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Dragon Boat Races Return to Cambodian Capital for Water Festival

Pigeons fly past as participants row dragon boats during a competition as part of the Water Festival on the Tonle Sap river in Phnom Penh on November 26, 2023. (AFP)
Pigeons fly past as participants row dragon boats during a competition as part of the Water Festival on the Tonle Sap river in Phnom Penh on November 26, 2023. (AFP)
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Dragon Boat Races Return to Cambodian Capital for Water Festival

Pigeons fly past as participants row dragon boats during a competition as part of the Water Festival on the Tonle Sap river in Phnom Penh on November 26, 2023. (AFP)
Pigeons fly past as participants row dragon boats during a competition as part of the Water Festival on the Tonle Sap river in Phnom Penh on November 26, 2023. (AFP)

Tens of thousands of spectators thronged the riverfront in the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh Sunday for an annual dragon boat race -- the centerpiece of the kingdom's three-day water festival, cancelled during the Covid pandemic.

Around 300 boats, their crews dressed in matching bright T-shirts, strained for the win as they dipped their colorful paddles into the Tonle Sap river with the royal palace behind them.

Cambodian King Norodom Sihamoni, Prime Minister Hun Manet, his father Hun Sen and senior government officials looked on as the yearly extravaganza began, with crowds urging the canoes over the final line.

Concerts, parades of lantern floats bedecked with colorful neon lights -- each representing a government ministry -- and fireworks are all part of the three-day festival that will last until Tuesday.

"I am happy that we can meet to celebrate the water festival," 38-year-old rower Hom Phos told AFP.

"I am so excited because it is our national festival."

The festival was last held in 2019, after which it was halted during the pandemic.

"During the Covid pandemic, everyone was worried about it, and we were not happy. But now we are happy again," fellow rower Yorn Vorn, 45, told AFP.

The festival marks the end of the rainy season when the Tonle Sap river, which joins the mighty Mekong River in front of the Royal Palace, reverses flow.

The celebrations turned deadly on the last day of the festival in 2010, when more than 350 people were killed in a stampede on an overcrowded bridge after panic spread over rumors it was about to collapse.

Then Prime Minister Hun Sen described the disaster as Cambodia's worst tragedy since the Khmer Rouge's 1975-1979 reign of terror, which killed up to a quarter of the population.

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In Belarus, the Native Language is Vanishing as Russian Takes Prominence

FILE - Schoolchildren perform at a ceremony marking Belarus' holiday honoring the state flag and emblem in Minsk, Belarus, on May 13, 2012. (AP Photo, File)
FILE - Schoolchildren perform at a ceremony marking Belarus' holiday honoring the state flag and emblem in Minsk, Belarus, on May 13, 2012. (AP Photo, File)
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In Belarus, the Native Language is Vanishing as Russian Takes Prominence

FILE - Schoolchildren perform at a ceremony marking Belarus' holiday honoring the state flag and emblem in Minsk, Belarus, on May 13, 2012. (AP Photo, File)
FILE - Schoolchildren perform at a ceremony marking Belarus' holiday honoring the state flag and emblem in Minsk, Belarus, on May 13, 2012. (AP Photo, File)

When school started this year for Mikalay in Belarus, the 15-year-old discovered that his teachers and administrators no longer called him by that name. Instead, they referred to him as Nikolai, its Russian equivalent.

What's more, classes at his school — one of the country's best — are now taught in Russian, not Belarusian, which he has spoken for most of his life.

Belarusians like Mikalay are experiencing a new wave of Russification as Moscow expands its economic, political and cultural dominance.

Russia under the czars and in the era of the Soviet Union imposed its language, symbols and cultural institutions on Belarus. But with the demise of the USSR in 1991, the country began to assert its identity, and Belarusian briefly became the official language, with the white-red-white national flag replacing a version of the red hammer and sickle, according to The AP.

But all that changed in 1994, after Alexander Lukashenko, a former Soviet collective farm official, came to power. The authoritarian leader made Russian an official language, alongside Belarusian, and did away with the nationalist symbols.

Now, with Lukashenko in control of the country for over three decades, he has allowed Russia to dominate all aspects of life in Belarus, a country of 9.5 million people. Belarusian, which like Russian uses the Cyrillic alphabet, is hardly heard on the streets of Minsk and other large cities anymore.

Official business is conducted in Russian, which dominates the majority of the media. Lukashenko speaks only Russian, and government officials often don't use their native tongue.

Belarus was part of the Russian empire for centuries and became one of 15 Soviet republics after the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution. Daily use of the Belarusian language decreased and continued only in the country's west and north and in rural areas.

In 1994, about 40% of students were taught in Belarusian; it's now down to under 9%.

Although Belarusian, like Russian, is an eastern Slavic language, its vocabulary is considerably different.