What do you know about Cambodia?

There's been a lot of discussions that I've found myself a part of or eavesdropping on about the art here and where its inspiration comes from.

There are various schools of thought as far as I can tell.

There are those, like Cambodian Living Arts, who think it incredibly important to move past the genocide, as there are now generations of artists who never experienced it and although they hear the stories and probably their family was affected, they are removed from it. It doesn't figure into their every day experience. CLA, and many other organizations, think that this is the way to move forward now, some thirty, forty years after the fact. Reconstruction is done, now is time to develop.

There are others, however, who believe that all the art should take its inspiration from the genocide because it is only through art that people heal. Everything should reflect and deal with it, in order to heal and move on.

I think this goes much past art. This generation -- if they know about Cambodia at all -- knows only about the American bombardments and the Khmer Rouge. They know it through films like "The Killing Fields." And yet, for centuries preceding, Cambodia was known in the Asian-pacific region for its art and culture.

I admit it's all I knew about. I don't even know if I knew that much before meeting my friend Nettra in university. I'd never heard of the place, or anything about it, and when I did hear about it, I heard about the Khmer Rouge. Because I decided to come, and therefore needed to learn, I read some wiki articles, and learned about how the country is just wobbling back to its feet after the genocide and the war. Because I was looking, I learned about the dance.

But I had no clue. I knew nothing about the culture, about the history, didn't know a lick about the arts, created a workshop without having any background on the general way of teaching and tradition here.

So what's the story here?

I think as always there must be a balance. Without films like "The Killing Fields" (which I admit to not having seen...) and a certain focus on the Khmer Rouge, people like me would never know about this place. But that's only one side of the story, only the black where there is a whole lot of gray to go with it. Something that has become very important to me is communicating to people back home that this place is more than a "post-conflict nation."

When I told people I was going here, I got a lot of strange looks and "that's great, but why Cambodia???" as though to ask why anyone in their right mind would go here. It's for that that I want to do my part to spread the word about this little country on the other side of the world from most of my friends and family and contacts.

The genocide was here, and it is part of the history. But it is not all, and --

nor, I think, should it be.