WBEZ 91.5 Chicago

Mr. Lim is a Cambodian refugee, high-school teacher, and volunteer at the Cambodian Association of Illinois. In 1975, he was driven out of his home at gunpoint, alongside the rest of the nation, and forced to work the land under a communist regime led by Pol Pot and Nuon Chea now called the Khmer Rouge.

New demographic studies released Wednesday by the Khmer Rouge tribunal—a UN-backed court now gearing up to try Nuon Chea for crimes against humanity and genocide of Cham Muslims and ethnic Vietnamese—suggests that the death toll under the communist regime is slightly higher than previous estimates. Between 1.75 and 2.2 million people perished between 1975 and 1979, the Phnom Penh Post reports. Of these, between 800,000 and 1.3 million were violent deaths.

Few answers to the obvious question—Why?—have ever been found. Still, a very smart reporter for the same paper mentioned above decided to ask it anyway. Thet Sambath’s unbelievable film, Enemies of the People, opens tonight at the Gene Siskel Film Center.

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This week, spice up your normal routine with deals at two restaurants focusing on food that fuses together flavors from around the globe. ‚ If you're beginning to think you should turn your love of eating into an occupation, there's a seminar for that, too.

The beet salad at Sola

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In photos of a young Jeremiah Sterling, a beautiful brown boy smiles from the frames, making life look easy: laughing, playing tough, but with sweetness and mischief in his eyes.

But, according to his mother, that wasn’t exactly so.

“That boy’s been fighting since he got here,” LaWanda Thompson-Sterling says about her son, Jeremiah, who was shot down in the alley across the street from their house on a residential street in West Pullman on July 15.

Odel Sterling, Jeremiah’s father and LaWanda’s ex-husband explains: “Jeremiah was stillborn, the umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck and he lost oxygen, so when he was born he didn’t breathe for 10 minutes before being revived. But I didn’t worry,” says Odel, a pastor, “because God had already showed that he would live.”

They named the boy – LaWanda’s second son, Odel’s first – Jeremiah because “it means `one whom God hears’,” says Odel, “and I wanted God to hear his prayers and his cries, and God did.”

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How would you like to schmooze with the city's culinary elite?‚  Perhaps sample nibbles from the area's best pastry chefs and imbibe in the handiwork of a few good mixologists?‚  If you're hungry - and creative - I'm giving you a chance to score two free tickets to the‚ "Dine Around"‚ portion of the‚ Meals on Wheels Chicago Chef's Ball on October 15th, at‚ Macy's on State Street.‚ 

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Zoë Jakes of Beats Antique

Though Riot Fest is the most exciting show looming on the horizon at the moment, there's plenty of fine noise in the clubs this weekend before that punk-rock smorgasbord gets underway in the middle of next week.

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Robservations on the media beat:

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  ^{Mark Edwards}

  Gee, was it something I said? Mark Edwards, the former program guru of Chicago's Lite FM, was ousted Thursday after 6‚½ years as director of programming at CBS Radio's KEZK-FM and KYKY-FM in St. Louis. Edwards, 50, had recently boosted KEZK to the top of the ratings in the Gateway City. The news came one day after he was praised here as the genius who turned WLIT-FM (93.9) into an adult-contemporary powerhouse in the '90s -- and one day after he'd returned from vacation.

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In truth, I started this project several years ago. When I began then by surveying my immediate neighborhood for potential interviewees, I stumbled across a building just two blocks away that I had never noticed before, marked by elaborate and unusual stonework. The Cambodian Association of Illinois. Those of you familiar with my work in Cambodia over the past three years know that walking into it, and meeting Leon Lim, were life-changing experiences for me.

So I’m bending the rules for Leon Lim, a high-school teacher (although one could argue that Studs only ever intended to eliminate college professors from his purview of Chicagoans) and volunteer at CAI. Since I first spoke to him a few years ago, he’s done some amazing things. So, for that matter, has CAI. And Cambodia. But I can tell you about that later. First I want you to meet Mr. Lim.

Back in 1981, I volunteered to help this organization, The Cambodian Association of Illinois. Then I became the board president in 1998, when we bought this building.

He is a quiet unassuming man, thin, with dark hair and a quick smile. He dresses impeccably, a pressed button-down shirt and neat pants, and you need to lean in to hear him.

The old office is on Lawrence, too, but near Kenmore, the Uptown area—the 15-something, I forget the address. We bought this building in 1998.

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