Sihanouk holds court on the Web
It's not a typical blog, but the former Cambodian monarch's Internet site pulls no punches in thousands of discourses on politics, Hollywood and killer spouses
By Miranda Leitsinger
Associated Press
May 30, 2005
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia -- "I thank you for insulting me."
Thus blogged former King Norodom Sihanouk to a critic of his support of same-sex marriage.
He didn't share any of the insulting e-mails with his readers, but noted: "My country, Cambodia, has chosen to be a liberal democracy since 1993. Every Cambodian ... including the King has the right to express freely their view."
It was one of thousands of commentaries that fill the Web site of the world's most colorful and pugnacious royal blogger, offering Sihanouk's views on almost anything, including environmental destruction, Hollywood stars, killer spouses and the rough-and-tumble world of Cambodian politics.
Sihanouk has been a giant on the Asian political scene for 50 years. He took on the French empire to win Cambodia's independence. During the Vietnam War he was such a nuisance to Washington that he was ousted in a U.S.-supported coup. He backed the Khmer Rouge until it turned against him and put him under house arrest.
Today at 82, he is Cambodia's lion in winter, undergoing cancer treatment in China, his former place of exile. Yet he's as loquacious as ever. The man who grew up on cowboy movies has taken to the World Wide Web with equal gusto.
For at least three years he has been posting his opinions, historical documents and exchanges with diplomats or Cambodian politicians. He abdicated in favor of his son Sihamoni last fall, and he is in and out of the hospital, but the Internet keeps him in the public eye in a style that may be unique on the world stage.
Sihanouk's Web site -- www.norodomsihanouk.info, which is mostly in French -- attracts about 1,000 visitors daily from around the world.
Excerpted in the press
After serving as king, president and prime minister at various times, he now calls himself "a senior citizen who hasn't any official power." But his views remain relevant enough to be summarized in the Cambodian press for the benefit of the many Cambodians who are too poor to have access to the Internet.
Sihanouk's site doesn't have all the technical features of a typical Web log, or blog. Still, says David Sifry, whose company, Technorati, tracks blogs, Sihanouk is making "incredibly innovative use of the Internet to be able to communicate directly with the people of Cambodia and the people of the world."
No surprise there. Sihanouk has always seen himself as a communicator and a trendsetter. He has been a moviemaker, painter, composer and singer, has led a jazz band and fielded a palace soccer team.
His charm and self-dramatizing pronouncements are still evident on his blog. After the 2003 national elections, he described the losses suffered by Funcinpec--a party led by one of his sons--as "shameful."
Then came the about-face: "Papa presents you and Funcinpec his humble apologies, with sincerity and great regret for the writings."
Here's a bit of vintage Sihanouk online, translated from French:
After asking his staff to send money and rice to the widow of a politician axed to death, he writes, "Surprise! `The assassin' so cruel ... is no other than his own wife, who finds herself in prison!! My aforementioned help couldn't be given to this widow, murderer of her own husband."
He also has angered Prime Minister Hun Sen with caustic critiques of Cambodian society and politics penned by Ruom Ritt, a supposed childhood pen pal. Sihanouk has claimed he lives in France but has also referred to him as "my alter ego."
His Majesty recently pulled the plug on Ritt after Hun Sen publicly wished the mystery man an early demise.
Venting on social ills
Sihanouk often lets fly with his views on social ills--illegal logging that threatens to turn his country into a "tiny Sahara without oil," the trafficking of Cambodian women for prostitution in other countries where they "suffer, are humiliated," their impoverished parents helpless to intervene.
After watching television images of same-sex weddings in San Francisco in February 2004, he wrote that Cambodia should do the same, never expecting that his input "would become the source of endless `earthquakes' throughout the world."
He recently blogged that his cancer has re-emerged from remission, but upon learning that a magazine was preparing his obituary, he told his readers: "Even today, Friday the 13th, I am not yet aware of my death. Maybe I am already dead. But I will continue to believe that I am alive."
Copyright © 2005, Chicago Tribune
chicagotribune.com |
