It’s strange to see many of my Cambodian team and friends highlighting that today is the 40th anniversary of the Khmer Rouge entering Phnom Penh and “liberating” the country. At the time, Cambodia had been in a bitter civil war and many describe the initial jubilation of the war being over and the country being unified. Of course, anyone that knows the history of Cambodia knows that this jubilation quickly turned to confusion and then fear as Phnom Penh was evacuated, and millions died in the following years of Khmer Rouge rule.
So while I don’t think it’s a day that anyone will celebrate, it is a day to be remembered. You have to keep in mind that this was only 40 years ago, which means many in Cambodia still remember this day, many more remember the aftermath of the Khmer Rouge takeover, and still more make life choices based on this fateful day and the subsequent killings without even realizing it.
One of the most fascinating aspects of living in Cambodia was seeing the long-term effects of the Khmer Rouge regime. Many of our team still own guns, though buried and out of sight, “just in case.” There is also a fear of banks, and often money is kept under the mattress.
One stark example of how the Khmer Rouge’s policies are still influencing Cambodians today is personified by a tuk tuk driver we employed early on in our time in Cambodia. Though a wonderful young man with a great personality, it became apparent, through a couple of close calls, that he needed glasses. We told him we would be happy to buy them for him, but he refused, claiming he could see fine. Another couple of close calls later, we again insisted that we at least take him to get his eyes checked. And again, he refused. Finally, we came to realize that he had been told by his parents not to wear glasses; that wearing glasses made you stand out and was dangerous. Of course his parents hadn’t added that this was only dangerous if the Khmer Rouge came back to power.
During the Khmer Rouge regime anyone with an education was systematically killed, so wearing glasses had highlighted education and had gotten many intellectuals killed. If his parents had stated that their fear was driven by the Khmer Rouge, our tuk tuk driver would have scoffed at them and happily donned a pair of glasses. Instead it was just insinuated that wearing glasses was dangerous and bad luck, not something to be messed with.
Slowly we’ve seen these emotional scars of the war fade further and further into the deep psyche of the Cambodian people. But today, looking back on that fateful day 40 years ago, it’s important to remember the history of the Cambodian civil war, the effects of the Khmer Rouge’s rule, and the amazing progress that has been made by the country since the May 1993 democratic elections.
More sources:
Scars of the Khmer Rouge: How Cambodia is healing from a genocide
Four decades after Cambodia’s Year Zero… Read more »