A few steps from the National Museum, along a thoroughfare of family-owned galleries, is Reyum, an arts collective that encourages youths to give meaning to their troubled pasts by reinterpreting traditional forms of painting and sculpture. Tucked in a side road around the corner is the nonprofit Friends restaurant, which provides on-the-job training for young people, some of whom are former street children. A short walk behind the palace brings the visitor to Street 240, a row of shops offering fine crafts, silks, and the uniquely Cambodian concoction of Belgian chocolate sprinkled with Kampot pepper.
Not far beyond, at the convergence of boulevards bearing the names of kings, rises the Independence Monument. Among my most precious memories, I recall, as a girl of four or five, walking here with my father. He would tell me stories that would stay with me in the ensuing years of chaos, stories I would invoke in quiet moments during my struggle to survive.
If you arrive early enough in the cool morning hours, you will find the park here filled with people, young and old, rich and poor, ministers and students and street vendors, walking, playing badminton, catching a moment’s rest, or exchanging stories before the start of another busy day.
While the city is frenetically rebuilding in what feels like a race to make up for lost time, this is a land of survivors, where each of us is shadowed by our own particular collection of echoes.
To the casual observer, the history of opulence and tragedy, artistic achievement and suffering compressed into just a few generations may feel irreconcilable. Yet, for those willing to listen and inquire, the city is full of clues marking junctures where our collective histories intersect, places that remind us what we’ve lost, and what might endure.
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