And in 30 minutes the cultural frontline with Tina Dickey Lee if you only think of Cambodia as the land of the Killing Fields and aged temples then think again from the rising young directors making waves at international festivals to a revival of the traditional arts we discover the cultural revolution that starring in the kingdom of Cambodia this is the b.b.c. World Service the world's media state. Own from our own correspondent after the news going back in the water in the South China Sea visibly shaken Juric says he still has nightmares about the day 3 years ago when his fishing boat was buzzed by Chinese helicopters threatened by armed men in speedboats and blasted with water cannon the cruel trick played on pharmacy in Kenya the most vocal of the ladies grabbed my hand there is a scandal here she said in the local market they say these are the new varieties but they sell us old rubbish seeds and crops fail also a place which was once fruitful now fallen fallow down at the fire station which used to serve as the old company telephone exchange we meet them on the town's unpaid fire chief given the choice of being run by the Dominican government or the Granada company he tells me he picked the Americans any day and the ran our over a university that's galvanized hungry that's from our own correspondents after this but isn't. I'm Stuart Macintosh with the b.b.c. News Hello North Korea has tried and failed to launch a missile a day after warning the United States that it would not shy away from conflict the u.s. Military said a land based ballistic missile that exploded within seconds of the launch from North Korea's east coast tensions between the u.s. And North Korea has been escalating with both sides making increasingly bellicose threats Here's our Korea correspondent Steve Evans North Korea frequently tests missiles in contravention of u.n. Resolutions the success rate has been improving but its record is still hit and miss with many exploding shortly after launch the South Korean military says this launch failed and that may put into perspective the state of the threat from the pariah nation a day after it displayed a range of different missiles on trucks parading before Kim Jong un through Pyongyang it is striving hard for an effective and reliable lost all of missiles capable of carrying the nuclear warheads but it isn't there yet a suicide car bomb has been driven into a bus of Syrians being evacuated from a besieged town many people are reported to have been killed on the outskirts of Aleppo their body parts and blood stream beside the shattered vehicles monitors say more than 20 people died government media gave a higher figure the convoy of buses was carrying residents and pro-government fighters from 2 Shia villages as part of a deal between the government and rebels. Tens of thousands of people across the United States of marched in more than 100 cities to demand that President Trump releases his tax returns something he's refused to do speaking at the protest in Washington the civil rights activist Tommy Commandery said Mr Drum should bow to public demands to reveal his tax returns. You know John the protests were timed to coincide with the traditional April 15th deadline for u.s. Citizens to file their annual tax returns. Thousands of demonstrators have returned to the streets of the Hungary in capital Budapest to show their anger at the policies pursued by the nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban the marches began in protest at a new law that will close down the country's most prestigious university but have gathered momentum and the demonstrators are now calling on Mr or band to step down he said it should be parliamentary elections next year not the protests that decide the country's future political direction you're listening to the world news from the b.b.c. . The Italian Coast Guard and other vessels have rescued more than 5000 people from on sea where the boats off the Libyan coast over the past 2 days officials said the fine spring weather had prompted an armada of boats packed with migrants to set off for Europe where they hope to find a better life. Egypt's Coptic minority have celebrated mass on the eve of Easter amid tight security one week after bombs killed more than 40 people at 2 churches policemen and soldiers stood guard as worshippers pass through metal detectors at St George's in Tampa and St Marks in Alexandria the church in Cathedral hit last Sunday Islamic state said it carried out the attacks. A radical Islamist party in Tunis he has said democracy has failed and it was now time for the ideology to be buried at the annual congress of the his but here movement it Leader of the said democracy no longer had any mass appeal and instead Sharia law should be adopted within an Islamic caliphate human history is part of milestone with the death of Emma Rinaldo the last person verified to have been born in the 19th century James Reynolds has more details Emma Morano died at her home in very banya in northern Italy ending a life which took in 3 centuries 11 popes and 45 different Italian Prime Ministers she was born on the 29th of November 1909 and she married in 1906 didn't think much of it and separated 12 years later she worked in a factory then in a kitchen and retired more than 40 years ago Emma Morano spent most of her final years as an increasingly famous expert on surviving into hyper old age if anyone should get a copy of her Emma Morano did reveal her own particular secret to living so long eating raw eggs and not being married b.b.c. News. Hello and welcome to from our own correspondent I'm Pascal hasa in today's program we look into a scam targeting African farmers new crops are very expensive for ordinary Kenyans and many who scrape together enough money to buy them are conned by crooks who say they're selling you disease resistant seeds when in fact they are not it is after all very hard to tell one seed from another also why an academic argument is riling hung Garion in the gentle rolling hills of western hungry at the St Moritz us Benedictine ministry in the village of book on bail brother Eja is praying with his flock this week let us also remember in our prayers the students and staff of the Central European university in Butte a pest he says and in the Dominican Republic what happened when the banana barons left town little by little all the resources in the town turned to dust the Degas burned down the employees canteen sat empty as if an epidemic could spread through the town with the power station and the aqueduct both long gone access to running water like Job's is now a luxury Manzanillo But 1st to the Pacific Ocean and some of its most dangerous waters in the South China Sea At least that's China's preferred name for is China Japan the Philippines Taiwan then and Indonesia are all pressing conflicting claims for the right to troll for fish or build a naval base is the area known as shoal is one of the most hotly contested a rule here there is an uneasy coexistence as large Chinese ships and smaller Philippine boats compete for fish despite an international ruling that both nations have the right to fish air they Jenks said this week that the scalper a show was an inherent part of Chinese territory. So what's the atmosphere like on the ground well rather in the water Humphrey Hawksley has been to a fishing village most affected by the 2 countries relations Juric chosen is standing at the end of a dirt track road with shacks and small stores on one side and the gently lapping West Philippine Sea On the other muscles bulging he's a big man too big really for the small motorcycle and side car which he calls t. Monster and with which he now makes ends meet by taking passengers here and there the water stretches off in a mix of bright tropical blues and murky grays towards a place about a day's sailing away called backhoe Damascene lock or lower mass and look it's a triangular chain of reefs and rocks with a large lagoon inside named after jurists northern Philippine hometown generations of his family have earned their living fishing there I'm so angry he says his eyes fitting between his motorcycle in the sea if I had a gun I've fought them if America supports us we should go to war with them visibly shaken Juric says he still has nightmares about the day 3 years ago when his fishing boat was buzzed by Chinese helicopters threatened by armed men in speedboats and blasted with water cannon this powerful jet of water smashed into my boat he says then it hit me directly and I was thrown into the sea I tried to scramble up and they hit me again it was as if they really wanted to kill me. Juric managed to cling on and pulled himself to safety the Philippine fishing boats there retreated and since then China has occupied the reef arguing that it lies within Chinese territorial waters these waters are also known as the South China Sea in the fishing grounds Scarborough Shoal last year an international tribunal at The Hague ruled that China had violated international law and that there was no legal basis to its territorial claims but so far that's counted for nothing despite having a defense treaty with the United States the Philippines was told that America would not go to war with China over a fishing reef but the way things unfolded for Jurich may show the style in which China plans to unseat America is the prevailing power in the Asia Pacific region 1st in October knowing his country was outgunned the new bullish president Rodrigo due to flew to Beijing to cut a deal Chinese investment in exchange for his keeping quiet about Scarborough Shoal next a Chinese official suddenly appeared in mass unlock itself all smiles and handshakes and invited members of the local fishing Association to visit China all expenses paid the chairman Leonardo Karisma a slight bespectacled man tells how they were shown around a marine research ship in the high tech Fisheries Center and sent on the bullet train from southern China for more meetings in Beijing at the end of the tour China put in an offer to buy all of mass and lock fish I don't know if we can trust them said Leonardo thoughtfully but we might have to. Then Juric got word that it was safe to work again around Scarborough Shoal In fact President deter wanted the fisherman to go out there Juric was unsure at 1st unable to shake off his nightmares but the day I saw him he had just come back from a week's fishing there he glanced affectionately across to his boat Mort at the water's edge wide bamboo stabilisers stretched from a long canoe like how painted in yellows greens and blues or lashed together with ropes and wires from a bygone age you could see it was no match for Chinese fishing technology or for that matter is water canon that week's work earn Juric 10 times more than ferrying passengers on his motorcycle in recent years he had been unable to provide for his wife Melinda and their 4 children it got so bad that Melinda had to get work as a domestic helper in Saudi Arabia where she is now I had lost all my confidence he said his lip quivering a c.n.d. Of his story I'm a fisherman it's who I am now that I can do that again Melinda can come back and we can live as a family Humphrey Hawksley. The hunger Arion government has taken some bold populist actions recently moving to close a private university clampdown on environmental groups am look up a sign of a Sikh as Prime Minister Viktor Orban has never been afraid to quote criticism even condemnation from abroad he argues that he's acting in the best interests of his country and its people and international opinion is not a priority but as a Budapest correspondent Nick thought discovers protests against the government's actions inside the country are also gaining ground and may have permeated some unexpected places in the gentle rolling hills of western Hungary at the St Moritz us Benedictine ministry in the village of book on bail brother Eja is praying with his flock this week let us also remember in our prayers the students and staff of the Central European University in beautiful best he says they sent him a sharp rebuke after the service from an older man in the congregation the Catholic Church in Hungary is deeply conservative a fact which usually translates into fierce loyalty to the current right wing government while nurse you asking us to pray for George Shorrosh the man remonstrates George Bush is the founder of the Central European university in the epicenter of the current storm he also happens to be of Jewish background brother patiently explains the value of the university as a center of learning not least to his own Christiane community this is not what the man he is on the government controlled news on public service television the feeders government in Hungary has rushed legislation through parliament which the central European university described as a premeditated attack government officials admit that several paragraphs of the law were indeed designed to make it impossible for the university to carry on working in Hungary as it has until now its founder George shortish now 86. Isn't Hungary and born financier and philanthropist who established the university with a generous and dominant in the early 1990 s. During the 1980 s. Some of his 1st contributions to Hungary with photocopying machines for every secondary school leaflets were printed on them which helped fuel the ferment which brought down the communist regime in the late 1980 s. The philanthropist like the priest has a healthy subversive streak. George Bush was deeply influenced by the philosopher called papa's book The Open Society and its enemies published in 1905 Shorrosh has devoted many of the millions he has made speculating on the stock markets and currencies of the world to creating open societies one of the NGOs he supports in Hungary is the local branch of Transparency International another the Civil Liberties Union he also backs the Roma Education Fund as a result he's resented and targeted by nationalists from Vladimir Putin to the to Oban over my own 3 decades in the region like met him several times in Gypsy or Roma ghettos as well as in plush hotel suites on one occasion at a World Bank event in the old Garion capital Sylvia he lamented the fact that young Roma often assimilate when they become successful Roma should be proud of their Romany origins he said Mr Shorrosh has kept completely quiet during the current dispute about the university it's rector the former Canadian Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff has been carefully driving the university boss round each political obstacle the government has strewn in its way Prime Minister the 2 Obama has not survived the last 30 years as hunger is most successful politician by taking unnecessary risks now there are signs that he's looking for a formula to back down the sight of tens of thousands of protesters on the streets of beat up past of his former allies in the European People's Party turning their backs on him even if the trumpet ministration in the us coming out in defense of the university may be too much that even his sturdy stomach to bear but where would a government retreat leave the open society and its enemies if the government were to look a little more closely at the University it so in advisedly declared war on it would find a lively debate in its corridors and lecture halls about just what constitutes an open society in a time of mass migration and global terror. It would find a positive reassessment of the value of national belonging and it would find the rector of the university my colleague nutty of talking about what he calls the gift of hospitality what it comes down to he said in a recent lecture is come in the Citizen give you this gift of hospitality in return the citizen expects the newcomer to acknowledge that gift and be grateful for it the Canadian refugee experience has been so successful he suggested because it's framed in these terms of local hospitality rather than the language of universal human rights back in the garden of the ministry of St Moritz us brother and I have taken off our shoes and socks was sitting among the wildflowers beside a stream as we fall silent of to so much talking the stream is suddenly very loud Nick thought in Hungary You're listening to from our own correspondent on the b.b.c. World Service and in case evidence is needed that on this program we don't shy away from the difficult questions next a topic that can make many a Weston foreign correspondent and little bit queasy the legacy of Western governments and companies abroad on the day commemorating the Republic of Congo's independence from France one company's man told me I would welcome the French back today if I could under their rule everything worked and I had a job as a postman it wasn't a fashionable point of view the colonizing power had looted the country's resources and exploited it citizens foreign private companies played a part too in the 1920 s. And thirty's one French company used forced labor to build the Congo ocean railway costing tens of thousands of lives but that's what the man told me so that's what I reported. Now the United States may not have actually colonized countries in the Caribbean and Latin America but it certainly wielded influence some North American companies was so powerful in the region that they were accused of running entire countries a so-called But Nonna republics what kind of legacy to such power leave behind Jim a newbie has been to see the remnants of a banana plantation in the Dominican Republic we head up the hill towards his grandfather's house and I'm Birch eyes sparkle recalling the place he spent his childhood holidays he shows me a black and white photo of him and his brother taken in the early 1960 s. Skinny boys in their swimming trunks posing with 2 fair skinned American girls so evils are rare in this rural part of the Dominican Republic but back in the sixty's men's and near the border with Haiti was an unusual kind of town unusual because it was built by the Granada company a subsidiary of the American United Fruit Company infamous for its been our exports United Fruit created small blue sticker with the Chiquita logo and its dominance in Latin America contributed to the term Banana Republic banana still dominate here at breakfast in a dense yellow mound of morning carbs for lunch cooked with garlic in a start she specialty called the Fungo and it didn't sliced in fright and alternative to French fries. And better points out the hospital once the pride of man's an ear and the 1st thing the company built after the houses it's now faded a mostly empty. The company also built the town's 1st school and port and provided Manzanita with the island's 1st golf club Bertie remembers of the Degas a grocery store stocked with American imports canned goods fine china small toys and back when the only cinema was hours away in the capital he was watching cowboy films in Technicolor on a huge screen at the clubhouse every Friday on Saturdays the screen moved to the bottom of the hill it was the locals to an ambush his grandfather an accountant came to Manzanillo in 1943 not long after the company arrived he lived amongst the executives mostly Americans at the top of the hill it was all sounding a little colonial a foreign company acting like a government and I wondered whether perhaps somebody had a rose tinted view of his holiday paradise hanging out with the children of the elite at the top of the hill but down at the fire station which used to serve as the old company telephone exchange we meet him on the town's unpaid 5 Chief given the choice of being run by the Dominican government or the Granada company he tells me he picked the Americans any day I was the 1st child to be born in months and his hospital room and says We love the Americans electricity was free water was free rent was free and then in 1965 the company left Ramon describes how laborers from outside the town agitated for workers' rights and independence from the foreigners strikes left more than a 1000000 rest seems bushels of bananas to rot in warehouses. Everyone expected the company to come back but it never did. Little by little all the resources in the town turned to dust the Degas burned down the employees canteen sat empty as if an epidemic could spread through the town with the power station and the aqueduct both long gone access to running water like Jobs is now a luxury Manzanillo. But at the top of the hill overlooking the ocean and birches grandparents house is still there rows of smart bungalows stand out with white fences in front gardens the clubhouse is there too although it's not open for lunch when we visit and I suspect few locals could afford it even when it is the land surrounding the club has reverted to wilderness the golf course the playground not the powerful the non-executives but for goats and then Ramon says you know the employees families who lived at the bottom of the hill once opposed to go up to the top but he was visibly surprised I didn't know that he replies later as I said he's in a lunch of beans and rice and bananas of course I look over to the port here in the Dominican Republic Ramon had said we have to have everything taken away from us in order to start over again recently a few local entrepreneurs have joined together to start exporting bananas again now than enough time has passed since the days of the Fruit Company it's fertilizes they can finally be certified organic for boatloads leave Manson he was port each week but man is built this town the 1st time perhaps bananas can help restore it to its former glory though many without an Executive Golf Course. That was German u.b. The United Nations says that 175000 children have dropped out of school in the last year in Kenya in the drought affected parts of the country presumably that help is needed in the fields or their parents just can't afford the school fees any mail a drought can wipe out a farming or hurting family safety net the livelihood that is their council or the savings in seeds and East Africa is in the grip of drought this year but as Adam Schor found on a recent visit to Kenya crops and only ruined by lack of water or pests and parasites but also by salesman with a particularly cruel trick at my house there is an almost daily battle it's a 3 way fight between May the fridge and the been trying to ensure the family is fed before we hit the use by dates is an ongoing food fight I hate to throw food away it feels so wrong but in many parts of the world the struggle over food waste is not just a moral issue it's one of survival. Recently I was in Kenya in the shores of Lake. We were there to cover a story about how insect infestations and disease would devastating crops this was causing huge amounts of food wastage and resulting in misery for millions of Africans I had traveled to the outskirts of NY Vasher to meet a small scale Fama called purity she lives in a little house with a few surrounding fields as she showed us through her front garden we had to step around the graves of 2 of her children and her husband here hardship is so common as to be unremarkable and people regularly die young from disease and illness. Purity grows maize one of Africa's staple crops but disease has devastated the harvest and when a crop fails so does a family with no crop she had to sell her only marketable assett the family cow the money she got for it allowed her to keep her remaining children in school but if the next crop fails there will be nothing for it but to take the children out of school and put them to work the culprit which had attacked her Fields was maize lethal necrosis disease or m l n d the disease seems to have started in Kenya but has spread to Tanzania you Canda in South Sudan it can be devastating and there is little small scale farmers can do about it. The answer to purity is problems may lie not far from her door earlier on in the day I had met Dr Paul 2 party prison a director of the global maize program at the International maize and wheat improvement center it's trying to develop new crops resistant to diseases like m.l. And d. But here in Africa there is a large gap between what happens in the world of science and big agricultural firms and what happens in the fields of small scale farmers new crops are very expensive for ordinary Kenyans and many who scrape together enough money to buy them are conned by crooks who say they're selling you disease resistant seeds when in fact they are not it is after all very hard to tell one seed from another the scandal of counterfeit seeds wasn't the story I had come to report on but as is often the case the more interesting and important tale is not always the one you turned up to tell . Having heard the b.b.c. Were in town a small group of women had gathered outside purities house and while waiting to talk to us the most vocal of the ladies grabbed my hand there is a scandal here she said we have to buy our seeds in the local market they say these are the new varieties but they sell us old rubbish seeds and our crops fail I held a hand and told her I didn't really know what I could do it's a cruel crime which takes money from poor farmers and sells them the promise of disease resistant seeds which are nothing of the sort one woman in particular wouldn't let go of my hand the rest of our team were already in the car waiting to leave and I was trying to edge my way towards them please tell our story she said repeatedly tell people how ordinary Kenyans are sold old seeds and our crops fail and our families are destroyed please tell them she said if you tell them they will know our hardship and maybe something will happen to us she implored still not letting go of my hand we had everything we needed to tell the world about the scientific story we'd come to report on but these women crowding around the car were proof that something else was going on too and perhaps something more important I don't know if it make a difference I said but yes I will try and tell your story and I'm sure and with that we've reached the end of this edition of from a and correspondent join us again next weekend and we'll tell you more of the wild stories. Distribution of the b.b.c. World Service in the United States is made possible by American Public Media producer and distributor of award winning public radio content engaging audiences creating meaningful experiences and fostering conversation proud to deliver the highest quality and most respected global news the b.b.c. World Service because global times call for global perspective a.p.m. American Public Media. Coming up on the cultural front line with me. One of the hottest young filmmakers in Cambodia on his forthcoming film about a notorious building he calls how does bidding. For me. Because I'm coming over and d.j. Now the social media celebrity and I'm going to breaking sexual and empowering young women that's the cultural front line with me. Now the b.b.c. News with. North Korea has tried and failed to launch a missile silo day after warning the United States that it would not shy away from conflict the u.s. Military said a land based ballistic missile that exploded within seconds of the launch which came hours before Mike Pence his vice president arrives in South Korea for talks on Pyongyang's Miss Island nuclear program. A suicide car bomb has been driven into a bus of Syrians being evacuated from a besieged town many people are reported to have been killed in the attack on the outskirts of Aleppo monitors say more than 20 people died government media gave a higher figure President Trump is coming under renewed public pressure to disclose his personal tax affairs thousands of people in dozens of cities are holding marches demanding he release his tax returns. Thousands of pilgrims have gathered in Rome to see Pope Francis lead the Easter celebrations at an evening vigil the pontiff urged his audience not to ignore the plight of immigrants a message underlined by the rescue over the past 2 days of more than $5000.00 people in the Mediterranean police in Guinea have arrested an Army colonel on suspicion of animal trafficking after they raided 2 of his properties and found wildlife including chimpanzees a baboon and ostriches from Mali they said Colonel Ibrahim a Bangor had planned to sell them the Mexican city of. Is hosting the finals of a 3000 year old ball game which is being revived in the country. Really his a bit like football but players use their hips not their feet to propel the ball losers who are often sacrificed to the gods though this year a knockout format has been preferred and the Panamanian international football field car engine is has been shot dead in the port city of call long on Rica's had played 84 times for his country most recently in the regional qualifying tournament . But I thought the most of what I thought of the book that your molars up there on the launch the 1st thing that comes to mind when you think of Cambodia. That was a Buddhist monk reciting a blessing for producers should. Who travel to the uncle temples in c.m. Reap Cambodia for the b.b.c. World Service. For most people the 1st thing they think of is the ancient temples a tank a water all the tragedy of the killing fields under the team a ruse that killed more than 2000000 people in the 19 $170.00 s. As one commentator puts it temples and trauma but there's far more to the country that used to be known as the pole of Asia as we are about to find out. 7 was. 'd to heal and in this edition of the cultural front line in the b.b.c. World Service We've been to Cambodia to discover the astonishing cultural revival and vibrant tulle scene that stirring in the country I think art and artists can create is we can dare to dream about a future the people that are living right well the truck that where there be and in them that smile. Was growing arts of the culture of the music the dance that's a it's a movement coming it's a movement that nobody can ever stop it. From and putting your heart your heart rate touch the heart of the arts that's something the miracle happened I gave to you day. At Lima woman like right now I would say and then be generous is my role model and I actually am whenever young like to be prime minister after a movie but an entire show me that you can make a lot of impact from different means so now Prime Minister is only a 2nd option 'd. First stop one of the. Most popular tourist destinations in the world want temple complex in see Emery. The magnificent uncle what Temple lies deep in the jungles of North Cambodia is a UNESCO world heritage site and the largest religious monument in the world built by Kim a king story of Armin in the early 12th century as the capital of the Camero empire the site only opened to tourism about 20 years ago as Cambodia emerged from decades of conflict the Hollywood blockbuster Lara Croft Tomb Raider starring Angelina Jolie which was filmed here also helped to put anchor firmly on the map but now over $2000000.00 visitors come here every year bringing in around $90000000.00 u.s. Dollars in ticket sales but the huge rise in football has also raised fears of rapid deterioration of the ancient monuments and the surrounding forests sock scientists are is in charge of the tourism department speaking to the b.b.c. World Service he explained how he's trying to reduce the impact by introducing a new code of conduct it has more than economical value to move to rhythms to nations it is in fact I think the soul of all combined eons if you look on our flag you know you would see in the middle is on what So that's why I mean you can Borden still coming of course to visit but also to praise is a living site so respect is important where monks are still what shipping every day the point of this uncle visit or code of conduct is pretty much to inform the visitors about some behavior that we should not do such as touching the carvings climbing under art on wars or writing on board of course we have forest I mean more of that in a park so we have to respect in a way of not littering our smoking area we have to live in a park about 130000 people living in and the been here for many generation actually so that we have less impact. On our side but tourism for us here is also an element of the good divisions because the more people understand about Uncle The more they also helping to conserve because they will not forget about our culture in 2016 the government to go the management of the NCCAM park and raise the price of tickets but many have questioned how much of the revenues being used for the benefit of the local people in the park many of whom still live in poverty in fact similar used to be the poorest province in the whole country but thanks to tourism development we are no longer the poorest province so we are was a program where we partner with UNESCO we train the villagers on how to do a good cultures so they can sell to the hotels at the handicraft training so they can do souvenirs to the visitors because we believe that good divisions it has to be grassroots because there have been here much longer than I am here of course 15 percent of this new is approved arise for it as a measurement of the site for Conservation of uncle but the other percentage goes to the whole country. To do salary. Developments you know it's pretty much if you're going to say. Chicken The most common story about. Lost City in the jungle which mysteriously vanished and was abandoned by the Cambodians after the apparent collapse of the Empire only to be rediscovered by French explorers in the 18th century Dr John a will father is an expert on Cambodian arts and culture and says that this is nothing more than a colonial narrative the mix of rediscovering of the Lost Kingdom was particularly useful to the French colonial administrators his because it justified their presence in Cambodia this makes a discovery is exactly that it's a mess what has remained a occupied site from the and Korean periods to the present day and has remained a site of religious pilgrimage throughout the centuries. When many people think of Cambodia what they think of temples and. Embodies marriage period. Less knowing that Cambodians had a very vibrant culture. Before the young Korean empire right through to the present day so we still see for example traditional. Dates back to the young Korean empire you can see evidence of this darkness and costs. Are released at the temples. That's a vibrant creative spirit it's rooted in the cultural heritage of the chimaera Empire continue to flourish and reached a peak in the 1950 s. And sixty's during what was known as the golden age of Cambodia. Under the reign of King Sihanouk who was himself a film producer and patron of the arts modern architecture film and music stride led by legendary singer such as Ross Sarasota cynicism. Ron Cambodia's psychedelic rock to Southeast Asia by storm. It was a time when everything seemed possible and then to Cambodia that title of the pearl of Asia. All that came to an abrupt end in 1975 when the communist scheme a rouge regime led by Paul Potts seized power under medicals withdrawal left cumbered you are one to prison for the guerrilla troops. With their slogan to keep you is no gain to lose you is no loss 90 percent of the country's finest artists singers and intellectuals were white to how one organization which has worked over the last 20 years drove by the traditional arts that were all but lost is Cambodian Living Arts and independent organization which helps the few surviving masters of traditional dolls and music to teach the next generation it was founded by own children poem The musician and himself acumen roofs of either. 12 years old when his parents were killed and he was sent to a labor camp for children where he managed to escape death by learning to play and sing propaganda music for the key may Rouge. Usually I played for the commercial leader when they were eating and stuff like that they want to enjoy. The sound of the killing or screaming from the people running around he was later adopted by an aid worker and grew up in the United States before returning to try and find his family only to discover that most of them had been killed. But he did find one of the music masters who talked him in the camp when I came back and I saw him on the street he was standing near by the highway he recognized me right away I saw him smiling but also 2 years coming down he said Where have you been I told him America he doesn't know where is but so please please I want to teach That's how I would dispute people how I found Cambodian living I started my 1st class in 1980 right in a slum here be behind us called the white building. On says that music saved his own life so the dition on music my music is very peaceful and some very scrapes for you know an adults have not heard life seen and German or touch a person or play music for 40 years many of them start also crying 'd I myself need to learn how to cry because crying is not in my vocabulary Eventually I learn music really saved my life if I don't cry I would have a heart attack and die when i cry i feel happy I have less nightmare that's a real power for me. 20 years on the National Museum of Cambodia so nightly performances of traditional Kenya dance and folk music by young students trained at his foundation and he's just signed a 5 year agreement with UNESCO and the Ministry of Culture to trade and music teachers to print outs education into schools throughout the country I am probably to say my dream is already came true now we are handing the baton on this young people are moving on to have their own dreams in their own time. We find one of those young artists who have taken up the baton just a stone's throw away in the white building where our own children Paul and held his very 1st. Class like a did in the heart of Phnom Penh it was hailed as Cambodia's fast modernist apartment block in the glittering 1960 s. Now a crumbling gray slum it still houses around 2 and a half 1000 residents it's also the subject of an upcoming feature film by one of the hottest young filmmakers in Cambodia Cavite. Was born is this white buildings I have been living here for almost my life it was known as a place for. Artists before and after the Khmer Rouge and now it's not a place for the drugs brought to troops and I saw it but then just a place for people to visit saw as an outsider. It's not an easy thing or to go inside a White Spirit in my house is in the 2nd unit we should walk on the street a lot of our kids are driving a bicycle was. When I was young so I feel a lot of dancing musicians sculptors and my father was a sculpture I used to be a dance a musician interested in making movies this building symbolism for me. Hearties and it's also residence this is represented Cambodia house complete it is the evolutions of this building you can understand a feeling that how the Cambodian changed for me now that this topic has become more important for me because this building is condemned by the union support that they go on to demolish disputing so I feel I want to capture my memories and to documenting this buildings in this story I focus on those 3 boys who is a breakdancer and a dream to be satisfied breakdancer but one of their friends have to lift can believe so the other 2 they feel that one of their friends bend them to the kind of like struggling with the. Dream but also they are fighting for the futures and this too boy story I think is so we can understand the most fear and feeling of this this building may be also part of combat in society and how do you think you will feel when this building is gone because it it will go into its so to me is emotional So no it's not only the space that I could stay of could live but it's a space that I feel connected you know as like a spiritual way you know you feel it and that's for me it's is emotional if I see that my house my buildings my neighbor but when it's always had broken to see this building is gone or. On the other side of town a short to drive away is Java arts and independent gallery that's one of the very few spaces in Phnom Penh that hosts exhibitions by contemporary visual artists day lame glory says the owner and artistic director of the gallery what I've seen specifically in the last few years is not only people wanting to be artists but now arts producers curators researchers art historians and that's just in the visual arts of course you have the same across performing arts film industry where you have people taking on these multiple roles that are part of the whole arts ecosystem so you have this critical mass of sorts where you have all this energy and now this environment that actually nurtures it it's grown despite the fact that there's no government funding or support for contemporary art and almost everyone we spoke to was hesitant to talk about the increasingly Ted's political climate with upcoming general elections in the country in 2018 Prime Minister Hun Sen a former commander Rouge leader who's held on to power since 1988 has ordered harsh crackdowns on his opponents and critics a controversial law was passed on the 20th of February this year which effectively grant the ruling Cambodian People's Party the right to dissolve all the political parties if it threatens Nash. Still unity in this climate Dana says artists have to be clever in the way they express themselves there is censorship in Cambodia although not officially and that's probably one of the hardest things to deal with because it's largely self-censorship but that's cut that's based on fear and not knowing quite what the consequences are of their actions or the content of their work Cambodian artists are using and this is across many art forms literature and use it in dance and visual arts where the using play on words double meaning and very subtle ways of communicating subversive messages hey we met another well known face at the heart of the contemporary art scene in Phnom Penh Rex may yen is a curator at Java ox he says that the young generation is shaping a new identity and feature for Cambodia we are the junk country and young country needs 2 things One is that we just try to rebuild our server and secondly it's because we don't have to recreate what nk or provided in this we don't have to recreate what the 64 Why did you know it's going to get inspiration from there but at the same time this country needs identity and that identity is up to the younger generation like myself to the artist and that when Art transform like he transform ourselves to be a new people to be the new comer to modern life the from one phone number to the another. One of those modern key men as is the social media celebrity outspoken radio and get me on to add a relationship guru of the time or better known as d.j. Nana Hello Jim is there. Now 29 year old Nana has captured the imagination of a generation of young Cambodians you make up 70 percent of the population through her weekly phone in radio show and more recently d.j. Now live t.v. On Facebook. But you know that in a country where most of the t.v. Is state run Facebook is the number one new source most of the cools to her showing from young girls and women under 30 you talk about sensitive topics like sex before marriage. Work raising awareness around HIV and domestic violence has earned her a un youth champion award for empowering young women. People like me because I just suddenly say what I want to say so it's come very natural so I should not giving up advice I give options so if somebody asked me something I said well you have to see option and each option of it is out differently and you choose yourself so I actually don't give really advice because what do I know about your life I listen to you of all at sea minutes and you expect me to know how to answer that I can't I usually conference on all saying not envision or saying for example I have a lot of story from a female friends and say I love him but I'm a good I can ask for his number and then I would have a question what is wrong with a girl asking for a phone number from a man and I have all the all the rice to answer because she asked me and then. Because you know some papers would say Who are you to give advice I would say I am the one who they ask. One of the story I do sleep even then I was receiving my. Child in a while from you and if a woman she was a gunman. What he called very very very small rooms next to each others and the guide and next room came in rape then the question that she asked me was how do I love him because she doesn't love him or what they ought to be slapped together so you know when you hear rapes you expect question like we have to file a complaint but not the question that came from the question that came from her was what should I do to long. Him because I already slept with him so I have to love him because there's no other choice that for me is like a wake up call of what the level of understanding of this powerful saying because people say that if you have secure his wife then they would live for me it was like oh my god there really a lot more to do one of the best thing is that I don't care much from the criticism I look at it as a very positive thing because I think I can only anger people when I hit the point and the most important thing is they do the bait and you discuss if you go to the common section people really discuss a lot they like go back and forth back and forth back and forth and I say mission accomplished from my Facebook page I see a huge progress of woman speaking about what they sing what I said is exactly what they want to say but the confidence to speak it out they didn't have the chance that channel us but now they will not let go off their own not all those sensitive topic I'm insensitive in Cambodia definition is not even sensitive in joint its relation but it is for us for girls fall patterns for society it is sensitive if you were to give one piece of advice to young women listening to you what's the best piece of life advice you can give them you can all they chose the next has been and if you don't like this has one we can change you can divorce and mad it again but just children may never able to choose their father so the most important decision that you make is not choosing your husband probably is choosing the father for your children I mean of course you have to bet on love but love should not be the only reason that you marry that person my mom she doesn't have high education choosing my father was an excellent gift for me I would have a totally different life you have a different father who inspires you who is your role model Well I have a lot of role models at the moment like right now because of the world. When I was a Ellen De Generes is my role models because I actually am when I was younger to be prime minister but and I'm trying to show me you can make a lot of impact in the country from different means you don't have to be prime minister to impact life so now Prime Minister is only a 2nd option to now on 7 the ground. This is the voice of Sure 80 dubbed Cambodia's Amy Winehouse. Better no doubt Chante the lead singer of one of the biggest rock groups to come out of Cambodia. She is another outspoken young Cambodian woman but with a very different background to d.j. Nama Chante was a poor village girl who rose to international stardom after an Australian musician Judean Paulson heard her singing in a Phnom Penh karaoke bar and spotted had talent of us straight away she is a metaphor for what she believed up and it was like if you're going to watch which in the show was on the charismatic lead singer of the Cambodian space projects Chante House told the world bringing back to life the old rock songs of the last divas from Cambodia's Golden Age it 2015 the story of her struggle to overcome poverty and prostitution was told in a b.b.c. Documentary rock in Cambodia to me is on she's now formed Have a good. Way to think way when I was young I love singing even when I was cooking even when I was playing even when I was working in a rubber plantation I sing on style. I am known as my whom. I have been working as a car Ok girl don't do 1006 I wanted to have a go at singing profession. Always so I asked the boss of one beer garden to let me sing in front of him but at the time I was too frightened and I dropped the mike Fortunately that day the boss accepted me he decided to hire me and I got paid like $2.00 a day was it was going to be. A little each other man sometimes I still don't believe a person from countryside a big no education like me can or save a lot of support from people from all walks of life and that this is actually the reason why I want to prove that I can do it wound side know who love. Me among the enemy. But to me plan and then music has a hold of that magical power it can help heal. Those who listen and those who sing it's of a never I go on stage of before I put the way my sadness one of the songs that I would have written is tox about the struggle of being human I want to tell people to continue living the life they have to continue fighting even though you know someone who comes from over disadvantaged background they should not continue to accept the status quo but to change their life 7. This emerging new generation artists musicians and coaching figures who are breaking the silence about the past through the helping to heal the wounds of their parents' generation and to recreate a new identity for themselves and for Cambodia. 80 minutes we heard the whole thing and the spirit is in our smile and the resilience in our smile and keeping that hope in life if he did keeping that hope alive every day when together in the world. I am very hopeful because I felt not only to come but in our sins but come board in general is very exciting but go on the cross will you do is take some time to help other outsider to see can bring different ways maybe you know should the case as you just heard hold that to be my generation is that it could start on them and then one day maybe Also I don't think I can remember a place for Couldn't feel anymore not to see commuter asked the country of genocide but also from there for the shows place will center of culture I think in 20 years with one of the one of the biggest sins and when insight is Asia I like to use to work on John Honduras has that the American Bar used to bombard Cambodia by bombing or to kill people but now it's time for Cambodia to go back to these countries United States or elsewhere in the world and bombard them with art and intellectual people go everywhere and go on a process to gather the resources you know one of John to go on a flight out then drop bombs over what. 'd comes over this week on the country from time for me to day Healy and my producer should Iran join me again same time next week. This is the b.b.c. World Service and on the inquiry this week 3 years ago 2 us States made marijuana legal today in Colorado and Washington there are more counter bishops' than McDonald's time retellings on them and we're asking what happens when you legalize cannabis one question surprising answers the inquiry listen online or subscribe to the inquiry podcast at feed the Sea World Service dot com.