‘Radical joy’: Cambodians in California celebrate Khmer culture 50 years after Killing Fields

In Long Beach, city with the largest diaspora of Cambodians in the US, people dance, eat and reflect on the 1975 killings

“Sousdey chnam thmey!” a rider shouted in Khmer into a megaphone while sitting atop a float swaddled in US and Cambodian flags. “Happy new year!” parade-goers yelled back from the street.

Thousands of Cambodian Americans gathered to celebrate the Khmer New Year in Long Beach’s Cambodia Town district – the heart of the largest diaspora of Cambodians in the United States.

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