Frangipani & Bafflegab

Calm and seemingly cool in 90DEG heat, the young woman walked down the red carpet at Pnompenh's Pochentong Airport, escorted by Cambodia's Prince Norodom Sihanouk, all smiles and a torrent of French. An exotically garbed palace guard held a giant green parasol over their heads to screen them from the afternoon sun, and 200 schoolgirls in bright green sampots, the traditional skirts, sprinkled her path with fragrant rose and jasmine petals, which they carried in silver bowls--the Buddhist way, explained Sihanouk, of honoring very special guests.

At the end of the carpet, waiting to be introduced, stood the Cambodian court, the government elite, and the diplomatic corps, including representatives of many Communist countries. For Jacqueline Kennedy, fulfilling a long-held dream of visiting the fabled ruins of Angkor, there must also have been a sense of deja vu. Her reception in Cambodia rivaled any she had received when she was the wife of the President of the United States.

The entire journey, in fact, had the trappings of a presidential--or royal--cavalcade. To make sure that her twelve-hour flight from Rome, where she stopped en route, to Bangkok would be both safe and comfortable, Alitalia stripped, searched and then replaced her plane's inside furnishings, made up a special 3-ft. by 6-ft. bed for her in what is usually the first-class lounge. The Pope, Women's Wear Daily noted in its distinctively catty way, is given no better treatment. In Bangkok, she was met by Thai officials, slept at the Thai government's guesthouse before being ferried on to Pnompenh by a U.S. Air Force C-54.

Keys of the Kingdom. Accompanied on her journey by Britain's Lord Harlech and New York Lawyer Michael Forrestal--both old friends and both tagged by gossips as possible suitors--together with Washington Journalist Charles Bartlett and his wife, Mrs. Kennedy was almost literally given the keys of the kingdom, whose ruler has been virulently anti-American.

Khemarin Palace, formerly the home of Cambodian sovereigns and now a residence for state guests, was put at her disposal, and the ruler's son-in-law, Prince Monirak, was assigned as her aide. A gala dinner in Chamcar Mon Palace on the Mekong River was followed by a performance of the royal ballet. With white frangipani blossoms in her hair, Princess Bopha Devi, Sihanouk's stunningly beautiful daughter and star of the ballet, led ten dancers in a re-enactment of Cambodian legends, and the Prince, enchanted by his guest, bubbled with jeu d'esprit. Jackie, in a lime green gown edged with silver to match her shoes, bantered with him in French and seemed to enjoy the occasion as much as he did. In serious vein, Sihanouk had warm words for her husband, who, he said pointedly, had "lit a light that has never been relit and which we miss cruelly today."

Light Lunch. From Pnompenh, the Kennedy party flew on to Angkor--a mysterious, romantic relic of the great Khmer civilization that vanished in war and bloodshed some time in the 15th century. Besides barring newsmen for most of the stay, the Cambodian hosts set up a "picnic lunch" (five dishes and two wines) for the tourists under tall hardwood trees, charmed them with the soft sounds of tiny gongs, cymbals and bamboo flutes. "Magnificent, magnificent," was Jackie's description of the ruins.

At night, the brooding hulk of Angkor Wat, the best known of the Khmer temples, was illuminated by candles, torches and floodlights. Strolling barefoot through the shadows, Jackie paused to run her fingers over the stone friezes that depicted the ancient battles between gods and men. From Angkor, the Kennedy party was to go to the port city of Sihanoukville, where Jacqueline was to rename a street "Avenue President Kennedy," and then back to Thailand, where she was to dine with the King and Queen.

An American Tourist. The trip was billed simply as the private visit of an American tourist, but of course nothing that Jacqueline Kennedy--or any other Kennedy--does is ever simple or very private. Though the State Department had no hand in promoting the tour, Washington was nonetheless pleased by it, and hoped that it might presage an improvement in American-Cambodian relations, which have been almost nonexistent. Sihanouk broke off relations with the U.S. in 1965, as a protest against the bombing of a Cambodian village by South Vietnamese planes. The U.S., for its part, has repeatedly complained about Cambodia's complaisant provision of safe refuge for the Viet Cong.

The visit may have helped "to relax" relations, Sihanouk later said, but it did nothing to alter the Prince's conviction that "sooner or later, all Asia will be Chinese." In nearly three hours of bafflegab at a press conference, he unequivocally supported Hanoi's terms for ending the war in Viet Nam. As soon as America stopped sending planes over the Cambodian border and recognized his country's "territorial integrity," allowed the Prince, he would be delighted to resume diplomatic relations with Washington.

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