=91Cambodian Cowboy' to visit Pampa on July 4
Posted: Saturday, Apr 19, 2008 - 09:21:56 am CDT
By DAVID BOWSER
The Pampa News
The story starts in Cambodia and ends on the Fourth of July at the
Canadian rodeo.
Sichan Siv, a former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and husband
of Martha Pattillo, a Pampa native, is the author of a new book,
=93Golden Bones,=94 the story of his journey from the killing fields of
Cambodia to the White House and the halls of the United Nations and
his relation to the Texas Panhandle.
It was in 1970, when Prince Sihanouk was deposed in Cambodia and Lon
Nol took power that the North Vietnamese Army broke out of their
sanctuaries in eastern Cambodia and attacked Cambodian forces. While a
1973 agreement in Paris ended the Vietnam War, the Khmer Rouge began
their battle to take over Cambodia.
By 1975, the Khmer Rouge had taken over the country and nearly two
million people had died of exhaustion, starvation and summary
execution.
Siv escaped Phnom Penh with his family in 1975, but he is the only
survivor. His mother, brother, sister and their families were clubbed
to death by the Khmer Rouge.
Siv made it to Thailand only to be held as an illegal alien.
Eventually, he made his way to the U.S., arriving in Connecticut in
June, 1976. He had two dollars in his pocket.
The name of his book comes from his return to his father's village in
Cambodia in 1992.
=93Cambodians call someone who is very blessed or lucky a =91person with
golden bones,'=94 Siv said.
The villagers knew he had survived the Khmer Rouge massacre, had gone
to America and was working in the White House for the President of the
United States.
=93They called me the =91man with golden bones,'=94 Siv said.
The book is due to be released in early July.
Siv is expected to be in Pampa and Canadian for the Fourth of July
celebrations.
=93For us, the most exotic thing in the world would be to go to Paris or
to the pyramids or to Cambodia and Angkor Wat,=94 Siv's wife said.
For her husband, she said the most exotic experience of a lifetime is
to come to the Texas Panhandle and ride on a real ranch.
=93He just thinks the panhandle is THE place,=94 she said.
When Siv was growing up in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, he used to watch John
Wayne films in French at the movie theaters.
=93Here, the heavens and earth hug each other,=94 Siv said on a visit to
the Brainard Ranch in 2003.
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