Banana Kingdoom: Be warned, laugh at your own risk!

The humor-king: aka Norodom Sihanouk
The bodyguard-comedian: Neay Krem (right standing next to Neay Koy) is on the payroll of Hun Xen's bodyguard (B-70) unit.
The Cartoonist: Cartoon by Sacrava published by the Phnom Penh Post in 1998

Comedians do not dispense humor freely

18 August 2010
By Kang Kallyan, Emile Boulenger and Adrien Le Gal
Cambodge Soir Hebdo
Translated from French by Jean Sanculnitête

Cartoonist Ung Bun Heang, who is now settled in Australia, finds himself being a “black sheep” as well because of his ferocious anti-government cartoons published on the opposition website KI-Media under the penname of Sacrava. Political cartoonist under the Khmer Republic, he described the latter as being a period of freedom of expression whereby no cartoonists were ever sent to court. To Ung Bun Heang, the absence of political cartoons in the news media published in Cambodia is a missing culture: “Cambodians love to laugh, even when they endure a hard life,” he claimed. “They appreciate cartoons, it’s the government that does not want to see them. If I were to publish my cartoons in the country, I am 1,000% certain that I would be sued for defamation.” His unflattering cartoons of Hun Xen – always wearing an eye patch – or that of the king leave him very little hope of returning back to Cambodia.

Skits, jokes, mimes … Humorists and cartoonists only have to dig into their repertoire to make Cambodian people laugh. But, when it involves politics, humor quickly turns into a double edge sword.

“It’s the story of a pretty girl…” Pok Thareth, aka Loa Sy [screw] his acting name, follows the gaze of an imaginary damsel and he knocked his face into a door. “That’s a skit that always works,” he joked. “But, there is no magic formula for humor … what matters most of all is talent. There’s this joke that works well: it’s about a Vietnamese woman who squeezes herself next to the driver at the front of the truck, and she placed her legs on each side of the hand brake … When she arrives at her destination, she refuses to pay because her thighs are bruised!”

The Khmer humor can also be lost in the translation into a western language. Nevertheless, the laughing tradition is deeply rooted in Cambodia, even if very few documents attest to the fact. “The tales of Alev and Thnenh Chey contain some comical elements,” Ros Chantrabot, the academician and political science professor at the Cambodian Royal Academy, noted. “These stories are passed down from one generation to another, they are part of the daily life and they are even taught in schools.”

Laugh as an outlet

Among the possibilities offered by the Khmer language and culture, there are also the verlan [from inversion of syllables in a word, e.g. verlan is in itself the verlan of the original French word “l’envers”, the inverse, “peak kroloas” in Khmer], wordplay, as well as the traditional Ayay songs. “Ayay involves a man and a woman who exchange rhythmic and improvised poems. Most often, they make erotic allusions,” Ros Chantrabot said. “It’s not raw, but the allusion is strong enough to make people laugh. It’s like a poem that is transformed so that everybody can take a romp.” “The tricks are more or less the same as in the west,” Phoeung Kompheak, the organizers of the yearly show for the Francophone Study Department, indicated. “The hyperbole is a style figure that works everywhere. For example, a troubadour will have all those who laugh lined up behind him, say, by telling the story of the sexual life of a couple of ogres while playing his mandolin. Another type of laugh can be obtained when one feels that one is cornered, when one does not know what to say… then one tells something funny or absurd, whereas in fact, it translates into something very sad.”

Laughing, when used as an outlet, allows one to touch upon subjects that, by modesty, one would not touch in normal talks. “Within the framework of humor, we can make allusions to eroticism and it is better accepted,” Ros Chatrabot stressed. With the exception of religion, no subjects are taboos for comedians. Even if no comedy has ever been placed to the Khmer Rouge regime era, jokes on the Khmer Rouge abound: considering the 1975-1979 period as a normal period is absurd enough to bring a laugh. “There’s one that everybody knows about,” said Ou Ponnarat, aka Neay Krem, a contemporary star comedian. “It’s about one person asking another: ‘How about you, what did you do under Pol Pot?’ and the other person would reply: ‘I sold coffees…’” During the period when the Khmer Rouge were rallying with the government, they were usually the butt of the jokes: “People were poking fun at them when they were told about “puppet” and they thought it really meant “enemy” because of the use of the word puppet in their propaganda…,” Ros Chantrabot remembers. Jokes about the handicapped people are not spared either. Neay Krem told countless number of times the story of a verbal exchange with a one-legged man when he unknowingly placed his artificial foot against the buttock of a woman. “What are you doing?” the woman asked. “I am a soldier,” the man replied. “Will you stop doing what you are doing, just now?” the woman asked again. “Yeah, when I will be demobilized…,” the man said. “But, what happens to your leg?” she asked. “It was a bomb,” he said…

Legacy of the 60s

Neay Krem indicated: “There were three types of spectators: the rich, the poor and the middle class. When telling jokes to each of the 3 types, we have to use different words. Among the farmers, cussing always bring out laughter … as well as sexually explicit jokes. For example, when I tell the story of a man who asked a woman if she would have a mortar and a pestle for him to borrow, then the woman would reply that she only has a mortar… During shows, we can make up a skit on the spot. It’s based on the principle of “unending story” whereby each comedian would take over the story where the previous one stopped…”

Ros Chantrabot added: “Current comedians are still very influenced by those from the 60s, such as Mandoline and Van Suy, who themselves took over Charlie Chaplin’s moustache. They just make some funny faces and say a few words that barely touch upon obscenity, they still lack the comical aspect stemming from a situation or from more elaborate skits.”

To Pok Thareth, even if the story does not include powerful jokes, it is fine as long as they include scenes that would make people laugh. “Sometimes, I tell situations in daily life where I am exaggerating them somewhat. For example, the story which took place in my neighborhood where a villager killed his neighbor’s chicken. Then he would give half of the chicken to his neighbor without telling him where the chicken came from. So when the neighbor started to wonder where his chicken was, the man would tell him: ‘Your chicken? You ate it yesterday and you didn’t complain about it!’”.

The Humor-King

In politics, the champion in the field was held by the topmost man in the country who used jokes to scathingly criticize his adversaries. Even though he claimed his innocence, King-Father Norodom Sihanouk is usually identified by observers as the master of political humor, along with his “childhood friend” Ruom Ritt – whom people suspect that the latter is no other than the king’s penname. At the end of 1997, the then-King announced that he would stop all criticisms on the government through his “Monthly Documentation Bulletin” … while immediately initiating the publication of his exchange with his “childhood friend” who wrote sour and caustic attacks against Hun Xen. As the tension between the king and the prime minister rose, the exchanges with Ruom Ritt became more frequent. Norodom Sihanouk, who affirmed that Ruom Ritt really existed, did not hesitate to provide details about the latter: during his childhood, he lived the 3rd district of Phnom Penh [Phsar Thmei area], Sihanouk claimed, and he did his elementary schooling in the same class as the future king at the François-Beaudoin school. A patriot dedicated to his country, Ruom Ritt would never accept any gratification and he lived in the French Pyrenees Mountain. Ruom Ritt’s writings are “strictly based on realities and truths “wrapped” with a lot of humor.” The pair of Sihanouk and Ruom Ritt would soon be caught in their own games: Hun Xen multiplied his responses to Ruom Ritt, whereas the NGOs used him as a witness [as to what was happening in Cambodia under Hun Xen] … In April 2003, Hun Xen asks the king to provide him the address of his pen pal so that he can “clarify all the problems he raised in his letters,” to which Sihanouk refused due to security concerns. Nevertheless, Ruom Ritt must now apologize for his scathing attacks, arguing that “being over 80,” he no longer has everything “up there, in his head.” In April of 2003, Sihanouk announced the end of the publication of his exchange as the letters from his “childhood friend” as they had caused “major annoyances to a certain party.” However, in 2004, Ruom Ritt took up his writing again to talk about the kingdom of “Keapucham” in which King Soukhani had a hard time finding a solution to the crisis faced by Sy Ramsain, the president of the same party name, Lord Chimsea from the Prachonchea party and The Great Lord Riddhnaran of the Fecsinpu. When the throne of the Keapucham changed hands, it was King Sihimona who became Ruom Ritt’s topic. He “loves women and damsels, only as his sisters,” Ruom Ritt wrote, and the king is not “lecherous” as “his father was when he was a young king in the 40s and 50s.” Then Ruom Ritt again went silent until last February, when a “fake Ruom Ritt” took to the scene by giving an audio interview on the Cambodian-Viet border issue broadcasted over the Internet by Sam Rainsy’s followers. Then King-Father had to come out from his reclusion to defend the integrity of his childhood friend who would be too old and too ill to be able to give out interviews.

In politics, rival factions have almost always tried to use humor as a tool to make fun of their adversaries. Pok Thareth, a long follower of Funcinpec, took part in several election campaigns along Prince Ranariddh to poke fun at the CPP. His tools: using Viet accent, mimes on politicians who would promise anything and everything, etc… His attacks usually hit the mark, so much so that he became the CPP black sheep. With the floundering of the royalist camp, Pok Thareth was banned from TV shows. In April 2009, he sent an apology letter to Hun Xen, and in return, he received his membership to the CPP, a sign indicating his possible return to favor.

Cartoonist Ung Bun Heang, who is now settled in Australia, finds himself being a “black sheep” as well because of his ferocious anti-government cartoons published on the opposition website KI-Media under the penname of Sacrava [KI-Media note: KI-Media is not part of any opposition party]. Political cartoonist under the Khmer Republic, he described the latter as being a period of freedom of expression whereby no cartoonists were ever sent to court. To Ung Bun Heang, the absence of political cartoons in the news media published in Cambodia is a missing culture: “Cambodians love to laugh, even when they endure a hard life,” he claimed. “They appreciate cartoons, it’s the government that does not want to see them. If I were to publish my cartoons in the country, I am 1,000% certain that I would be sued for defamation.” His unflattering cartoons of Hun Xen – always wearing an eye patch – or that of the king leave him very little hope of returning back to Cambodia.

“Cambodian comedians are not yet able to laugh about politics, they don’t have enough knowledge, neither in politics, nor in the legal matters,” Ros Chantrabot claimed while noting that no political satire is ever broadcasted on Cambodian TVs.

The bodyguard-comedian

Nowadays, only the CPP has the exclusivity when it comes to manipulating political humor and cartoons. Starting in 2000, Neay Krem, who is close to the government, poked fun at garment union officials in his skit known as “the fishing pole without a fishing hook” in which he meant to broadcast [the CPP anti-union propaganda message] that striking workers are exposing themselves to firing and would most likely end up as prostitutes. In June of 2009, right in the middle of the corruption controversy in Cambodia, Neay Krem attacked the NGOs [that were raising the government corruption issue], claiming that they were embezzling money while they were leading anti-corruption activities, that they were cheating their documents to obtain funding, that they were trying to obtain petition thumbprints from tuk-tuk drivers who were asleep. Meanwhile, Neay Krem painted the reporters and representatives of donor countries as customers of luxury hotels and they were accompanied by pretty girls. [To the CPP,] humor is their preference: like about 20 other comedians, Neay Krem is in the payroll of Hun Xen’s bodyguards unit.