Cambodian Learns Even U.S. Can Be Brutal : Journalism: Reach Sambath, here on a media fellowship at Cal State Fullerton, had his romatic view of this country shattered by terrorism in Oklahoma City.

As a 17-year-old student in Phnom Penh, Reach Sambath was roused from his classroom and forced to cheer for the Vietnamese army. Other than to wave a miniature Vietnamese flag, Reach was instructed not to move during the hollow tribute to the Communist force that occupied his country for a decade.

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But during the spiritless parade in the Cambodian capital, Reach noticed a cadre of people, scrambling around, angling for photographs and talking to anyone they pleased. They were journalists.

“I had to stand in the same place or I would be arrested, but the foreign journalists were moving everywhere,” said Reach, 27, who recently completed a semester-long fellowship studying the media at Cal State Fullerton. “So, I realized that this was freedom, and I wanted that job.”

Today, after nearly five months of scrutinizing the U.S. press, Reach returns to Cambodia to his small village outside the capital city with renewed hope for his homeland and a decidedly less romanticized view of the United States.

Always, Reach remembers, he wanted to come to the United States, where everyone seemed rich, the press championed the truth and, unlike his own war-torn country, its people were safe. But a CNN broadcast the morning of April 19 from Oklahoma City showed him another view.

“When I saw the kids coming out of the building covered with blood, I could not stop my tears,” said Reach of the deadliest act of domestic terrorism in U.S. history. “I sat here and cried alone.”

“I saw America as heaven,” continued Reach, one of 15 journalists to win a Freedom Forum international scholarship. “But it was not like in my dream. The homeless, the crime and then Oklahoma City.”

As a journalist, however, Reach saw the bombing as a tremendous opportunity to examine how the media covers such a massive story. Overall, Reach, a correspondent with the Agence France-Presse news service, gave his U.S. colleagues very high marks.

“They did a good job,” said Reach, who studied coverage by 20 of the nation’s major newspapers. “They did it fast and it was detailed. They communicate better than we do in Cambodia.”

But Reach chided the press for initial reports that suggested Middle Eastern terrorists may have been responsible.

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“They should have been more careful; this is not a joke,” he said. “It can cause a backlash. In Los Angeles, Muslims received death threats.”

Also during his study of the press, Reach was disappointed by its lack of stories from Cambodia. He blamed misplaced priorities for pushing out coverage of Cambodia.

“[Americans] care so much about business,” he said. “They talk about business first, then news later. They worry about money, taxes and jobs, so why should they care about Cambodia?”

Reach admits he is still learning about news judgment himself. He still has mixed feelings about the publication of a controversial photo he snapped before he left Cambodia. The photo, which ran in many newspapers throughout Asia, showed a Cambodian government soldier holding the severed head of a Khmer Rouge rebel fighter.

“The government really hates me for that picture, but I don’t care,” said Reach, who was criticized by a high-ranking Cambodian official for it. “If I didn’t get that picture, the government would never know what their soldiers are doing.”

“But it was a disgusting photo,” added Reach, whose editors feared another paper would run the photograph first. “I still feel bad about it. Sometimes competition makes you go crazy with ethics.”

Sadly, coming from a country where millions died during two decades of civil strife and foreign invasions, Reach is no stranger to reporting on atrocities. He recalled surveying a lake area where the Khmer Rouge killed 34 Vietnamese.

“It was horrible. The smell of death was terrible,” he said. “And the image of the dead never leaves you. When you go to bed, you still see them.”

Reporting about the Khmer Rouge raises extremely difficult ethical issues for Reach. The Khmer Rouge, which is blamed for more than 1 million deaths during a brutal reign in the 1970s and today refuses to recognize the United Nations-sponsored election in Cambodia, also killed Reach’s parents and five siblings, leaving him with only one brother.

“The Khmer Rouge is like a tiger and they cannot live without human flesh,” he said. “I don’t know if they will ever join society.”

But Reach is more hopeful than ever about his own and his country’s future. His wife, Chhoy Chanty, is carrying their first child, due in September.

“I love my country, my work and my wife,” Reach said. “I think my child will live in more peace than me.”