the king was a mere poseur.

Aiming too low.

Suggested I might want to respond to this.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blog...-sihanouk.html


Suppose that I might.

[Sam Lord]

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blog...-sihanouk.html

I found it interesting. Especially this bit:

Like Pol Pot’s perverse ideology of annihilation in the name of nationalist authenticity, the mirage of Khmer monarchism—that the king was the nation’s greatness and glory made flesh—was concocted in Paris, untroubled by reference to historical reality. When the French colonized Indochina in the late nineteenth century, they discovered the magnificent temple and palace complex of Angkor buried deep in the jungle. Realizing that Cambodia had once been among the most sophisticated powers on earth, French scholars encouraged twentieth-century Cambodians to imagine that their decadent and largely impotent royal family carried all the promise of past Khmer greatness. The French built a fancy new royal palace in Phnom Penh, where Sihanouk came of age. So it was not as surprising as one might wish it was, that as the Khmer Rouge began their reign of mass murder, forty-some years ago, Pol Pot and Sihanouk paused to pose for photographs together in the Angkorian ruins.

The Khmer Rouge, I think, also harkened back to the time of Khmer greatness.

It seems to be what the "communists" and royalty had in common.

[Kev Bar]

I found it interesting. Especially this bit:



The Khmer Rouge, I think, also harkened back to the time of Khmer greatness.

It seems to be what the "communists" and royalty had in common.

Indeed.

It is interesting. And quite a notable feature of Khmer politics.

It's rare though that you get a politician/leader who does not exploit a grounds for potency.

So the manner of the exploitation becomes relevant.

[Kev Bar]

You read Philip Gourevitch's piece on Cambodia's King Norodom Sihanouk in The New Yorker.

And you just know that Mr Gourevitch doesn't know who is talking about.

It is obvious he has never met King Sihanouk.

In person.

Cos Gourevitch is a bright person.

And had he met Sihanouk we'd know about it.

Cos Sihanouk has that impression on people.

This is no boasty, braggy, access thing.

It's just because Sihanouk was a pretty unique act.

Just think of all the profiles.

All the usual suspects:boy-king, pampered, mercurial, erratic, Oriental playboy, artistic, saffron robed exotica.

Everyone struggling to deal with the fact, to articulate in some way, that Sihanouk was the real deal.

Cos Sihanouk was the real deal.

"The Fantasy of King Sihanouk."

That's what the New Yorker says.

And that is actually what Gourevith seems totally ignorant of or oblivious to.

Fantasy.

Spectacle.

Art.

Sihanouk had no arms or money.

He didn't rape his people.

He wasn't a kelptocrat.

He worked for his supper.

A scam artist maybe?

But an artist.

He hustled on behalf of Cambodia.

Not always perfectly.

But let's take the worst of what Gourevitch throws at him:

Distorting quite a few facts along the way, the big accusation is that Sihanouk is largely responsible for the Khmer Rouge's genocidal rule.

But had he checked, Gourevitch would have easily seen that history is already robbing him of the potency of that polemic.

Julio Jeldres, Sihanouk's biographer, tells us of Sihanouk's expressing his concerns about the Khmer Rouge to Chou Enlai in 73.

Sihanouk was seeking support to neuter them.

But Chou Enlai had the Gang of Four to worry about.

And the Yanks were not listening.

The Yanks!

The New Yorker piece is written as if the Americans played no role.

There is no sense that the post Killing Fields Khmer Rouge occupied the UN seat down the road.

And no sense of the pressure that was put on Sihanouk to deal with them.

Pressure.

Sihanouk is a lesson in a man who dealt with pressure.

He had a lot thrown at him.

Even for one born a God-King

A collision of centuries, superpowers and virulent ideologies.

He dealt with them all.

Mao to Mitterand, Tito to Nehru, Ceaucescau to Ho Chi Minh, Nixon to Kim Jong Il

All.

With Cambodia's well being as his aim, all Sihanouk had at his diplomatic disposal was spectacle.

The Fantasy of King Sihanouk.

Pure Fantasy.

Think Jagger at Altamont singing Sympathy For The Devil.

Then think amateur hour.

Cos that's what it was compared to this 89 year king's never-ending tour.

And despite being born to absolutism.

And the country's history of it.

And the region's propensity for it.

Sihanouk had a real appreciation of the artifice of what we now call human rights.

Here's a senior Red Cross Official who had dealings with him.

With the Khmer Rouge's Ieng Thirith.

And with Hun Sen.

"The only one who has listened and then delivered in terms of Geneva Conventions and all that jazz, was him," the Red Cross official said, speaking of Sihanouk.

"With him we did at least release all political prisoners that were (known to be...) in jail when the SNC took over," he added, referring to the Supreme National Council, the reconciliation grouping of Cambodia's warring factions pending the outcome of UN brokered elections.

And yet Gourevith laughs at Sihanouk's belief that history had no place for dishonesty and lies.

"It seems impossible that Sihanouk really believed that, " Gourevith wrote at the end of his New Yorker piece.

But it's entirely possible.

Cos Sihanouk knows history will be kind to him.

He'll get kudos for the hours telling the peasants what Mao or Tito had just said to him.

Way out there.

Where he was only thing that came from the sky that didn't bring death.

A one man shock and awe band.

Helicopter largesse in a water buffalo world.

Norodom Sihanouk.

Samdech Euv.

Respect.

You were.

Pure.

Rock star.

[Sam Lord]

Whatever ....

[Kev Bar]

Whatever ....

Ah Sam.

You're surprising me.

[Spectabilis]

'Helicopter largesse in a water buffalo world.'
Can't you even like the image Sam?

I like the complex portrayal of one I thought a shallow puppet. I am learning.