AHRC-ETC-044-2010
December 15, 2010
An article by Dr. Gaffar Peang-Meth published by the Asian Human Rights Commission
Last year, a reader e-mailed me from Phnom Penh to say he has enjoyed reading my columns on the Internet and that he will be the first in line to sign up for my classes should I return to teaching. Thus, began a long distance relationship that later brought photos of Khmer village children and their teacher and big brother, a handsome young chap -- photos that I attached to my computer screen until today.
Having learned much from and about the young man, Makara, born to a Khmer father, a soldier with long relationships with Vietnam, and raised by a grandfather in Sre Kok village, Anlung Romiet, Kandal province, I asked if I might write a column about his life and his thinking, which, I said, would benefit Cambodians and non-Cambodians interested in the Khmer people's future.
As I sent him additional questions, I reminded him that published materials would remain public in perpetuity; that my article would bring out friends and adversaries, praise and unkind comments. His usual prompt responses revealed a quick-witted young graduate of the Royal University of Phnom Penh with an English literature degree, who embellished the words I used in my articles to throw back at me: "I love my motherland, I do what I can, with what I have, which is very little, where I am, in a country reigned by terror and injustice."
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