Magnum Blog / Secrets of the Soil

Secrets of the Soil

John Vink/Magnum Photos Nearly 30 years after the fall of the Khmer Rouge regime, evidence of their brutal rule is still being discovered. On May 5, villagers of Koh Sla, while digging the soil, stumbled upon a burial site dating from the regime. Some people started exploring the site, looking for jewelry which would have been left in the graves. About 120 corpses were unearthed. On a small hilltop nearby, the remains of a separate body were found, wrapped in olive coloured plastic sheeting, which indicates this was not a civilian victim but more probably a Vietnamese soldier who died during the 1979 campaign by the Vietnamese army to push back the Khmer Rouge to the strongholds from where they would remain active until 1998. The bones were recovered by the Vietnamese on May 10th and repatriated.

inge bondi

John: I have read your blog and a few others. I do feel strongly that this would be much better if it were personalized, i.e. telling your story and your reactions. There is no reason one cannot include important facts. The facts are available elsewhere, but anything more personal, your feelings, how you came to that spot, your difficulties and surprises would make this memorable.
Best, Inge

deghia fairouz

“There are only the men to kill a million of them for the victory of a chief: men who do not know each other between-kill on the order of chiefs who know each other and between-do not commit suicide, chiefs who will sign peace by tightening the hand, champagne glass in the other.” (Absolute/1994)

John Vink

Inge, I am a photojournalist. Someone telling the stories of people to other people through pictures with captions. A go-between who selects the messages he wants to carry... My feelings being much less important than the ones of those I take pictures of, the "I" word would be distracting.

And anyhow: certain facts are not available elsewhere.The selection of facts and the way in which I reveal those and other well-known facts are precisely what reveal my feelings. And that is more than enough to go public with.

PS: I don't have a blog but a website...

Terry Carroll

When I saw the "above the fold" portion of this piece, my immediate thought (despite the horrific subject matter, pardon me) was, "Darn, a blog entry by John Vink -- now we're not going to be treated to any witty or snarky comments by John Vink!" But Mr. Vink is nothing if not verbally engaging. The irony here is that one of the readers is complaining of his entry's lack of any expressed personal feelings or "behind-the-scenes" information -- the sort of thing that makes the Magnum Blog more than merely a presentation of images. Common, John, what's the story?! PS: this is a blog within a website.

Affectionately,
Terry Carroll
terrycarroll.com

James Cox

9000 people with wives, children, husbands, mothers & fathers. Now the long painstaking work to identify them and the flood of emotions that are going to wash over the people who lost loved ones 30 years ago. You’re right John this is not a posting where the “I” word is appropriate. But Inge, in a larger sense, has a point. For it to be successful, the blog does have to be more personal & more interactive than the Magnum website. Thanks for contributing regularly to the comments section. An exchange between Magnum members & outsiders is what it should all be about I suppose. I know you people are all very busy but it would be nice to see more of your colleagues commenting.

John Vink

Terry, James, Inge: I don't mind using the "I" word in comments but not in my stories, especially when they were never published before... The story behind this posting is just yet another chapter in what I'm doing here in Cambodia, and part of the reason why I'm staying that long. I repeat over and over again I come after the hysteria, the paroxysm (more about that in a long 3-part interview on Wayne Yang's blog http://www.eightdiagrams.com/), I come when the other journalists are gone. In this case I am documenting the reconstruction of a country (that'll take some years). Finding big graveyards (this was not a mass grave) like this is part of that reconstruction process. But you'd be surprised as to how these situations are perceived here. Emotions? Well, the main reason why the graves were disturbed was to find jewels. Forget about identification... Strange emotions (for us)... Not that people don't show their emotions, but so much less here... Showing your emotions is losing face... And that's also why there are so many cases of PTSD.
Not long ago, I stumbled upon a seminar in positive thinking taking place in the house of the infamous former Khmer Rouge leader Ta Mok!!! Ever heard of a positive thinking seminar in Hitler's Berchtesgaden??? Well, that's today's Cambodia. People are praying and paying respect to Pol Pot at his cremation site nearly every day... That's what I try to explain these days. And I'd rather try and do it without the "I" word...

Chris Henderson

Too often the documentation of events such as this are sabotaged by the telling and retelling of the recorder's perception. This story is not about John's perception per se, it is about uncovering another painful memento of a tragic time. John's perception, if we need it, is in the images. Words provide the adequate information needed to communicate the real scale of the images and the event they represent. The written form of John's perception in this case becomes irrelevant. It is about the history, and it is about those who have suffered and continue to be reminded of their suffering. I see nothing wrong with the entry. Blog or not. Keep up the great and, as always, immensly valuable work.

Animesh Ray

I understand and appreciate John Vink's concern for objectivity but given that there is no such thing as absolute objectivity- - everything that we see and communicate are colored by our own intellect- - I see little reason not to personalize the blogs. Magnum's images have the reputation they deserve precisely because the personalities of its photographers show through these images. why not extend the artistry of the images through the literary flourish that Vink evidently possesses- --by including his own impressions. Just my humble opinion.
Regards,
animesh

James Cox

John, thanks. That’s a very interesting insight into the mindset out there. I was a long way from imagining what you’ve told us.

tetsu

What an impressive capture!
I visited one of the Killing fileds in cambodia about 8 years ago. I couldn't stop crying....

Elisa

I believe it is very interesting to find such exemplars and clear up their history. Thanks for sharing

Patricio Murphy

I agree with the author's idea that the word "I" should be used carefully, if not completely out, when telling this kind of stories.
I live in a country where every now and then we discover some trace of the terror we lived 30 years back. To me John's insight on how the people over there live with the memories of a terror far greater is very interesting. Someone ponited that "Magnum's images have the reputation they deserve precisely because the personalities of its photographers show through these images". Well, I think in refusing to use the word I, the author's personality shows, perhaps in a way that's not to someone else's liking, but it does show.
Great idea this blog. :-)

Peter

"Ever heard of a positive thinking seminar in Hitler's Berchtesgaden???" Pity you are falling in the same trap as so many others. The butchery in Cambodia was not inspired by a 'fascist' or 'Nazi' ideology but by an extreme offshoot of a 'communist' one. Comparisons with Hitler and all he stood for are tempting, and sometimes politically opportune (when the Vietnamese government took control of Cambodia and discovered Tuol Sleng prison, it sent a delegation to the DDR so as to learn more about creating a 'holocaust' monument. It would have been more appropriate if they would have searched for inspiration in Siberia.

John Vink

Mr Peter,

When or where did I say the cambodian khmer rouge regime was inspired by fascism? Of course fascism and the Khmer Rouge are not the same. Don't think I don't know that. Although you might admit one can find similarities in the results of totalitarianism and some of its mechanics.
The point I wanted to make is that people not realising who Hitler was and people not knowing who Ta Mok or Pol Pot were have things in common. Either they deliberately show no respect to those who suffered because of those regimes, either they have absolutely no political conscience, or they are uneducated. In the case of young Cambodians holding a positive thinking seminar in Ta Mok's house it is the lack of education. The whole period of the Khmer Rouge regime is still not taught in cambodian schools...

Oh, and I thought the DDR was a communist country... Just like Siberia at the time...

Peter

Mr Vink

"When or where did I say"...Well, you said it in a reply above. Re DDR...they went, not to be inspired by 'the DDR' but to copy a 'holocaust' monument. Re the point you want to make: I think it's all three: they are uneducated (matter of fact); they have no political conscience (which is not needed since they are in charge and will stay in charge), and they do not respect (an attitude which logically flows from the present day Cambodian power structure).

Sally

Day of Anger - terrible celebration. People made a lot of mistakes during the centuries. We have to pay for it.