The Killing Fields and S-21, Phenom Penh Cambodia

The first time I heard about The Killing Fields was through my friend Jose's blog. He described the scene in harrowing words that shocked me, but nothing could prepare me for the feelings that this place stirred in me. The pain and sadness that came from me that day was not a simple mourning like the loss of a family member, but something more profound. What I saw that day, what caused me to stagger around the complex in a shock of sorrow, was the loss of humanity that results from the abandonment on reason.

The creed of the Khmer Rouge was even simpler than the creed of communism, against which America was obsessed: destroy anyone who has a mind and exterminate their families. Drive fear into the hearts of any who would think for themselves, anyone who has an education or knowledge. When we got to the compound and began to explore, the first thing I saw was an enormous tower, constructed for the exhumed bones of the Khmer Rouge's victims. The skulls were categorized according to age and sex, layered shelf upon shelf to the top of the tower. My eyes lifted toward the glass shelves and my friend asked, why would they display these bodies so ungraciously. So it doesn't happen again, I said. I'm not sure if I can believe that. There is no expiration date on the cruelty of which human beings are capable. We have seen these themes repeat throughout our history, from the Viking raids to Hitler's Holocaust, the brutal have always sought power.

We wandered around the complex, from mass grave to mass grave. We saw the killing tree, against which children were tortured, and read about the loud music they played throughout the day so that people working in the fields beyond would not know what was happening in the complex.

After the Killing Fields, we went to S-21, a high school transformed into a torture facility and prison. I walked along the corridors, stepping into a few classrooms along the East side of the complex which had been converted to large, single cells. There was an iron bed, wrought iron leg shackles and an iron box for the prisoner's excrement. I made my way around the bed, my imagination surging until I saw the photographs. When the Vietnamese raided Phenom Penh, after the "American War", they found the remains of the Cambodian victims of S-21 and photographed them. When S-21 became a memorial museum, these photographs were mounted on the walls and the beds placed as they had been. After the first photograph, I was shocked and left the room. When I came upon the second, I started to cry.

When I turned around to look at the grounds, it was as if the facility had been resurrected in all of it's horror. I looked onto the grounds of the compound, picturing the smiling school children running for recess, until my imagination played fast forward on the tape. The children are rounded up and kicked out, barbed wire is coiled, scaffolds builts, bayonets thrust, the blood and and the screams. The center building contained a gallery of rows upon rows of photographs, mug shots of the victims upon their entry into S-21. Some men wore a vigilante glare, daring the photographer to attack. Others were terrified, unable to protect their loved ones. I came upon the children before I saw the women, little babies in navy blue suits staring blankly at the camera. The youngest that I saw was a child so little, he was cradled in his mother's arms. The vacant look on her face is not afraid or even alive anymore. It's as if the child she holds is already dead. As I walked the rows, staring into the eyes of these people, struck by the myriad of emotion conveyed through their eyes, I came upon one girl who moved me to tears. She had been beated, her eye was swollen shut and bruised but she was still fighting. She faced a fear greater than any I will ever see, but she looked at her captor and raised her head proudly.

The dilemma that this experience brought to me was profound: The tragedy of this totalitarian government is so appalling that we want to keep these things from happening in the future. However, the only way to do this is to assert a moral superiority to these intolerable actions and one can only achieve this by establishing that there is such a thing as RIGHT. This means accepting that RIGHT exists, not "right for me" and "right for you." One's right to life supersedes the world's cultural ideals: the individual's right to life is the highest moral ideal. It is against these atrocious acts that people must stand and defend the world's smallest minority: the individual.

(Since writing this post, I have read First They Killed My Father by Luong Ung. For more information and a non-fiction account of being a child during this time, I refer you to the book)

observations of the outbound 5

"Are you French? You look French" says the man in front of me, while chomping on tiny balled bites of raw ground beef out of the package. He has peeled away the plastic wrap and shoveled down the whole packet of Safeway meat. Impressive in a Rosemary's Baby kind of way. Though his head is clean shaven, Bic style, blond hair bushes from his ears and I notice a streak of blue dirt behind them, tucked in the creases. He steals an occasional glance backward toward me, trying to catch my attention again. Perhaps I should tell him that my family heritage is French.

There's a little boy on the bus, dressed in a green snowflake sweater and a red scarf. He is missing his two front teeth; he giggles at his mother and squeezes himself between the spaces of the seats which sit back to back. The bus wrenches to an awkward stop, throwing me forward in my chair and the child falls forward into the leg of a man standing up. His mother apologizes and grabs him, her hat falls forward over her eyes.

so much government, so little time.

if there's one thing my travels in japan taught me, it was the stealthy and disarming nature of government. socialism is so embedded in japanese culture that people rarely think that they might be entitled to feel or act in opposition to the group. i saw this most clearly when i worked for NOVA but i won't get into that again. recently, i found out the extent to which the government's mandates have crossed into the public health arena and i had to share this. the new york times reported that the japanese government has made obesity illegal. in an attempt to lower the health care costs shelled out by the government, men and women between the ages of 40 and 74 must have their waists measured as a part of their annual physical. if they are metabo (+33.5 inches for men, 35.4 inches for women), they have 3 months to loose it or face 6 months of mandatory lifestyle training. the idea is to shame people into loosing weight because no one wants to be singled out as a fatty. because the government will penalize private companies (who provide health insurance for the metabos), private companies have begun measuring their employees from age 30 and having family metabo days where you have to listen to lectures about how to eat right.

to me, this is a clear-cut example of why the government should not provide social services for its citizens. anyone who pays the price for a service wants to make sure they minimize their waste: if you pay for your car, you drive carefully; if you pay for your education, you go to class; if you pay for your healthcare, you eat right and excersise. when the government gets in there to provide these "necessities" it also follows that they will find it mandatory to minimize their losses, thus restricting the freedom of those that use their services.

For Love of Da Robot: A Shout Out to Daft Punk

What is it about Daft Punk that makes people paint themselves with their lyrics and choreograph catchy little ditties for YouTube celebrity? If you have seen their videos online and listened to their music, you might have an idea, but true Daft Punkers will argue that you don't know what you're talking about unless you've been to a show. With fierce competition and jaw dropping prices to acquire tickets, few people are able to experience the electo-high of a Daft Punk show.

When the Da Funk Fest came to Toyko, Alive 2007 had just been released, fusing the energy of all those old favorites together, resulting in a seamless stream of power. I couldn't miss it, so I made the trip to Tokyo to pay homage to the French masters. Held in greater Tokyo's Makuhari Messe arena, I was surrounded by thousands of screaming fans from all over the world. When the curtain went up, neon light spilled onto the crowd, alternating static and lyrics, beaming incandescence onto the screaming, dancing mob. Famous for their love of robots, the French duo wear robot helmets at every show and make their radical electro-funk from inside of an enormous pyramid. The lighting is as important as the music; the glowing pyramid being the cornerstone of the Daft Punk image. Its radiance flickers over the raised hands of the crowd along with the music, starting with simple light flashes and building into full graphic photos along its walls. A lighting grate frames the pyramid like a halo while the back screen provides the background for the scene. With the music and the lights creating an electronic wonderland, it was impossible to stop dancing through the whole 3 hour show and despite being completely out of breath, I was still begging for an encore.

Arguably the most successful electronic artists of all time, Daft Punk have forged an electomania for the mainstream. DFA artist LCD Soundsystem alluded to Daft Punk as far back as 2005, making a top 40 dance record that featured the track "Daft Punk is Playing at My House." We have seen big-name artists like Busta Rhymes and Janet Jackson use their songs to make hits, most recent success story being Kanye West's sample of "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" which won him an appearance at the Grammy's and a number one slot on the charts in the US, UK, New Zealand and Canada (for starters). While this might make Daft Punk purists' stomachs turn, there is no arguing the proliferation of this group's past popularity. And as our culture becomes more cyber-possessed, there is no limit to how popular these electo-dieties might become.

Update: 3/3/09
Another movie score will be added to Daft Punk's orchestral repertoire...They've just been signed to do Disney's score for upcoming film, Tron 2.0.

The Goriest Meal

Jenny and Monika are vegetarians, though you would never know this if you were their travel buddy. One day in Hanoi, the girls meet me in the room and pull a pink plastic bag out of the fridge saying they have brought me a present: dog meat. Since they are vegetarians and they ate dog, I should do it too. Well, I couldn't do it and I never heard the end of that. Look, I'm all about experimentation, but eating Lassie is taking it a bit far for me.


Being born in Louisiana, eating strange reptiles is pretty normal. I've grown up eating crawfish, alligator, turtle soup and frog legs, so when the girls heard about a snake village outside Hanoi, I was game. The snake village has these specialty, family-run restaurants that serve cobra feasts featuring the raw heart of the snake and snake blood wine. We selected our restaurant and withing minutes, the server's father and brother brought out a writhing cobra to the corner of the restaurant, stepped on its head and stretched out its body, slit its throat and drained the blood into a goblet. Our server then ushered us back to our table and mixed the blood with rice wine. As we toasted, she brought out another goblet containing a greenish liquid, which turned out to be snake bile, and 3 cobra hearts in 3 glasses for us. We were told that the cobra is supposed to give you long life and fertility, which is why Vietnamese have these restaurants. After having our "wine" and some beer to wash it all down, our server started bringing out the rest of the food.

The menu was so extensive, we couldn't eat everything she brought. Imagine iron chef where the secret ingredient is cobra. Among the twelve dishes we were served, we had snake gruel, snake with ginger, sauteed snake with garlic, snake steamed with Chinese medicinal herbs and fried snake with dipping sauce. I wouldn't have been surprised if she had served us cobra ice cream at the end of the meal.

My vegetarians made me proud that night. The slaughter didn't phase them one bit. When our glasses were drained and our bellies full, we caught our taxi back to town, a little grossed out that we were stuffed with snakes.

Notes from the Underground: A Look Inside the Love Hotel

At first mention of the words Love Hotel, most Americans envision flickering Neon signs and dank walls shedding their paper like dead skin. But, since we’re talking about Japan, this is not the case. Fuse the Japanese obsession with technology and cleanliness, twist in some kinky fantasies and you have the Love Hotel, or Rabu Hoteru. These gigantic, window-less buildings look like they have popped out of a Disney theme park in the shapes of ships and pyramids. Wandering through the maze of private entrances and frosted glass doors, you'll be lucky to stumble upon the reception board since no one is there to tell you where it is. The most important feature of the Love Hotel is discretion; no grimy man handing out keys under a flickering florescent light here. The reception board displays illuminated photos of the rooms they have available and upon selection, illuminate a map to your room. Your room number is also illuminated so you know you're in the right place, which is helpful since you haven't been given a key. But don't worry about someone bursting into your fantasy romance: that sound you hear upon closing the door is the magnetic seal and no one is coming in (or out) until the bill is paid: a security measure that makes you feel like a character from a Murakami book.


The room is pristine and fully equipped with all the necessary amenities: mini bar, video game center, karaoke station and a vending machine filled with toys and edible panties to spice up the evening. While the knowledge that an unknown number of people have "done it" in this room is slightly unnerving, the sheets on the circular bed are pressed and the mirrors on the ceiling are sparkling, so it's easy to shrug it off. Besides, the jacuzzi and bidet being standard equipment in the "LoveHo" makes emerging from your lust cubby less conspicuous.

But now it's time to pay for your evening by turning on your T.V. and selecting payment from the game system's drop down menu. The amount you owe the house then pops up on the screen and you swipe your credit card using that card reader on the wall. If you don't have plastic, no worries. Just use the pneumatic tube to send your yen soaring to the unknown people on the free side of the door. When you get your change and receipt, the door unlocks and you are free from your prison of pleasure.

For those of us more accustomed to space, this might seem like a lot of effort for a lay, but its not surprising that these dens of fornication are so popular among Japanese who haven't given up their love of paper walls. Add onto that the merging of families into common households and the idea of going out to get it on sounds completely reasonable. As real estate prices continue to soar and fewer people can afford the spacious homes to which Americans have become accustomed, you might see this Love Hotel phenomenon trickle into the states.

my cup runneth over and the transitions thereafter

in the process of living, i suspended writing for the last few weeks of my trip. sometimes people forget the details so they insist on writing everyday. in my case, these details are burned into my mind so vividly that when i close my eyes, i see them. last night i was dreaming about a kayak and water flowing over my computer. i was using the computer to protect myself against the elements. then i was in the arms of a man who loved me and made me laugh. my sister woke me up with a giggle, "you were a smiling sleeper!"

i rolled over, but was unable to harness that dream again. that's very much where i am right now. like a dreamer suspended between reality and a weightless, watery dream world. i am now in limbo between my past experiences and my future goals. i am terrified and exhausted, thrilled and expectant, but i have been unable to touch this blog since i left asia. it's just too personal, too reminiscent of those days and right now i just can't process all of that joy. in the words of henry david thoreau,

"if the day and night are such that you greet them with joy, and life emits a fragrance like flowers and sweet-scented herbs, is more elastic, more starry, more immortal- that is your success. all nature is your congratulation, and you have cause momentarily to bless yourself. the greatest gains and values are farthest from being appreciated. we easily come to doubt if they exist. we soon forget them. they are the highest reality...the true harvest of my daily life is somewhat intangible and indescribably as the tints of morning or evening. it is a little star-dust caught, a segment of the rainbow which i have clutched"

i have touched the rainbow, worshiped the dawn, bathed in luminance and danced in the air. looking over endless fields of green rice, pointed hats knee deep in planting, i turned to allan and whispered, "my cup runneth over" and smiled like the light across the horizon. i agonized over the decision to return to the old life, knowing it would entail forging a new life in a new world and now i return to reality to push the pages from this old, gorgeous chapter in the book of me to the new, blank pages. possibility in my life legend is currently giving me writers block, so i stand, poised with a mammoth quill waiting for the dust to clear from my mind.

"everything had changed suddenly- the tone, the moral climate; you didn't know what to think, whom to listen to. as if all your life you had been led by the hand like a small child and suddenly you were on your own, you had to learn to walk by yourself. there was no one around, neither family nor people whose judgment you respected. at such a time you felt the need of committing yourself to something absolute- life or truth or beauty- of being ruled by it in place of the man-made rules that had been discarded. you needed to surrender to some such ultimate purpose more fully, more unreservedly than you had ever done in the old familiar, peaceful days, in the old life that was now abolished and gone for good."
-boris pasternak
from dr. zhivago