Phnom Penh a year earlier, but had failed the second part, normally a prerequisite for further study abroad. Because the government was in the hands of the Democratic Party, for whom he and his friend Rath Samoeun had campaigned tirelessly, he eventually got his bursary, but not until all the others had left. Samoeun, who had passed his
bac
with flying colours, had reached Paris earlier, and it is possible that Sâr’s initial contact was with him. In any event, soon after arriving, Ieng Sary went to
pay his respects
to Keng Vannsak, who had been four years his senior at the Lycée Sisowath and was now, at the age of twenty-five, among the leading figures of the little Cambodian colony in Paris. He had a friend, he told Vannsak, a young man named Saloth Sâr, who was having great difficulty finding a place to stay. Was he in a position to help?
Vannsak was then living in the rue de Commerce, in the 15th arron-dissement, a stone’s throw from the market at La Motte-Picquet. He was not long back from London where he had married, at the Hampstead Registry Office, a gifted young Frenchwoman who shared his passion for oriental languages. The couple were, indeed, in a position to help. Just across the road, on the corner of the rue de Commerce and the rue Letellier, was a wine shop which doubled as a café. The vintner let out the rooms above. They were spartan in the extreme — bare, dingy bedsits, in which the bed was the only item of furniture provided — but it was a place to live and Sâr moved in at once. Vannsak lent him a chair and some saucepans, and when the young man went down with flu that winter, his wife, Suzanne, ministered to him with daily injections.
The same month that Sary arrived in France, the AEK elected a new six-man executive committee whose members included Keng Vannsak and Thiounn Mumm. One of its first actions was to set up informal student
discussion groups, known as Cercles d’Etudes (Study Circles). There was a Law Circle, headed by Mumm’s brother, Chum; an Arts Circle, under the actor Hang Thun Hak; and others concerned with farming, literature and women’s issues. The inaugural meeting took place on December 21 1950, when Hak’s group — which included Sary, Rath Samoeun and Hou Yuon, then studying for a law degree — debated the relationship between art and society.
A few weeks later Vannsak invited a few friends to a more select, unpublicised gathering in his apartment. This group, which had no name, met two or three times a month to discuss political issues — and specifically the future of Cambodia, now, for the first time, being directly affected by the war in neighbouring Vietnam. Ieng Sary and Rath Samoeun were regular participants. So was Sien An, a former classmate at the Lycée Sisowath, later to become Cambodian Ambassador to Hanoi. Ea Sichau, the president of the Khmer Student Association, and Hang Thun Hak also attended. So did Sâr. The meetings of Vannsak’s circle marked the beginning of his political apprenticeship.
In retrospect, October 1 1949, the day when Mao Zedong stood at the Gate of Heavenly Peace in Beijing and proclaimed the founding of the Chinese People’s Republic and, coincidentally, the day that Sâr and his companions arrived in Paris, was the beginning of the end of the French presence in Indochina.
All through the 1940s, Ho Chi Minh had been at pains to obscure the reality that the Viet Minh was controlled by the Indochinese Communist Party, even claiming, falsely, that the Party had been dissolved. He presented himself as a nationalist, fighting an anti-colonial war in an area of the world where decolonisation was in full spate. Burma, India, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines were all struggling to free themselves from their respective overlords.
The young Cambodians in Paris saw themselves in the same light. They were first and foremost patriots, engaged, albeit at one remove, in a shared fight for liberty. Mey Mann envisaged
bac
with flying colours, had reached Paris earlier, and it is possible that Sâr’s initial contact was with him. In any event, soon after arriving, Ieng Sary went to
pay his respects
to Keng Vannsak, who had been four years his senior at the Lycée Sisowath and was now, at the age of twenty-five, among the leading figures of the little Cambodian colony in Paris. He had a friend, he told Vannsak, a young man named Saloth Sâr, who was having great difficulty finding a place to stay. Was he in a position to help?
Vannsak was then living in the rue de Commerce, in the 15th arron-dissement, a stone’s throw from the market at La Motte-Picquet. He was not long back from London where he had married, at the Hampstead Registry Office, a gifted young Frenchwoman who shared his passion for oriental languages. The couple were, indeed, in a position to help. Just across the road, on the corner of the rue de Commerce and the rue Letellier, was a wine shop which doubled as a café. The vintner let out the rooms above. They were spartan in the extreme — bare, dingy bedsits, in which the bed was the only item of furniture provided — but it was a place to live and Sâr moved in at once. Vannsak lent him a chair and some saucepans, and when the young man went down with flu that winter, his wife, Suzanne, ministered to him with daily injections.
The same month that Sary arrived in France, the AEK elected a new six-man executive committee whose members included Keng Vannsak and Thiounn Mumm. One of its first actions was to set up informal student
discussion groups, known as Cercles d’Etudes (Study Circles). There was a Law Circle, headed by Mumm’s brother, Chum; an Arts Circle, under the actor Hang Thun Hak; and others concerned with farming, literature and women’s issues. The inaugural meeting took place on December 21 1950, when Hak’s group — which included Sary, Rath Samoeun and Hou Yuon, then studying for a law degree — debated the relationship between art and society.
A few weeks later Vannsak invited a few friends to a more select, unpublicised gathering in his apartment. This group, which had no name, met two or three times a month to discuss political issues — and specifically the future of Cambodia, now, for the first time, being directly affected by the war in neighbouring Vietnam. Ieng Sary and Rath Samoeun were regular participants. So was Sien An, a former classmate at the Lycée Sisowath, later to become Cambodian Ambassador to Hanoi. Ea Sichau, the president of the Khmer Student Association, and Hang Thun Hak also attended. So did Sâr. The meetings of Vannsak’s circle marked the beginning of his political apprenticeship.
In retrospect, October 1 1949, the day when Mao Zedong stood at the Gate of Heavenly Peace in Beijing and proclaimed the founding of the Chinese People’s Republic and, coincidentally, the day that Sâr and his companions arrived in Paris, was the beginning of the end of the French presence in Indochina.
All through the 1940s, Ho Chi Minh had been at pains to obscure the reality that the Viet Minh was controlled by the Indochinese Communist Party, even claiming, falsely, that the Party had been dissolved. He presented himself as a nationalist, fighting an anti-colonial war in an area of the world where decolonisation was in full spate. Burma, India, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines were all struggling to free themselves from their respective overlords.
The young Cambodians in Paris saw themselves in the same light. They were first and foremost patriots, engaged, albeit at one remove, in a shared fight for liberty. Mey Mann envisaged
Similar Books
