No Rice No Food

No rice no food sounds a bit strange. It is essential to understanding the Khmer. Khmer is how Cambodians refer to themselves in their language. At the most simple 'No rice No Food' means that you have to have rice to have had a proper meal.

Let's say if you go out for pizza, a well loved a appreciated food for the Khmer. Man are you hungry. You go to Pizza Company (not a Cambodian company) and order 2 extra large pizza. Two bastardized pizzas with what they call hotdogs in the crust. Although not what I really call pizza it is tasty enough and you pay the bill. After get in the tuk-tuk or moto-dop and go home.
While most westerners (barrang) would stagger home (because of the beers), flop on the bed and fall in to a food induced comma. Perhaps waking up to pee from all the beer.

If you are paying attention you know is what is wrong if you replace the westerner with a Khmer in that scenario. They have not properly eaten.  They had crust, cheese, hotdog, pizza sauce (sort of) and maybe seafood. What they have not had is rice.

What in English has only one word, in Khmer has at least 3 in Khmer.They have a name for cooked rice (bhi) , a name for uncooked rice (anchor) and for rice not yet picked from the plant(srov.) Most of their ancestor's lives have been centered around the production and consumption of rice. So when they get home they must eat at least some rice. 

As one of us you may think this is nuts. Your stomach is full but still eat rice. It is not about the the nourishment or the desire to fill one's stomach. It is the desire to find that thing in life that is most important and not live without it for even one time. Here rice leads to money, to a live without hunger,to everything that makes life worth living.

As with most countries the old is making way with the new and the rice centered life is slowly fading.

In America we had some ideals that kept our country centered. Values such as freedom and protecting each other especially the poor and the weak. It is being replaced with the Trump view of the world. Anyone less than you needs to be kept in their place. Hurting people because of their race or country of origin is ok. Women are to be used as long as they are young and beautiful and discarded soon after. Friends are just commodities and enemies are to be admired and embraced for their corruption of power.  It is ok for someone powerful to try to hurt the powerless.

Most of us people who are not good in the best sense have found the wrong thing to center our lives. Food, drink, sex the pursuit of the the wrong thing I really thought these kind of people where a minority in the US.. Seem like many more people than I could have imaged centered their lives on hate. Always grabbing for the wrong thing.