The Education of an Idealist: A Memoir

by Samantha Power

While I looked forward to most of my courtesy calls, I was unenthused about some, including my meeting with the Cambodian ambassador, a man who in UN gatherings mumbled his country’s turgid prepared statements and betrayed no charisma. True to form, he began our meeting by delivering a set of rote talking points. But when I asked him what life had been like for him as a boy growing up under the Khmer Rouge, his manner was transformed. He said that the Khmer Rouge executed his father “for being a teacher,” but when they murdered his sister, a housewife, he said, “they did not have to give a reason.” The ambassador noted matter-of-factly that he and his surviving siblings nearly starved to death. “I am surprised by how much food is wasted at the UN,” he said, simply.

Damn.