Hi friends!

Every time I with grief and joy read old articles of the Russian correspondents about Cambodia. It is very sad that there were such hard times. It is good that all in the past. After the Pol Pot's regime it was difficult to be restored to the country, but people having united made it!!!

I submit you article of 1982 "Color of hope" from the Russian correspondent Victor Pritula. Article appeared in April, 1982 in the  "Around the World"  magazine. I will surely give the reference in the bottom of a post to original article in Russian

Color of hope, 1982, "Around the World"

Architect Ti Yao

 Even now, at the beginning of the dry season, Phnom Penh kept the green outfit. The tops of coconut trees rose above the third floors, chunky krosangs drop sour fruits on the cracked asphalt; Areca palms and mango trees, though lost part of their foliage in the winter, swaying luxuriantly. Greens as if to hide the wounds of the city. And treat these wounds people.

Polpotovska clique experienced a fierce hatred of cinemas, hospitals, markets, banks and other public buildings. The Bank was blown up inside by a massive dynamite charge. The twisted walls, the collapsed roof, the broken sculptures that once adorned the main entrance are silent witnesses of the crime of one of the most barbaric regimes in the history of mankind.

 Badly damaged the hotel "Sukali". Dozens of residential buildings have been destroyed on Son Ngok Mina Avenue, which crosses the entire city with a perfectly straight eight-kilometer line.

 The city heals wounds. People move into the renovated houses, posters appear on the pediments of the restored cinemas, restaurants and cafes open, red signs decorate the bakeries again.

 In the near future, Soviet builders, who help the Phnom Penh to restore the city, will begin the construction of a new building of the National Bank, while they will try to preserve its former architectural appearance, created by the famous architect van Molivan.

 Violent hats of trees, flowing lashes of ivy and vines do not hide the already revived buildings. They retreat where the bamboo lattice of scaffolding cuts into the bushes, where the walls of restored housing Shine with fresh whitewash.

 The Deputy people's revolutionary Committee of Phnom Penh, architect Ti Yao, Affairs-dozens, all urgent, and then you need to carve out at least half an hour — the correspondents came.

 A thin girl of seven timidly stopped at the door.

- "Daughter,"- explains Ti Yao, his eyes filling with tenderness.- I'm at work late at night, I leave home at five in the morning. Here is and see you only here. Would it hurt?

 In 1963 Ti Yao came to Moscow to study urban planning. In 1970 he returned home, worked in the Department of architecture of the Ministry of public works, was Dean of the faculty of architecture of Phnom Penh University of arts...

 - In 1975 I had to change my profession. We moved to Kratie province and was forced to dig canals. Many of my comrades were killed, and I got lost among strangers who did not know that I studied in the Soviet Union. If I found out about this polotovsky secret police, it is unlikely we could talk here...

 He returned to Phnom Penh in January 1979, immediately after his release. The city resembled a ruined ant-hill. Hundreds of houses were in ruins, the streets were littered with garbage. Rats, hunger, diseases were sovereign owners of the capital. The population has been exterminated or evicted, institutions destroyed or looted. Where to start the recovery? When people began to return, first of all it was necessary to provide food, housing, work, medical care. It seemed almost impossible at the time. Now, two years later, in Phnom Penh about four hundred thousand people, dozens of schools, hospitals, shops, eight cinemas. Many industrial enterprises work... 

- We not only restored buildings. In the suburban area, in urban gardens, parks, vegetables were grown, fruit trees were nurtured. Our people know everything, we just had to give them hope, to return faith in tomorrow, in life itself. We gathered the surviving masters, established crafts. At this stage, it is an urgent need: we need clothes, food, household utensils. Of course, the Soviet Union, Vietnam and other socialist countries provided us with great assistance. 

Ti Yao spoke about the development of the education system, the future of the capital, the revival of the whole country. And about their dreams and Affairs in this difficult and the beautiful process. 

Knock on the door: in the architect's office came two guys with rolls of paper. Unfolded on the table sheets of sketches of posters. On one-a call to maintain cleanliness in the city, the other is dedicated to the campaign to eliminate illiteracy, the third calls on the Phnom Penh elections. 

Ti Yao looks at the posters, makes comments to the artists, says something to the girl, who settled down in the corner of the office with a notebook for drawing, then, having caught a glimpse, remembers us and smiles... 

Boys on Wat Phnone

 It was March, the middle of the dry season, when everything freezes in anticipation of rain, and the water level in the river Tonle SAP falls a few meters. And only on the banks exposed to water green gardens, which will be destined in three or four months to go under water again. During the day, mercury rose to the forty-degree mark; the water in the basin, placed on the roof of our house, warmed up so that it was quite suitable for washing. Midday slumber for three hours enveloped the city. And only in urban markets continued lazy trade.

 On that hot March day I wandered into the Wat Phnom — Temple Hill. There is a legend about a pious and rich widow Stump. One day during the spill, the legend says, a tree was nailed to her house. In the hollow of his widow found four bronze statues of Buddha and a stone statue of a deity. Mrs. Peng called the neighbors and told them to lay down the prayer hill to the West of her house. Neighbors helped her to erect a hill, then sawed the tree, made him an altar, which was hoisted on the top of man-made mountains. There and has put the widow Stump four bronze shapes. A stone statue was installed at the Eastern foot of the mountain. Later on the hill was built Wat Phnom don Penh pagoda-a Temple on the mountain of Mrs. Penh-and the area around the hill called Phnom Penh. It all happened six hundred years ago...

 Now on the steps of the pagoda sat two elderly Buddhist monks and silently looked into the hot March distance.

 — Pol pot did not spare anyone and anything,— with bitterness has told to me by the architect T. Yao.- Wat Phnom didn't escape destruction. In the ruins of many buildings on the hill, stolen sacred statues. We're trying to save and preserve the survivors. 

Wat Phnom is now deprived of lush tropical greenery. It will bloom with the beginning of the rainy season. Miraculously surviving among the ruins of the pagoda, but it requires a serious overhaul. In the tourist avenues, which produced the press service of Sihanouk, Wat Phnom was different. Beautiful and intangible.

 And I suddenly imagined tourists, hung with film and cameras. I imagined these tourists, otakibashi their portion of the Buddhist exotic, and then remembered about the village Kandersteg, where we shot the TV essay about the crimes of the Pol pot regime.

 It was two years ago, when it was still difficult for Kampuchea to live, when the fate of the first full-fledged rice harvest was decided, when there was not enough food and the people's authorities distributed among the peasants the products received through international aid channels. . ...

 Together with Canadalisting came several American, canadian and British journalists. They worked to literally sweat: snapping closures, removing the closeup of the haggard faces of the peasants, the banks with corn oil, sacks of rice, the young guys from the squad of the national police, watching the procedure in the distribution... Some photos I met then in magazines and Newspapers. Among those journalists there were some honest who wrote the truth. 

And the others?

Their professionally made pictures were followed by comments from which followed that hunger will finish destruction of the nation that the country stands on the brink of disaster and that national revolutionary powers and Vietnamese are guilty of all.

The slander terrible on a thought was ordinary for these newspapers. They could accuse the people who saved the country and the people from elimination, the people who lifted a banner of fight and expelled murderers from Kampuchea of inability to direct the state. It was possible to them — or rather great paid for it — to accuse fraternal people of Vietnam with which Kampucheans are connected for many years joint fight against the French colonialists and the American aggression, in intervention.

The lie was followed by cries about the tragedy of Kampuchea. But they did not want to remember the tragedy played with coming to power of a propekinskoa of the clique which threw the country on a death side. Now they seldom come to Kampuchea. There is no hunger, the person at people open and cheerful.

... Boyish laughter Vat Pnoma returned me on the landing. To the Pnompenh boys, naughty, brisk, sociable as all boys of the world, it is visible, it was not fallen down during a midday heat too. They came here to look at a snake.

— What snake? — I asked again.

— Big as It is nude — told the most brisk.

— Black — quietly added another. Eyes at them shone for horror and delight.

Having bypassed a pagoda and with bated breath, we glanced in the dried well. At the bottom of it the large cobra lay. The snake hissed and crept away in a crack between stones. Children grievously clinked languages that expressed extreme degree of chagrin, and in a moment were scattered on a hill slope.

Monks still with detachment sat on temple steps when several women with gifts — rice, bananas, pineapples came...

There were three hours p.m., and the sun already not so scorched. The city woke up. Who returned to work after a lunch break, who went to the market; sellers of cigarettes, sweets, street culinary specialists already exposed the trays on sidewalks. Heavy trucks and canary "Ladas", country vehicles, trishaws and cyclists rolled on Son Ngok Minh Avenue. Diversity, noise, the pulsing life.

And a great number of children — on hands or on a hip at mother or tripping afterwards. They were born and took the first steps on the freed, coming to life earth.

I slowly went on the wide sidewalk of the avenue, smiled to me, I smiled, greeted acquaintances.

Fishermen Chran Chomresa

Not to pass the market in the capital in any way. At first you go there just to buy fruit and vegetables. Gradually the market attracts with brightness of paints, scale of smells, variety of persons more and more. Also you begin to peer more fixedly into it clear life not at once.

In days of polpotovsky hard times the markets were destroyed. Fruits of work of peasants, fishermen, handicraftsmen, hunters were appropriated by those who surpassed the Beijing teachers in scales of "cultural revolution". At times and now the people who lost each other in exile meet here the family or acquaintances from whom they learn about the fate of missing.

The markets began to arise through the whole country at once after overthrow of the pro-Beijing clique. Then the monetary system and trade was not introduced yet was exchange. Rice was a basis of exchange. It was changed for fish, vegetables, fruit, a piece of fabric for Sorong, a shirt or sandals.

When national revolutionary powers introduced riels of national Kampuchea into circulation, trade considerably quickened. The good harvest of rice reaped during a dry season of 1981 well affected strengthening of positions of the reviving national economy. Market price of rice approached state.

They say, on consumption of fish per capita Khmers are high on the list in the world. In fish ranks of what you will only not see. In a basin eels coil, nearby in a basket the small small fish trembles — from it hostesses produce odorous fish sauce. The one-and-a-half-meter big fish caught in the river Tonle Sap adjoins to a small group of the "tupolobik" caught in liquid dirt on rice fields. Crabs, shrimps of a morning catch potter about on trays and in boxes.

The rivers and canals, ponds and lakes among which first place in trade is won by the Great lake Sap are rich with fish.

On streets of the settlement of Chran Chomres that on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, is also not visible in the mornings to the people. All population on the river. At the beginning of a dry season the fishing season is in full swing: at this time waters of Tonle Sap flow back to Mekong, with them also fish comes from the Great lake.

Dolblenki, catamarans scurry about between motionless rafts. Rafts are anchored in the middle of the river. On them winches yes easy canopies. Several times a day pull out a seine. The catch is delivered somewhat quicker to the coast, some part is processed here, but the most part is sent to Phnom Penh. Ashore young women under the leadership of two old men repair networks. They settled down at the spacious building — a canopy and one wall. In provinces under the same canopies rural smithies, rural schools are located. The population of the settlement — a chama — one of ethnic minorities which practises Islam, and a canopy in Chran Chomres — the mosque.

From charge of the National and revolutionary tribunal which pronounced the death sentence to executioners:

"Pol Pot — Iyeng of the Sari intended to destroy Muslims. Pursuing policy of violent assimilation, they organized prosecutions and murders of a number of eminent persons of Islam. Nearly 90 percent of the Muslim population were destroyed... All 114 mosques were ruined and destroyed. Some of them are blown up by dynamite, taken down by bulldozers".

The canopy serves in Chran Chomresa also as the school room. The survived chama after release returned to native places. Returned to habitual occupation — fishing.

During the general elections in local bodies of public authority held in Kampuchea in March, 1981, the mosque in Chran Chomresa became the polling precinct. The first old men — to them here respect and honor voted.

The fishing artel obtains the credits from the state for acquisition of tackles, motors for boats, rice at state prices, salt, some industrial goods. Fishermen pay off with a part of the catch, carry the rest on the market.

The groom and the bride from Samdekh Pang Street

 It rained all night. Strange was to see blue-and-blue Phnom Penh the sky poserevshim. On the street naked toddlers splashed in spilled after a night of rain puddle somewhere bawled cock, slept through the rain morning. And then came Samarin. 

...When we first started shooting the television in the morning in the hotel was a swarthy young man in shirt, khaki pants, sandals out of car tires. He called my name — Amarin and said that we expect in school, Santamo. On the way to school, the young man was restrained, anxious and continually wrote in his notebook French phrases: as I understood, he seriously taught the language. 

Half a day we filmed and recorded at the school of Santamo. Stories of teachers, drawings of school students who kept episodes of the endured tragedy, school classes, still half-empty, faces of children, their serious eyes beyond their years. Everything we encountered that morning shocked us. Our guide was irreplaceable: quickly and accurately translated, helped... 

We were shooting a lot and UK Samarin imperceptibly became a member of our group.

 Together, we traveled through more than half of the provinces of Kampuchea and ate more than one pound of salt. However, about of salt later.

 So, this cloudy morning Somarin rolled up on a Bicycle. 

-My friend is getting married today,- said Somarin, after the usual greetings and questions about life.— And he really wants you to come to his wedding. And we went to one of the many streets, fan diverging from the Central market. In front of the house, decorated with garlands and colored lanterns, gathered children, neighbors, just passers-by. 

From around the corner came the sound of a drum — and there was a bride and groom. The groom was wearing a dark jacket, white shirt and tie, but instead of pants he was wearing brown sampot. 

Sampot-a kind of traditional Khmer sarong-a piece of cotton, and during the holidays silk fabric, which is wrapped around the lower body. Sampot is something like pants: the ends of the fabric are passed between the legs and, tightened above the knees, fixed at the waist on the back. Shod was the groom in boots with thick soles and white socks. Sampat bride was Burgundy, white sleeveless blouse, a tight fit body.

 You can get all kinds of jewelry — bracelets on her wrists and ankles, tiara in black, collected in a bunch the hair, the necklace — did not overshadow the beauty of the girl. The groom and the bride were followed by a drummer, girlfriends and friends. On trays gifts - who than is rich. Fold in white paper and tied with bright ribbons, pineapples, bananas, fruits Creanga, oranges and grapefruits, melons, peanuts, dried in the sun shell. 

Khmer weddings are unusually rich in activities and last for three or even four days. But most importantly is done on the first day.

 When the bride and groom knelt down on the Mat at the entrance, the brisk old man went round the young men, dancing and humming. He was given silver scissors on a tray, and the man cut a strand of hair from the newlyweds. 

 Is to happiness, explains Co-Marin.- The Union of young people should be strong, it is fastened for life.

 The man all circled and sang some kind and cheerful songs. Kim SOK Bol - the name of the groom-works in the Phnom Penh port. He's twenty-five years old. Prior to 1975, was a freshman Polytechnic Institute; then exile, hard labor in the fields and Pol pot, one of the communes in Battambang province. After his release he returned to Phnom Penh, where he found his father and two brothers. His mother and older sister died in 1977. Biography of his bride, twenty-two year old Heng Tirith, is also inseparable from the fate of generation. The years of the Pol pot terror, hardship and loss...

 The wedding master of ceremonies, forty-five-year-old Hep Tien, told us that his whole family died in the hot April days of the seventy-fifth year, when they were driven on the road to Kampongsaom. His eyes glistened with tears. At the Khmer wedding, guests sit in small companies, and the bride and groom move from one group to another. So " bitter!"no shouting at a Khmer wedding.

 Served fruit. Melon slices sprinkled with sugar. But the slices of grapefruit, oranges, pieces of pineapple and watermelon are sprinkled with coarse salt. Pineapples with salt - it is not only tasty, but also useful, because salt reduces the effect of acid, destroying tooth enamel. As for citrus and watermelon, I would prefer them in their natural form, but the Khmer eat with salt. I soon got used to this kitchen. That's how we ate with Somarin more than one pound of salt. Meanwhile, the first day of the wedding was coming to an end. Young people tirelessly danced ramvong. Ahead commanded girl, for it the young man, then girl and so on, and so on... They move rhythmically in a circle, according to waving hands. My dance was not particularly successful, but did not participate in rumonge impossible. So to our table and approached the young. We're being photographed. 

- For luck, - says Somarin.— By heart. On a quiet street we say goodbye. On the black sky showed the stars, hung the month. I thank Somarin for the joy he gave me on a cloudy day. He's looking at his watch. 

- Will fly to me from the wife, - he speaks exaggeratedly frightened; then quietly, seriously adds: - the Cloudy season at us came to an end. And leaves on his bike with a patched-pereletnye tires. My friend Somarin. 

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  "Around the World" in 1983, №4.   

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 Until next time, @r3benok