02 Friday Apr 2021
Posted in Institution, International, Politics, Stories
My dear Kacvey,
Do you recall the term “weak strongman” that was in this letter “The Weak and Desperate Strongman” of 9 October 2017, and that has also been used in our later correspondences?
Well, Foreign Affairs has published an article under the signature of Timothy Frye and titled: “Russia’s Weak Strongman – The Perilous Bargains That Keep Putin in Power”
What an interesting article that presents so many similarities with our original “weak strongman”!
Enjoy the reading with your students!
24 Saturday Oct 2020
My dear Kacvey,
Here is a very ancient Chinese tale that Chinese of every generation, educated or otherwise, since that time knows by heart. You may wish to share it with your students as a lesson of righteousness, integrity and rectitude. It is out of this tale that were borne the origins of both, the sticky rice dumplings 粽子 (glutinous rice stuffed with different fillings and wrapped in bamboo leaves) and the Duanwu Festival 端午节 (Double Fifth Festival), also known as the “Dragon Boat Festival” celebrated on every 5 May.
In the “Songs of the South 楚辭”, the tale was titled “The Old Fisherman 渔父” and goes as follows:
“After Qu Yuan was banished, he wandered, sometimes along the river’s banks, sometimes along the marsh’s edge, singing as he went. His expression was dejected and his features emaciated.
“An old fisherman caught sight of him. “Are not you the Lord of the Three Wards?” said the fisherman. “What has brought you to this pass?”
“Because all the world is muddy and I alone am clear,” said Qu Yuan, “and because all men are drunk and I alone am sober, I have been sent into exile.”
“The Wise Man is not chained to material circumstances,” said the old fisherman, “but can move as the world moves. If all the world is muddy, why not help them to stir up the mud and beat up the waves? And if all men are drunk, why not sup their dregs and swill their lees? Why get yourself exiled because of your deep thoughts and your fine aspirations?”
“Qu Yuan replied, “I have heard it said: “He who has just washed his hair should brush his hat; and he who has just bathed should shake his clothes.” How can I submit my spotless purity to the dirt of others? I would rather cast myself into the waters of the river and be buried in the bowels of fishes, than hide my shining light in the dark and dust of the world.”
“The old fisherman, with a faint smile, struck his paddle in the water and made off. And as he went he sang:
“When the Cang Lang’s waters are clear,
I can wash my hat-strings in them;
When the Cang Lang’s waters are muddy,
I can wash my feet in them.”
“With that he was gone, and did not speak again.”
Here is the Chinese text:
屈原既放，游于江潭，行吟泽畔。颜色憔悴，形容枯槁。
渔父见而问之，曰：“子非三闾大夫欤？何故至于斯”
屈原曰：“举世皆浊我独清，众人皆醉我独醒，是以见放”
渔父曰：”圣人不凝滞于物，而能与世推移。世人皆浊，何不淈其泥而扬其波？众人皆醉，何不哺其糟而歠其醨？何故深思高举，自令放为”
屈原曰：“吾闻之：新沐者必弹冠，新浴者必振衣。安能以身之察察，受物之汶汶者乎？宁赴湘流，葬身于江鱼之腹中。安能以皓皓之白，而蒙世俗之尘埃乎”
渔父莞尔而笑，鼓枻而去。乃歌曰：“沧浪之水清兮，可以濯吾缨。沧浪之水浊兮，可以濯吾足”
遂去，不复与言.
05 Wednesday Aug 2020
Posted in Book, Culture, International, Social, Stories
≈ Comments Off on Old Roguery – 老猾俏皮
My dear Kacvey,
You may wish to share this view with your students by of course respecting social distancing during the Wuhan virus pandemic, officially known as Covid-19.
It is about a particular character trait, among many others, written by Lin Yutang 林语堂 in his book “My Country and My People – 吾国与吾民”
In Chapter 2(4), Lin Yutang identified “old roguery – 老猾俏皮” as that particular character trait. Here are some extracts of what he wrote:
“… An old rogue is a man who has seen a lot of life, and who is materialistic, nonchalant, and skeptical of progress. At its best, this old roguery gives us mellowness and good temper, which in old men make many girls prefer them for husbands. For if life is worth anything, it is that it teaches a lesson of kindliness. The Chinese people have arrived at this point of view, not by having found any religious sanction for it, but from a profound observation and a knowledge of the vicissitudes of life. Typical of this extremely shrewd philosophy is the following famous dialogue of two poet-monks of the Tang Dynasty: “Once Hanshan asked Shihteh: “If one slanders me, sneers at me, despises me, injures me, hates me, and deceives me, what should I do?” Shihteh replied: “Only bear with him, yield to him, let him, avoid him, endure him, respect him, and ignore him. And after a few years, you just look at him.”
寒山曾问拾得：”世间谤我，欺我，辱我，笑我，轻我，贱我，厌我，骗我， 如何处治乎？拾得云： “只是忍他，让他，由他，避他，耐他，不要理他，再待几年，你且看他。”
Lin Yutang continued:
“… At its worst, this old roguery, which is the highest product of Chinese intelligence, works against idealism and action. It shatters all desire for reform., laughs at the futility of of human effort. and renders the Chinese people incapable of idealism and action. It has a strange way of reducing all human activities to the level of the alimentary canal and other simple biological needs. Mencius 孟子 was a great rogue when he declared the chief desires of mankind to be food and women, or alimentation and reproduction. The late President Li Yunhong 黎云洪 was also a great rogue when he pronounced the healthily accepted dictum of Chinese political philosophy and formula for solving all Chinese party differences by saying “When there is rice, let everybody share it – 有饭大家吃.” President Li was a grim realist without knowing it , and he spoke wiser than he knew when he was thus giving an economic interpretation of current Chinese history…”
Li Yutang went on:
“… This nonchalant and materialistic attitude is based on the very shrewd view of life to which only old people and old nations can attain. It would be futile for young men under thirty to understand it , as it is futile for young nations of the West to try to appreciate it. Perhaps it was no mere accident that “Laozi, 老子” the very name of the author of Dao De Jing 道德经, the Bible of Taoism, means “the old boy.”
“… Taoism, in theory and practice … is a philosophy which counteracts the positivism of Confucius, and serves as a safety-valve for the imperfections of a Confucian society. For the Confucian outlook on life is positive, while the Taoistic outlook is negative, and out of the alchemy of these two strange elements emerges the immortal thing we called the Chinese character.
” Hence all Chinese are Confucianists when successful, and Taoists when they are failures. The Confucianist in us builds and strives, while the Taoist in us watches and smiles. Therefore when a Chinese scholar is in office he moralizes, and when he is out of office he versifies, and usually it is good Taoist poetry. That explains why almost all Chinese scholars write poetry, and why in almost all collected works of Chinese writers, poetry occupies the better and greater half.
“… The Chinese are by nature greater Taoists than they are by culture Confucianists. As a people, we are great enough to draw up an imperial code, based on the conception of essential justice, but we are also great enough to distrust lawyers and law courts. Ninety-five per cent of legal troubles are settled out of court. We are great enough to make elaborate rules on ceremony, but we are also great enough to treat them as part of the great joke of life, which explains the great feasting and merry-making at Chinese funerals. We are great enough to denounce vice, but we are also great enough not to be surprised or disturbed by it. We are great enough to start successive waves of revolutions, but we are also great enough to compromise and to go back to the previous patterns of government. We are great enough to elaborate a perfect system of official impeachment and civil service and traffic regulations and library reading-rooms rules, but we are also great enough to break to break all systems, to ignore them, circumvent them, play with them, and become superior to them. We do not teach our young in the colleges a course of political political science, showing how a government is supposed to be run, but we teach them by daily example how our municipal, provincial and central governments are actually run. We have no use of impracticable idealism, as we have no patience for doctrinaire theology. We do not teach our young to become like the sons of God, but we teach them to behave like sane, normal human beings. That is why I believe that the Chinese are essentially humanists and Christianity must fail in China, or it must be altered beyond recognition before it can be accepted. The only part of Christian teachings which will be truly accepted by the Chinese people is Christ’s injunction to be “harmless as doves – 慈和如鸽” but “wise as serpents – 极敏如蛇.” For these two virtues, dove-like gentleness and serpent-like wisdom, are attributes of the old rogue.
“In one word, we recognize the necessity of human effort but we also admit the futility of it. This general attitude of mind has a tendency to develop passive defense tactics. “Great things can be reduced into small things, and small things can be reduced to nothing – 大事化小事，小事化无事.” On this general principle, all Chinese disputes are patched up, all Chinese schemes are readjusted, and all reform programs are discounted until there are peace and rice for everybody. “One bid is not as as good as one pass – 多一事不如省一事,” so runs another of our proverbs, which means the same thing as “Let well enough alone – 勿生事,” and “Let sleeping dogs lie – 莫惹睡狗.”
In Chapter 3(3), “Lack of Science 缺乏科学精神,” Lin YuTang wrote:
“Sufficient discussion of the characteristics of Chinese thinking has been made to enable us to appreciate the cause of their failure to develop natural science. The Greeks laid the foundation of natural science because the Greek mind was essentially an analytical mind, a fact which is proved by the striking modernity of Aristotle. The Egyptians developed geometry and astronomy, sciences which required an analytical mind; and the Hindus developed a grammar of their own. The Chinese, with all their native intelligence, never developed a science of grammar, and their mathematics and astronomical knowledge have largely been imported. For the Chinese mind delights only in moral platitude, and their abstract terms like “benevolence, 仁” “kindliness,义” “propriety, 礼” and “loyalty 忠” are so general that in such discussions they are naturally lost in vague generalities…
“It is easy to see why the Chinese mind cannot develop a scientific method, for the scientific method, besides being analytical, always involves an amount of stupid drudgery, while the Chinese believe in flashes of common sense and insight. And inductive reasoning, carried over to human relationships (in which the Chinese are primarily interested) often results in a form of stupidity not so rare in American universities …”
This letter will be updated when and if other info are revealed in the book.
22 Wednesday Jul 2020
My dear Kacvey,
Your students and you have certainly read about mythological tales how God created animals, but all of you have never heard or read about how God created flowers. Yes, FLOWERS, that beautiful and colorful thing that adorn planet earth!
Well, in Chapter: “Weimar in Early Spring” from his literary masterpiece: “An Empty Room”, Mu Xin let his imagination go way beyond the beyond.
Mu Xin wrote: “I imagine a mythology of flowers, flowers created during a grand competition among the gods. One god invented the lily, another god the tulip. Here appeared peonies and there water lilies …”
Kacvey, your students and you will not be disappointed with Mu Xin’s imagination when you reach the end of “Weimar in Early Spring” chapter!
14 Thursday May 2020
My dear Kacvey,
On 14 May 2020, History Today published an article titled “The Angkor Empire’s National Health Service” under the signature of Joanna Wolfarth, a cultural historian, lecturer and writer.
The article mentioned two major quotes, both attributed to King Jayavarman VII, and translated from the historical inscriptions sculpted in various temples in the Bayon complex; they are so powerful in meaning that your students should reflect upon for their intellectual development and perspective:
1. “He suffered the illnesses of his subjects more than his own; because it is the pain of the public that is the pain of kings rather than their own pain.“
2. “Filled with a deep sympathy for the good of the world, the king swore this oath: ‘All beings who are plunged in the ocean of existence, may I draw out by virtue of this good work. And may the kings of Cambodia who come after me, attached to goodness … attain with their wives, dignitaries and friends the place of deliverance where there is no more illness.“
The power of history is so heavy that it breaks the bones and skull of the present.
29 Sunday Mar 2020
Posted in Book, Culture, International, Social, Stories
≈ Comments Off on “Body beyond the Body”
My dear Kacvey,
Here is a teeny piece of food for thought and online (ZOOM or otherwise!) discussions with your students in this period of lockdown, confinement, stay-at-home and social distancing due to the consequences of the Wuhan virus pandemic.
This is the tidbit: The way the Wuhan virus has spread pandemicly reminds of anecdotes buried in the “Journey to the West” (西游记), one of the four great classical novels of Chinese literature. One of the character in that novel, is Sun Wukong (孙悟空), also known as the Monkey King (Please do not confuse with Hanuman of the Ramayana!)
The novel told of how Monkey King wrecked havoc heaven palace or temple by using a supernatural method of self-reproduction called “Body beyond the Body” (身外身法) by plucking a hair or handful of hairs from its own body and throwing them into its mouth; it chewed them to tiny pieces then spat them into the air by shouting “Change!”. Suddenly those pieces of hair changed at once into either imitation monkey or multiple little monkeys encircling the enemy combatants on all sides or do whatever Monkey King ordered them to do.
You can argue that this is a weird, eerie or creepy way of seeing thing, but please bear in mind that this Wuhan virus or corona virus or Covid-19, or whatever you like to call it, is so new to our humanity and its knowledge, scientific or otherwise.
But the way the virus has been spreading pandemicly seems to look like [Repeat: seems to look like] the way Monkey King used its divine power to reproduce its imitation(s) … supernaturally, and as the tales go!
23 Monday Mar 2020
My dear Kacvey,
Here is a short extract from William Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” (Act 1, Scene II) where Prospero spoke to his daughter, Miranda, who asked why Alonso did not destroy her father. Prospero responded:
“Well demanded, wench:
My tale provokes that question. Dear, they durst not,
So dear the love my people bore me, nor set
A mark so bloody on the business, but
With colours fairer painted their foul ends.
In few, they hurried us aboard a bark,
Bore us some leagues to sea; where they prepared
A rotten carcass of a boat, not rigg’d,
Nor tackle, sail, nor mast; the very rats
Instinctively had quit it: there they hoist us,
To cry to the sea that roar’d to us, to sigh
To the winds whose pity, sighing back again,
Did us but loving wrong.”
You are absolutely right if you sighed “What the heck is this and what does Prosepro have anything to do with us?”
Well, pull out The Tempest from the shelf, and read it! Meantime, have you noticed this phrase: “the very rats instinctively had quit it“? This phrase seems to be source of the commonly used expression: “Rats leave a sinking ship.”
In the Chinese language, an idiom goes: “树倒猢狲散” (shu dao hu sun san) which literally means: “When the tree topples the monkeys scatter.”
With the above exposed ingredients, here is the plat de resistance to be prepared and served. In the very current political situation in the City of Tonlé Buon Mouk that is living under the sunless and extremely dark cloud of the virus from Wuhan with daily increasing number of people tested positive, the confinement of citizens to heir home, the every-now-and-then electricity black out and shortage of water, the closing of many garment plants and the subsequent massive workers layoff, the closing of borders with neighboring countries, import-export and tourism at standstill either in Kg Som, Pochentong or Siem Reap, future trade with the European Union consequencing the autocratic politics of the weak strongman, the bogus and senseless trial of the opposition No. 1, the intestinal feud within the corrupt people party, the lack of transparency in governance, the hardening of the police apparatus… The entire leadership of the country has disappeared from the public scene with the exception of officials from the ministry of health that updates on the numbers of people infected without telling what they are actually doing in the face the pandemic. The apparent vacuum or nothingness in leadership looks like a headless chicken running around before collapsing.
The question of the moment is: What would be Cambodia if it happened that the weak strongman is no longer able to steer his ship out of this never-known-before hurricane, and the ship sinks? After 35 years of post-KR rule by an ex-KR, the sugarcane (ampeuv) that the weak strongman used to suck to get the juice to oppress the Khmer people and to corrupt the system to enrich himself and members and sycophants of his tribe has no more juice to rely on. Sugarcane dregs (kaag ampeuv) are now dry and good only for their return to nature. On top of all that, the weak strongman dual allegiance to both the Inner River and the Northern Capital is falling victim of his own game: the weak strongman first vassalized itself in 1977 to the Inner River for the return to power on 7 January 1979, and re-vassalized itself anew to the Northern Capital around 2010, to become like Carlo Goldoni’s “The Servant of Two Masters”. And now, both masters have their own problem of Covid 19, and when masters have problems, the valet is neither in their agenda nor their concern. Period.
The weak strongman has been ruling with all the sugarcane juice from the two masters. When the juice stops flowing to his cup, how could he sustain himself and his corrupt autocracy? And what if the corona virus is located in the neighborhood of Takhmao?
Whether it’s “Rats leave a sinking ship” or “When the tree topples the monkeys scatter”, it figuratively means that an opportunist always abandons an unfavorable cause, or when a person falls from power, his hangers-on disperse, or when a leader loses power, his/her followers become disorganized.
Kacvey, it’s now your turn to find out: if the ship sinks, who are the rats that will leave ship? Or if the tree falls, where will the monkeys scatter to?
Please report soonest. Thanks.
01 Wednesday Jan 2020
Posted in Stories
≈ Comments Off on What Would 2020 Bring?
My dear Kacvey,
The cosmic second has just passed, carrying all of us to 2020!
Happy New Year 2020 to you, your students and everybody inside and outside our Circle!
Happy New Year 2020 to all Khmer who are:
– free, not valet of foreigners,
– loving and working towards true democracy, and not past-KR affiliated,
– respecting human rights, not abusers, oppressors or authoritarians,
– serving the country and its people, not a party or a person,
– honest, not corrupt and hypocrite,
– working hard to earn a living with their own blood, sweat and tears, not bought out by the ugly color of unqualified money, and
– agents of CHANGE for a better future of the country and its people.
Honestly, will Cambodia be “Happy” as wishes for happiness would mean to be? As crystal ball is in short supply among people who think, the probability that the country under the direction of the ex-KR-turned-autocrat would worsen is rather high:
– How is it possible for the ex-KR-turned-autocrat return the country to the democratic arrangement before he dissolved the opposition party and subsequently organized a sham election?
– How is it possible for the ex-KR-turned-autocrat to get rid of the fear of being treated like Najib Razak of Malaysia, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan or Omar al-Bashir of Sudan?
– How much longer the ex-KR-turned-autocrat can walk the tight rope and balance himself between China and Vietnam to which he has ceded everything that is Khmer, just for the sake of him staying in absolute and uncontested power?
– How is it possible for the ex-KR-turned-autocrat to undo and to unshackle himself from the excessive and continuing plethora of Chinese, masters of the Dara Sakor project, the hundreds of casinos, condominiums, triads, dams …
– How is it possible for the Khmer to breath some air of freedom and liberty when the ex-KR-turned-autocrat used missiles, machine guns and thousands of policemen and soldiers to intimidate and threaten Khmer civilians walking with bare hands?
– Similarly, it will all come down to this: How is it possible for the ex-KR-turned-autocrat to recover his lost eyesight?
But nothing is seemingly and totally lost yet, as history tells us, again and again, that everything has an end, and contemporary history will also have an end: Colonialism, Francoism in Spain, Salazarism in Portugal, Apartheid in South Africa, the USSR, The Iron Curtain, the Berlin Wall, the Chinese Cultural Revolution, the Ho Chi Minh Trail, Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Sihanouk, Lon Nol, Pol Pot …
For our part, let continue to do what we, you, your students and us, have been doing with more determination and better knowledge. An effective individual cell, no matter how small it is, can contribute to cure the Khmer body and kill the virus infected by the ex-KR-turned-autocrat.
Martin Luther King, Jr., once said: “Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle. And so we must straighten our backs and work for our freedom. A man can’t ride you unless your back is bent.”
Happy New Year 2020, and throughout!
31 Tuesday Dec 2019
Posted in Stories
≈ Comments Off on What Had “CHANGED” in 2019?
My dear Kacvey,
Hope, during the last class before winter break, you had lengthily go over the main events that occurred during 2019 in the City of Tonlé Buon Mouk with your students and drawn important lessons for their future thinking.
There is only one spatial or cosmic second that separates the end of 2019 and the beginning of 2020. Therefore, everything will continue as it has been continuing with or without changes. Autocracy by the ex-Khmer Rouge will also continue, but with or without changes. For our part, let have a look at what had CHANGED throughout 2019:
The Mekong
The level of water in the Mekong is the the lowest ever registered since the existence of time. The Khmer lifeline has CHANGED downwards to change the Khmer living downward.
The lands
The lands of Srok Khmer have CHANGED from being a fertile rice fields to become the lands of Chinese casinos, gambling dens and condominium, and possible military base for the Chinese to freely come and settle in Srok Khmer to CHANGE the landscape of Khmer culture and history.
The forests
The forests have CHANGED from being thick to become a horizon of treeless flatland or mountains, and the corrupt trees fellers have CHANGED their tactics to pretend to burn the motorcycles or trucks that illegally transported felled trees to foreign countries.
The people
The sycophantic people around the ex-KR-turned-autocrat CHANGED so much in displaying openly their corrupt wealth inside and outside the country. Before UNTAC, they were less than worms that now CHANGED to full-fledged acanthovalva inconspicuaria.
The Chinafication of Srok Khmer CHANGES the population landscape that had already CHANGED since the military Vietnamese intervention in January 1979 and its aftermath.
The institutions
The four institutional branches have CHANGED into the Vishnu-like four-arms of the ex-KR-turned-autocrat.
The police and military
The police and military have CHANGED from having nothing of their own to become 100% consumers of Chinese and Vietnamese war machines and apparatuses to oppress Khmer people.
They CHANGED from being unable to handle a dozen of Lao soldiers at the border to become ex-KR-turned-autocrat’s mercenaries to oppress opposition members.
The economy
The economy has CHANGED to become indebted to the Chinese of more than $7 billion that has also CHANGED into a death trap for Srok Khmer’s future.
The European Union had CHANGED their policies not only with regards to import of Khmer rice to European countries but also to warning of the future withdrawal of preferential tariffs if the ex-KR-turned-autocrat continued to abuse the human rights of the Khmer people.
The opposition
The status of the opposition has CHANGED from being dissolved by the ex-KR-turned-autocrat’s kangaroo court to still being recognized by the ex-KR-turned-autocrat as the sole party that permanently threatens him.
Oppo No.1 status has CHANGED from house arrest to partially free. Foreign ambassadors have CHANGED from being met at their embassy to paying personal visit to him at his residence.
Oppo No.2 status has CHANGED to become interim president who CHANGED his strategies to try to actually enter Cambodia directly from Thailand on 9 November.
Opposition supporters have CHANGED from being 2-clans to becoming conscientious that being 2-clanists would not advance the party cause.
The ex-KR-turned-autocrat
The ex-KR-turned-autocrat CHANGED to have “shoulder pain” that needed to be medevac to a hospital in Singapore for a 2.00 am treatment.
He has CHANGED from playing golf to lonely biking in his golden lair, from being among the people to becoming lethargic, fat face and a silly soliloquist behind a bunch of yellow flowers on Koh Pich.
He has CHANGED his walking pace to becoming slower, heavier and burdensome.
His popularity has CHANGED downwards as he CHANGED his walkabout habit to being in solitary manner in front of the screen of his facebook account.
He has CHANGED from talking incessantly about oppo No.2 to becoming quiet on the subject and letting hiss chained dogs barking instead.
He has CHANGED from eating នំបញ្ចុក at the table to devouring it standing up while in Europe.
Some of his relatives and sycophants have CHANGED their status from Cambodian to becoming European (wondering why not Chinese!), others to becoming “sanctioned” by the United States.
His party, driven by massive and unqualified money, Chinese or otherwise, seems to CHANGE its revolutionary ideology from communism to becoming corrupt people party.
So, Kacvey, your students know that CHANGE is a constant phenomenon that happens to everybody from Heraclitus who said: “No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man” to President Barack Obama who stated: “Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek”.
He who doesn’t realize that CHANGE happens in every second of his live and around his live is he who will be victim of his own silent self-CHANGE. Or as Confucius, once, said: “Only the wisest and stupidest of men never change.”
09 Monday Sep 2019
My dear Kacvey,
In Old Man Khmao Town, two swallows sitting on an electrical cable over the Old Péth Chkuort building, were chatting quietly while the monsoon rain was threatening from Paris:
Chheu Smaa: Are you ready for the 9 November reception?
Phkaï Mphéy: Yes, I am.
Chheu Smaa: And your guys?
Phkaï Mphéy: Can’t ascertain for sure.
Chheu Smaa: What do you mean?
Phkaï Mphéy: Two things not clear to them: 1) What are they going to do with thousands and thousands of people in motion? and 2) how are they going to be split between the parade at the Monument of Independence and the reception?
Chheu Smaa: What are Duck-and-White’s plans?
Phkaï Mphéy: None. Same. None of them know what to do. They talk and threaten like you do on FB.
Chheu Smaa: Don’t they understand my mind and decision?
Phkaï Mphéy: That, they do. But there is an ocean between understanding and setting up execution plan.
Chheu Smaa: And the borders?
Phkaï Mphéy: They are on full alert and manned as usual.
Chheu Smaa: Thailand,Laos, Vietnam, sea coasts?
Phkaï Mphéy: All official checkpoints are fully equipped, but there are more than 500 miles of frontiers and we can’t post one soldier or policeman on every yard?
Chheu Smaa: And the airports?
Phkaï Mphéy: Airports? Why do you think he’ll fly in like a fly attracted by the bonfire?
Chheu Smaa: He doesn’t have the guerrilla disposition like I did with Pol Pot or the Vietnamese.
Phkaï Mphéy: Your past disposition is not the same as your present one. And no sign of full cooperation has been received from the 3 neighbors.
Chheu Smaa: You mean all 3?
Phkaï Mphéy: Yes, all 3.
Chheu Smaa: Why?
Phkaï Mphéy: Inner River is silent like midnight winter at South Pole. Have you received anything that you don’t want to share or be implemented?
Chheu Smaa: That’s why Silver is in Laos.
Phkaï Mphéy: Is Silver in the game, or is he like White or Duck? Could he answer the key questions about the reception?
Chheu Smaa: What key questions?
Phkaï Mphéy: 1) What if you can’t catch him? 2) If you caught him, what will you do the next hour?
Chheu Smaa: I’ll catch him and lock him up in the same cell as oppo No. 1 in Thbum Khmaung?
Phkaï Mphéy: OK, for question No. 2, but what would you do with him the next day or month? Don’t repeat the error you made with oppo No.1. How about my question No. 1?
Chheu Smaa: He has to come in, because otherwise he’ll loose all credibility with his people?
Phkaï Mphéy: His credibility with his people is not your problem for the moment. It’s his problem and he’ll own it. The question to you still is: if he’s in and you can’t catch him, what will be your order for us to execute?
Chheu Smaa: Now my question to you is: if he’s in, why can’t you catch him?
Phkaï Mphéy: We don’t know his whereabouts. Have you heard about Schindler’s List?
Chheu Smaa: My son, the Intelligence man, should know?
Phkaï Mphéy: That kid, your presumed dauphin, if only he knows where his underwear or shoes are?
Chheu Smaa: Easy on him, he’s learning.
Phkaï Mphéy: Bad teacher doesn’t make good teaching to unwilling kid!
Chheu Smaa: The circle doesn’t seem to close.
Phkaï Mphéy: No. You already made the first mistake by arresting oppo No.1, and now trying to arrest oppo No.2?
Chheu Smaa: I have to double down, otherwise I’ll lose face.
Phkaï Mphéy: Losing face should not be in such a big political and national equation.
Chheu Smaa: I can’t turn back the clock. I’ll make the clock going forward for me.
Phkaï Mphéy: You’re playing Mugabe’s game.
Chheu Smaa: What choice do I have, with hundred and hundred millions $ under my bed and the deal I’ve made with Northern Capital.
Phkaï Mphéy: I can’t address that. You threw the dice, and the number came out to haunt you.
Chheu Smaa: You’re not helpful.
Phkaï Mphéy: The idea and strategies are yours. I execute it. Unclear strategies create high risks in execution, because it will involve people lives.
Chheu Smaa: You talk differently now.
Phkaï Mphéy: Since 1975, we run a lot around on how to dominate, but the domination has turned out to be different from the original idea.
Chheu Smaa: What do you mean?
Phkaï Mphéy: Come on, “what do you mean?” Tonlé Sap, Bokor, casinos, dams, Kg Som, Dara Sakor, Ream, Hostile Takeover … that what I mean!
Chheu Smaa: You have a piece of it to, haven’t you?
Phkaï Mphéy: Yes I do, but nowadays and around my dinner table, the discussions are very tough with my kids who don’t know anybody beside you as the leader, whereas they perfectly know that the world is moving around with different ideas and people all the time. They might show up at the reception and they have already dared me to arrest or shoot them.
Chheu Smaa: You look soft!
Phkaï Mphéy: Age changes people. You still don’t answer my question No.1.
Chheu Smaa: I will be at the spot where he’ll be found and direct the operations myself.
Phkaï Mphéy: That’s not the answer. If we know where he will be, we’ll do it for you. And stay where you are to nurse your shoulder pain. Until I get the answer, I can’t justify the order to the troops to arrest him. Only exactly 2 months left to set up the stratagems.
Chheu Smaa: True, the pain in the shoulder affects my overall mobility that conditions my relationship with my surroundings. If you were me, what would be your answer to your own question No. 1.
Phkaï Mphéy: Pledge incompetence because if I were you I would have let the 2018 elections go on normally. And “Que será, será!” I would have listened to people’s voice and heartbeats and respect their ballots.
Chheu Smaa: You didn’t say that to me at that time.
Phkaï Mphéy: I did, but my suggestion was drowned by those closer and closest to you.
Chheu Smaa: You should have insisted.
Phkaï Mphéy: Very difficult to penetrate the many rings of brutal bulldogs.
Chheu Smaa: You still don’t answer my hypothetical question?
Phkaï Mphéy: OK, if you insisted: Be honest with yourself and go and tell the party directly that you have had enough with politics, you don’t have the physical ability to lead anymore, you resign from your position as party leader and LET THE PARTY DECIDE ON HOW TO PROCEED on your replacement. Take the next plane either to Northern Capital for medical treatment like Sihanouk did or to Singapore like Mugabe did.
Chheu Smaa: Won’t be that easy.
Phkaï Mphéy: What makes you thing that this whole stuff is easy to handle?
Chheu Smaa: The party won’t be able to decide.
Phkaï Mphéy: Why?
Chheu Smaa: There is no dominant person and there could be too many “suitors?”
Phkaï Mphéy: You never wanted White or the senator to be your replacement, in case… Instead you play around with the idea of junior. Unintended compounded problems! If you resigned, the party will find a solution the next hour. Same if you dropped dead.
Chheu Smaa: Give me one more good reason why I should resign?
Phkaï Mphéy: Ready: You will avoid or suffer the consequences of all the voluntary troubles you have created with oppo, the Vietnamese and the Chinese. The mess that you have created will be handled one way or another by your party or successor. Remember the thread David Cameron-Theresa May-Boris Johnson in the Conservative Party of UK politics on Brexit: Theresa May inherited David Cameron’s mess, Boris Johnson inherited Theresa May’s mess, and who knows who will inherit Boris Johnson’s mess?!The good thing is that Cameron and May enjoy their vacations while Boris Johnson is now having a s… of a time.
Chheu Smaa: It makes sense, bu I can’t do that.
Phkaï Mphéy: Why?
Chheu Smaa: History will wipe me out of its book.
Phkaï Mphéy: You’ve have made your history since your youth, but future history of the country will be the consequences of your own history. Why would you care about history?
Chheu Smaa: My family will live in shame.
Phkaï Mphéy: Have you talked to Pol Pot’s children?
Chheu Smaa: Do you really think that he will be in the country on 9 November?
Phkaï Mphéy: My opinion is worth nothing. It’s your perspective that I need to know.
Chheu Smaa: Would the soldiers or policemen drop their guns and shackles like Lon Nol troops did upon our arrival in Phnom Penh in April 1975 or like Pol Pot’s troops did upon our arrival in Phnom Penh in January 1979? That’s history.
Phkaï Mphéy: Either history repeats itself or rather like Mr. Kem Ley’s funerals procession in July 2017. My kids were in that procession too.
Chheu Smaa: Thanks for the chat. Time to take medicine and write few lines on FB to keep my fans in “like”.
Phkaï Mphéy: You don’t look good, do you?
Chheu Smaa: The shoulder pain’s episode.
Phkaï Mphéy: Do you know what are you doing or will be doing?
Chheu Smaa: Can’t say in few words, and can’t see through the 4 walls of my lair.
Phkaï Mphéy: Are you scared of tomorrow?
Chheu Smaa: Uncertainty feeds scare and anxiety. Can’t get rid of them. No more joy or fun like in the past.
Phkaï Mphéy: I’ll be waiting for the 9 November plan, if you come up with any.
Both swallows parted after leaving few droppings on the roof of the Old Péth Chkuort building.
*****
A few days later, the two swallows met again on a branch of a longan tree (doeum méan) in the fortress orchard.
Chheu Smaa: Did you get my plan?
Phkaï Mphéy: Yes, I did and I already shared with the commanders.
Chheu Smaa: What’s their mood or reaction?
Phkaï Mphéy: Cold. Expressionless. Stoic. Almost indifferent. And none of the ah-nhok has shown up.
Chheu Smaa: Why?
Phkaï Mphéy: Ah-Nhoks must be busy sending their people to go shopping abroad. Others didn’t talk or ask questions. They took the paper and left. By the way, who drew that plan?
Chheu Smaa: The quartet and the think-tankers, with my approval.
Phkaï Mphéy: Well, from my point of view, it’s not a plan, it’s a war paper like in Samloth. One, you can’t neglect the “unarmed people” factor, and two we are not trained to fight civil march.
Chheu Smaa: I hear you, but do as it’s planned. You are not convinced, aren’t you?
Phkaï Mphéy: Not only unconvinced but also not understand what do you actually have in mind and what will you do afterwards.
Chheu Smaa: We continue to design some models based on response from Asean.
Phkaï Mphéy: You’re mad to have sent that letter to Asean! Whose stupid idea is that?
Chheu Smaa: Silver drafted the letter.
Phkaï Mphéy: And you approved it without sounding it out first with their ambassadors?
Chheu Smaa: Yes and No.
Phkaï Mphéy: Well, Silver knows s… about diplomacy and international politics. Have you slept well?
Chheu Smaa: Not really. Rarely closed my eye for more than 2 hours. To fight for power when young was different from fighting to keep power now. Once, there was only one objective. Now, too many considerations.
Phkaï Mphéy: Your hands are trembling.
Chheu Smaa: A little bit. Pain in the shoulder.
Phkaï Mphéy: I’ll report later.
Then they flew off into different direction of the sky.