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casket. In Phnom Penh mourners converged spontaneously on the Royal Palace. They
wore white—the traditional shade of mourning—and came clutching lotus flowers,
candles, black ribbons, and portraits of the beloved “King Father.” Some of them had
traveled hundreds of kilometers. When Sihanouk's body returned from China two days
later, thousands lined the streets to see the gold funeral cortege on its stately procession
to the Royal Palace. Some wept openly as the coffin arrived outside the mustard-colored
palace walls, covered with flowers and draped with Cambodia's blue royal standard.
Buddhist monks formed a saffron guard of honor. Crowds remained outside the palace
well into the evening, setting fire to biers of incense that sent plumes of fragrant smoke
billowing into an inky night sky.
The public outpouring was a reminder that for much of the population, particularly the
older generations, the monarchy retained its emotional grip. Sam Sokhan, a 78-year-old
Buddhist nun with a shaved head, served in a village militia regiment during Sihanouk's
“royal crusade” for independence in the early 1950s. She recalled how under the guid-
ance of
Samdech Eav
—“Monsignor Papa”—the soldiers in her regiment confronted the
French and “scared them back to their own country.” “I hope he gets reborn soon,” she
told me as she waited in the sun for Sihanouk's coffin to pass. “I pray for the king in
heaven. And when he gets there I hope he takes a look back at the people.”
The scenes in Phnom Penh formed a neat symmetry with those that had greeted Sihan-
ouk on his return from exile 21 years earlier. On that sunny day in November 1991, Hun
Sen had escorted the silver-haired prince home from Beijing and then rode into town with
him from the airport. As they moved along the crowded streets the young prime minis-
ter, wearing a loose-fitting navy blue suit and sunglasses, basked in Sihanouk's reflected
glory. After playing a key role in the peace talks that brought his exile to an end, Hun Sen
would always claim credit for Sihanouk's return. In 2012 the prime minister drove along
the same roads, at a discreet distance behind Sihanouk's funeral carriage, in a Mercedes
with blacked-out windows. But the political symbolism was unmistakable. Again, Hun
Sen had brought Sihanouk home.
The Royal Government spared no expenses bringing the curtain down on the God-King.
While Sihanouk's body lay in state at the Royal Palace, the government built a $1.5 mil-
lion crematorium, topped by a golden spire 47 meters high. It was erected on the
veal
mean
, the open area next to the palace where royal funerals have traditionally taken place.
A new annual public holiday was announced to mark his passing and the government re-
instated the annual celebration of the signing of the Paris Agreements, abolished in 2004
but now hailed, in a subtly backhanded compliment, as Sihanouk's shining achievement.
On February 1, 2013, the first royal funeral procession in half a century bore Sihan-
ouk's casket through the streets of Phnom Penh, while loudspeakers rigged across town
broadcast eulogies of the King Father. Three days later, on the sultry evening of Febru-
