Cambodia: A land of untold stories
Massey University journalism graduate James Ellingham was the recipient of an Asia:NZ media internship at the Phnom Penh Post in Cambodia in 2009. This is his account of reporting for New Zealand media from the Southeast Asian country.
Most media talk about the horrors of Asian prisons. Prey Sar (or S24) prison is about 30 minutes by tuk tuk out of Cambodia’s sprawling yet low slung capital Phnom Penh.
When I pulled up I almost expected to see chain gangs of men breaking their backs while raking dirt. But, locals say, don’t listen to all of the foreign stories about the place.
The reason for my prison visit was to try to catch up with incarcerated New Zealander Graham Cleghorn. He’s been imprisoned on rape charges since 2004. He says he’s innocent but who really knows. Cleghorn’s name should be familiar to New Zealanders as his case has been reported widely, but I hadn’t seen an interview with him in the New Zealand media for some time. So I decided to turn up and interview the man.
Reading other people’s travel stories about prison visits I expected to have to bribe my way in with US dollars and some self-righteous reporter’s swagger. “I’m a New Zealand reporter and I’m here to see Graham Cleghorn.”
But it wasn’t as tough as that. I did have to pay a bribe – 500 riel – which is about 15 New Zealand cents. Having taken a local with me to engage with the security guards in Khmer may have helped with this. Some people, I heard, had been charged up to US$20 to enter.
In context, Cambodian locals generally pay about US$30 per month to rent a pretty standard Phnom Penh apartment – although definitely not in the inner-city New Zealand sense of the word.
The reporter’s speech wasn’t necessary. I was let straight in, although I couldn’t take my phone or any electronic devices and had to plead my case to be allowed to enter with a notebook and pen. And it was only one pen I was allowed.
So I’m in the middle of a Cambodian prison yard waiting to see Cleghorn, surrounded by curious mostly smiling inmates taking a look at the foreigner who was staring at them, wondering what they had done to be behind bars.
Cleghorn emerged, a thin pale imitation of the strongman shown in old photos of him continually rehashed by New Zealand papers every time a story about him runs. This and another interview with him go as normal. I can’t imagine New Zealand’s Department of Corrections would allow media to speak with a prisoner so easily, if at all.
On my return to New Zealand I worked with the Phnom Penh Post and wrote more stories about Cleghorn’s latest battle with Cambodian courts, where he was being sued for defamation.
One of the advantages of working as reporter in Cambodia, at the Phnom Penh Post, is that the kingdom hasn’t reached the stage of hiding behind a trembling wall of PR. Working on the business desk I was blunted a few times, but accessing people is easy. And sometimes luck plays a part, too.
Photo: "When I landed in Cambodia I found a tuk tuk driver who spoke English. He was invaluable throughout my stay - always knowing where to go and acting as a translater." Here, American reporter Jake Schoneker, 2nd from left, and James Ellingham, right, with Mark Sao, or Mister Mark, and his family.
A tourist must-do in Phnom Penh is a visit to the former Khmer Rouge prison Toul Sleng or S21. This and the killing fields will stir even the most unemotional.
While at S-21 I saw a man perform some kind of ceremony, pouring water and dust on to a lawn. That man was former New Zealand rower Rob Hamill – in Cambodia to hear the former governor of S-21 sentenced to 19 years’ prison at a special UN-backed court, and to film his story of looking for the remains of his brother Kerry who was captured by the Khmer Rouge and killed at the prison. Graciously, Hamill gave up his final evening in the kingdom for an interview where he told of his family’s pain at losing Kerry.
While access for interviews was often easier than in New Zealand, language barriers and communication equipment failures could mean the smallest story took the biggest of efforts.
Sometimes, that and the almost bureaucratic feel of the Phnom Penh Post environment could be frustrating, but you just had to take note of how Khmer people live and not let it worry you.
The chance to live and work in a country so different from New Zealand should be taken, so I would strongly recommend to New Zealand journalists to apply for an Asia New Zealand Foundation media grant.
Photo: JAmes (2nd from right) with some of the younger Khmer reporters at the Phnom Penh Post. The paper has two editions - English and Khmer - and many of the local reporters produce stories in both.
In Cambodia, you may get ripped off a few times and maybe feel like melting in the heat or realise you alone can’t cure Cambodia’s poverty, but there’s nothing like a dose of perspective when you live in a country like New Zealand. Cambodia is the kingdom where anything goes and, for journalists, it’s a land of infinite untold stories.
- by James Ellingham; published May 2011. Photos supplied.