Cambodia Reborn

How about this for a final paragraph to a travel story in yesterday's New Statesman online magazine. Positive, upbeat stories on Cambodia are all too rare in the news media these days, so this is worth reading:

Now is the moment to visit Cambodia. Its Buddhist people are cheerful and courteous; its culture (notably the youthful "apsara" ballet) is captivating; its Khmer cuisine (based heavily on fish such as amok from regular flooding of the Tonle Sap great lake in the central plain) is memorable. The landscape is studded with incom parable archaeological sites. Angkor has yet to be polluted by commercialism: for me, it recalled the brooding majesty of Machu Picchu back in 1963. Cambodia's emergent society is unformed, unlike capitalistic Malaysia, now celebrating the 50th anniversary of its independence. But something new, and maybe better, is growing.

You can read the full article by Kenneth Morgan, titled Cambodia Reborn here.