Christmas in Cambodia

Someone else once spent his Christmas in Cambodia. It was John Kerry, and his holiday memories are the reason he lost the 2004 presidential election and stuck us with a bonus four years of George W. Bush:

"I remember Christmas of 1968 sitting on a gunboat in Cambodia. I remember what it was like to be shot at by Vietnamese and Khmer Rouge and Cambodians, and have the president of the United States telling the American people that I was not there; the troops were not in Cambodia. I have that memory which is seared -- seared -- in me."

This is the claim that Kerry's comrades disputed. They say his ship never entered Cambodia. Never mind that few soldiers admitted to taking part in a secret and illegal war with Cambodia. It became accepted fact that Kerry, like most Democrats, was yellow.

I spent my first Christmas in Cambodia exactly forty years after Kerry did (or didn’t, depending who you believe). Thankfully, there are no bullets flying past my head. The country is at peace, though only because its populace is willing to accept a semi-totalitarian and totally corrupt government.

Unlike its shady, 30-years-of-war-causing dealings that Kerry described, America today has an overt presence in Cambodia. And that presence comes in the form of… Stuff. At Lucky, the overpriced grocery store in the center of Phnom Penh, discarded Christmas items cover discount shelves. On one, someone had peeled back the foil on a tray of chocolate Santas, broken off the heads, and folded the foil back over. On another, there were melted giant Hershey kisses with their points caved in, victims of the long journey from who-knows-where. This is probably the farthest place Hershey ships to. It's the periphery of Western encroachment, a place where few people speak English but every waiter wears a Santa hat.

I spent the day, like a true expat, with a group of fellow foreigners--temporary orphans--filling in as one another's family for the day. We ate turkey and wondered where in this country one finds a bird with this much meat on its bones. It's probably imported.