Oh, the world you would have known, Shrey Mom. There are still times now, thirty years after you left us, when I look up from whatever I am doing and search for some sign from your spirit. Is that you, that slight soothing pressure on my face? Are you hiding in the clear fresh water I use to clean my client’s feet? Did you slip into that little girl’s giggle? For just a minute, she sounds so much like you.
So many times I ask my husband, “Where are the spirits of all the children who starved to death during the Khmer Rouge? Are they still waiting in Cambodia for their families to come home? Do they know we are here in America?”
He says he does not know. I never tell him how I wait for you. How I worry.
The women who come into my salon, Shrey Mom, carry huge leather satchels that probably cost more money than all the rice we harvested during five years at Pou Chrey. Sometimes they bring their children with them, pale little children in fancy soccer uniforms and hundred dollar sneakers. They will never know the joy of playing a simple game of Leak Kanseng in their dirty bare feet. The dogs that wait for them in cars much grander than the Anghar tanks go to special shops for shampoos. Akmow would not be welcome here, with his dusty black coat and half an ear.
What stories I could tell you about this strange world of America, daughter. But there are no words in the Khmer language to describe such things. It is like a story I once heard about a very old tribe who had never seen a boat before. And so, when they looked out over the ocean, where many, many enemy boats were arriving, they only saw the water. What did they know of something besides a bird that could float?
As much as I want to tell you about my life in America, things are so very different here that there is no space in your little mind for you to even imagine their existence. I can tell you that I own a small shop in a very, very rich town in America, that I clean people’s hands and feet and paint their nails different colors. Sometimes I grind fake nails for them and paste them on their fingers. Every day fancy women come here and I put rich creams on their faces to make them look younger or use hot wax to strip hair from their body. Not sexy in America to have hair on your body.
I do these things to make them happy but they are not happy, Shrey Mom. Always they have problems. I am sorry with them. I remember to ask them how things are when they return. But deep inside, as I bend over their hands, I am saying to myself: “You think your life is a sad story? You have everything. A home. Food. A job. Education. Why you so sad?”
Sometimes I think, “If only you knew my story. You would understand what sorrow really is.” But I say nothing. They are my customers and I have bills to pay.
I will tell you what their lives remind me of, though. It is another story. Some Buddhist monks came to the largest city in America, a city bigger than twenty Phnom Phen's with buildings that rise so high into the sky you cannot see where they end. The monks went every day to a famous building where very important paintings and other art is kept, and they carved a very, very big and beautiful sculpture. It took them weeks and weeks to finish. The sculpture was so big it was the size of a small rice field. When they were done they just left it there, and pretty soon this beautiful piece of art started to melt. The days were too hot. But the monks had known all the time that what they had worked so hard to create would not last. They had done it this way on purpose. They had made the sculpture out of butter.
This is what America is like, Shrey Mom. It is not a real place. What they call beauty here is just what they use to cover up what is real. It will not last.
But the story of our lives? Ah, this will never melt, this will last forever. Yes, this is the story I will tell you
Monday, May 21, 2007
Takmau, April 1975
First, I tell you story about day our lives change forever. Hot, dusty day, a month before the rains swell Tonle Sap, fill all Cambodia rivers. Perhaps you remember?
Midday outside our house. Mae sleeping in hammock and you laughing, running circles with Amonk. So so hot I cook clams on ground; they just blister in sun.
“You hungry?” I ask Mae. She shake her head no. Too hot to eat.
I always hungry. I watch you play, eat rice and clams. But oh I ache, miss my husband. Kuan not coming home. Two days ago his friend stop by to tell me.
“Something terrible about to happen,” he say. “Kuan want me give you this.” He hands me $20 and Kuan’s army uniform. “Not safe for him here, he leave country.”
What I thinking anyway. Not like no signs. Every night, Kuan and I lie beside each other in bed, listening to battle sounds under covers.
My world so small. Kuan all I think about. I so crazy in love with him. What could be more terrible than this? I scheming how to meet in City. Yesterday, we heard that airport close. Maybe he still here. Maybe not too late.
I jump to my feet, hear bombs and gunfire. Noise too close.
“Gee, what’s going on?”
Across lake see smoke and people running. Mae sit up in hammock. You stop playing, grab at my skirt. More gunshots, bombs. In seconds, Highway just beyond front yard is crowded with people rushing towards Phnom Phen.
Everywhere stench of gunpowder. Things happening so fast, camera going snap, snap, snap, only each picture frozen in slow motion like trapped in nightmare where you scream and no sound.
Gunfire, explosions, smoke closer and closer. Friends and neighbors speed past on motorcycles and trucks.
“Leave, leave!”.
Ba arrive on his bicycle.
“Get in house,” he yell. “Khmer Rouge attack. Hide, hide.”
I grab you and we run upstairs.
“We go to Phnom Phen,” I say. “Why we stay here? Everyone leaving.”
Ba not listen. “We safe here. Enough food for three months.”
I so angry. Want to go with everyone else to City. Maybe Kuan still there. We stay with his family.
But Ba in charge and so we stay.
We lock all doors, close windows. People running by just outside, pounding on the door “Get out! Get out!” Instead, we hide under the bed in the back room.
We here for long time. You want your favorite toy. I run toward front room to fetch it, suddenly hear loud noise. Scramble back under bed. Knock on door downstairs, friend of Ba’s calling up: “Are you still there? A bomb has fallen on your house. Is anyone in there?”
Sun setting. We still under bed when we hear someone kicking open downstairs door. We so quiet, even Amonk know no make noise. We hear people knocking things off shelves, throwing things around rooms. Now they climb stairs. Three pair shoes enter. Rubber shoes made from tires. Khmer Rouge. We so quiet as they move through room, throwing open cabinets, scattering everything on floor.
But Ba too tall. One of soldiers see his feet.
“Get out, get out from under there,” he order. We crawl out. We so frightened. I hold you in my arms so tight.
Three rifles point at us.
“Do you have guns here? Any army hiding in house?”
You sit on floor, playing with roll toilet paper while Bad talks.
"No, no, we not army. Just let us stay here. No problem."
Soldiers say we have to leave. No time to take anything with us. We not safe here. Americans going to bomb city. We leave now. In three days things safe, we return.
Out. Out. So quick we wrap clothing in sarongs, Ba stuffs big suitcase. We pushed at gunpoint out onto street. Soldiers everywhere. Now everyone rush away from Phnom Phen – cars, trucks, tuk-tuks overflowing with people, bicycles and motos carry whole family. Gunshots. Small boys in big black clothing scarves wrapped around heads carry guns as big as they are. Their eyes crazy with power. Bombs explode, gun battles rage. Fear so heavy you can smell it.
“Go, go, go.” Armed soldiers alongside road urge us onward, only allowing us to stop to drink from large buckets of water sitting along road.
We walk all night. Hundreds seeking shelter under trees when bullets come too close.
Ba, Mae and I take turn carrying you, your little feet tire so quickly. I so angry at Ba. Why he not see this? Why he not take us away sooner?
Finally, morning. Rest in small farm. Farmer come over with food for you. Banana leaf wrapped around brown rice and tiny dried fish.
Do you remember that morning, Shrey Mom, that tiny offering food? It meal for four of us.
I still haunted by way that farmer look at us. He know what in store for us. He sorry. Oh, how I hate that man because when I look at him I know. I know old life over. Life never again be normal. I know this, but I no idea three days really mean four years.
In that moment it just like they say happen before you die. My whole life flash fast before my eyes, like star shoot across sky. Like that for you, Shrey Mom? When you die, your star not have long to travel. Only five year. In my death moment, path 24 year long. My life slip away in second, not enough time even for me to reach out and capture even tiniest picture. It all gone before I finish one breath.
Takmau, 1957
Spirit is everything in Cambodia. Our parents tell us that on the day we are born, our spirit is flying above, summoned to land in that split second of time when our body slips into this world. They choose us; they are our first taste of the air.
We are sewing mosquito nets in the cool outdoor corridor in the middle of our two-story house. I smell magnolias and drying fish.
We are so poor. Pa rides his bike to work in the fields, a few hours journey each way. Sometimes he disappears for days at a time. There is never enough food, and when we are not at school we are working for Mae, endlessly stitching new nets to sell in the local market or in Phnom Phen. We are always waiting for holiday, once a year noodle soup and two new sets of clothes
I am maybe five or six. Already, I am angry at my spirit.
“Why you have to stop here, why this poor family?” I ask. “Why you do this to me? If you had flown a little slower, you would have landed just next door. Look how many things you would have had -- a TV, a car, lots of food.”
Then I look out in the other direction.
“Why you not fly a little slower? Even on the other side, still things would have been a little better. Why you have to land here?”
The sun is setting over the Mekong, the evening chills. The cicadas chat with birds, a dog howls. I can hear my stomach clenching with hunger, so empty it is hard to pay attention to my stitching. The babies begin to cry and Big Brother tries to distract them. Our well-seasoned ears easily weed out the sound of Ba’s bike as he turns into the alley beside our home. Now we can eat.
Everyone loves Ba. He is an artist. “Oh, your father, he so wise,” they say. Our neighbors and everyone in our family come to him for advice. He knows everything. And oh, how he loves to tell stories about Grandpa’s life in China. These are my favorite times. After dinner, I am so tired, still hungry, our sewing is folded away, the babies sleep. Only the crickets chatter as Ba begins to talk. Akmow, our black lab, curls at his feet.
Ba enchants me with bigger-than-life, true fairytales, so rich and humming with life that time and space disappear.
I am no longer just one little girl in a large poor Cambodian family. I am traveling inside Ba’s memories. I am in China, crouching outside a school with other hushed children, secretly listening to lessons only meant for rich young ears. I am dancing in the dark swollen fields, chasing down fireflies, capturing hundreds in a clear glass jar. I poke holes in the lids and read very big schoolbooks by the light of my firefly lantern. My night sky is too rich with stars and moonlight. I sleep.
My eyes snap open as Ba settles me down in the long bamboo bed with my sisters.
“It’s okay. You were dreaming,” he whispers. I stare for a moment into his deep black eyes. I sigh and turn away into sleep. We, four sisters, side by side every night, tiny sardines packed tight in a poreless tin can. So safe.
Midday outside our house. Mae sleeping in hammock and you laughing, running circles with Amonk. So so hot I cook clams on ground; they just blister in sun.
“You hungry?” I ask Mae. She shake her head no. Too hot to eat.
I always hungry. I watch you play, eat rice and clams. But oh I ache, miss my husband. Kuan not coming home. Two days ago his friend stop by to tell me.
“Something terrible about to happen,” he say. “Kuan want me give you this.” He hands me $20 and Kuan’s army uniform. “Not safe for him here, he leave country.”
What I thinking anyway. Not like no signs. Every night, Kuan and I lie beside each other in bed, listening to battle sounds under covers.
My world so small. Kuan all I think about. I so crazy in love with him. What could be more terrible than this? I scheming how to meet in City. Yesterday, we heard that airport close. Maybe he still here. Maybe not too late.
I jump to my feet, hear bombs and gunfire. Noise too close.
“Gee, what’s going on?”
Across lake see smoke and people running. Mae sit up in hammock. You stop playing, grab at my skirt. More gunshots, bombs. In seconds, Highway just beyond front yard is crowded with people rushing towards Phnom Phen.
Everywhere stench of gunpowder. Things happening so fast, camera going snap, snap, snap, only each picture frozen in slow motion like trapped in nightmare where you scream and no sound.
Gunfire, explosions, smoke closer and closer. Friends and neighbors speed past on motorcycles and trucks.
“Leave, leave!”.
Ba arrive on his bicycle.
“Get in house,” he yell. “Khmer Rouge attack. Hide, hide.”
I grab you and we run upstairs.
“We go to Phnom Phen,” I say. “Why we stay here? Everyone leaving.”
Ba not listen. “We safe here. Enough food for three months.”
I so angry. Want to go with everyone else to City. Maybe Kuan still there. We stay with his family.
But Ba in charge and so we stay.
We lock all doors, close windows. People running by just outside, pounding on the door “Get out! Get out!” Instead, we hide under the bed in the back room.
We here for long time. You want your favorite toy. I run toward front room to fetch it, suddenly hear loud noise. Scramble back under bed. Knock on door downstairs, friend of Ba’s calling up: “Are you still there? A bomb has fallen on your house. Is anyone in there?”
Sun setting. We still under bed when we hear someone kicking open downstairs door. We so quiet, even Amonk know no make noise. We hear people knocking things off shelves, throwing things around rooms. Now they climb stairs. Three pair shoes enter. Rubber shoes made from tires. Khmer Rouge. We so quiet as they move through room, throwing open cabinets, scattering everything on floor.
But Ba too tall. One of soldiers see his feet.
“Get out, get out from under there,” he order. We crawl out. We so frightened. I hold you in my arms so tight.
Three rifles point at us.
“Do you have guns here? Any army hiding in house?”
You sit on floor, playing with roll toilet paper while Bad talks.
"No, no, we not army. Just let us stay here. No problem."
Soldiers say we have to leave. No time to take anything with us. We not safe here. Americans going to bomb city. We leave now. In three days things safe, we return.
Out. Out. So quick we wrap clothing in sarongs, Ba stuffs big suitcase. We pushed at gunpoint out onto street. Soldiers everywhere. Now everyone rush away from Phnom Phen – cars, trucks, tuk-tuks overflowing with people, bicycles and motos carry whole family. Gunshots. Small boys in big black clothing scarves wrapped around heads carry guns as big as they are. Their eyes crazy with power. Bombs explode, gun battles rage. Fear so heavy you can smell it.
“Go, go, go.” Armed soldiers alongside road urge us onward, only allowing us to stop to drink from large buckets of water sitting along road.
We walk all night. Hundreds seeking shelter under trees when bullets come too close.
Ba, Mae and I take turn carrying you, your little feet tire so quickly. I so angry at Ba. Why he not see this? Why he not take us away sooner?
Finally, morning. Rest in small farm. Farmer come over with food for you. Banana leaf wrapped around brown rice and tiny dried fish.
Do you remember that morning, Shrey Mom, that tiny offering food? It meal for four of us.
I still haunted by way that farmer look at us. He know what in store for us. He sorry. Oh, how I hate that man because when I look at him I know. I know old life over. Life never again be normal. I know this, but I no idea three days really mean four years.
In that moment it just like they say happen before you die. My whole life flash fast before my eyes, like star shoot across sky. Like that for you, Shrey Mom? When you die, your star not have long to travel. Only five year. In my death moment, path 24 year long. My life slip away in second, not enough time even for me to reach out and capture even tiniest picture. It all gone before I finish one breath.
Takmau, 1957
Spirit is everything in Cambodia. Our parents tell us that on the day we are born, our spirit is flying above, summoned to land in that split second of time when our body slips into this world. They choose us; they are our first taste of the air.
We are sewing mosquito nets in the cool outdoor corridor in the middle of our two-story house. I smell magnolias and drying fish.
We are so poor. Pa rides his bike to work in the fields, a few hours journey each way. Sometimes he disappears for days at a time. There is never enough food, and when we are not at school we are working for Mae, endlessly stitching new nets to sell in the local market or in Phnom Phen. We are always waiting for holiday, once a year noodle soup and two new sets of clothes
I am maybe five or six. Already, I am angry at my spirit.
“Why you have to stop here, why this poor family?” I ask. “Why you do this to me? If you had flown a little slower, you would have landed just next door. Look how many things you would have had -- a TV, a car, lots of food.”
Then I look out in the other direction.
“Why you not fly a little slower? Even on the other side, still things would have been a little better. Why you have to land here?”
The sun is setting over the Mekong, the evening chills. The cicadas chat with birds, a dog howls. I can hear my stomach clenching with hunger, so empty it is hard to pay attention to my stitching. The babies begin to cry and Big Brother tries to distract them. Our well-seasoned ears easily weed out the sound of Ba’s bike as he turns into the alley beside our home. Now we can eat.
Everyone loves Ba. He is an artist. “Oh, your father, he so wise,” they say. Our neighbors and everyone in our family come to him for advice. He knows everything. And oh, how he loves to tell stories about Grandpa’s life in China. These are my favorite times. After dinner, I am so tired, still hungry, our sewing is folded away, the babies sleep. Only the crickets chatter as Ba begins to talk. Akmow, our black lab, curls at his feet.
Ba enchants me with bigger-than-life, true fairytales, so rich and humming with life that time and space disappear.
I am no longer just one little girl in a large poor Cambodian family. I am traveling inside Ba’s memories. I am in China, crouching outside a school with other hushed children, secretly listening to lessons only meant for rich young ears. I am dancing in the dark swollen fields, chasing down fireflies, capturing hundreds in a clear glass jar. I poke holes in the lids and read very big schoolbooks by the light of my firefly lantern. My night sky is too rich with stars and moonlight. I sleep.
My eyes snap open as Ba settles me down in the long bamboo bed with my sisters.
“It’s okay. You were dreaming,” he whispers. I stare for a moment into his deep black eyes. I sigh and turn away into sleep. We, four sisters, side by side every night, tiny sardines packed tight in a poreless tin can. So safe.
Takmou: 1950s
Today is an important day. Ba is taking me to get my birth certificate so I can go to big children’s school. I ride on the handlebars of his bike to the government building in the center of town.
Downtown Takmou is always crowded, so much to see. The outside market full of merchants selling colorful silks and threads, shiny jewelry, books and clothing. So many things to eat here. Fruit stands overflow with pineapple and papaya. Plump ducks and chicken hang from long string from top canopy many stands. Smell of cooking meats and fish. Rows of tuks tuks and motobikes, bicycles.
Cars and buses with windows wide open cross bridge over Mekong, some pass by Takmou on way to Vietnam.
There are many people in line by the time we arrive, some friends from the Buddhist school. But everyone is quiet inside, the children stand still beside their parents; we all turn to look each time someone joins the line to see if it is someone we know.
I still don’t understand why this day so important. Why I need a paper to show I was born when I have been here for 8 years already?
When we reach the front desk, Ba tells the woman the date and place of my birth. Lots of other information about our family. It takes a long time before she finally hands him a fancy piece of thick white paper. He immediately folds it into his sac. Hands her a pocketful of coins.
“Let me see, Ba, let me see!” I grab onto my father’s sleeve as soon as we are outside.
“Wait, Kim. Wait.”
Ba says he is going to buy me a treat to celebrate. We stop at a fancy food stand beside the Mekong River. I choose fried bananas and coconut ice cream.
“Big treat for big girl,” he says.” Almost like your birthday.”
We sit on the lawn alongside the River, shaded by a small grove of cypress trees. The Cambodian flag snaps in a cool afternoon breeze. We watch fisherman as they work on their nets. Dirty-faced bare-chested little boys rush back and forth from the boats carrying buckets of fish to the market. A group of old men sit on wooden boxes with dominoes spread out before them on top of a rusted lobster crate.
A young man is sitting in the grass playing a guitar. I think maybe he is an American. He has yellow hair and little brown spots on his face and the music is like nothing I have ever heard before. He looks so strange here, so unexpected, like finding a pink pearl inside a cracked clam shell. I just stare in disbelief as I eat my ice cream. My father glances at me and, for just a second, looks out to see what I am staring at before turning his attention back to his own thoughts.
Finally, Ba reaches into his sac and hands me my birth certificate. The paper is heavy with a raised seal in the bottom corner marked with the date. I trace the letters of my name with my fingers. This is the first time I have seen my name printed anywhere. I feel so proud and special, maybe now everything will be different. I am important now.
When I look up again the American is gone. We ride home on the bicycle. I am so excited to show Mae my special paper. But when I run into the house she is lying quietly on her bed. Big sister lifts her fingers to her mouth to signal me no talking. I walk outside and join my other sisters. They don’t even look up when I sit down beside them. Nothing is different. Mosquito nets are always the most important thing.
***
I am daughter number three in family of five girls, one boy. We live alongside Highway 2 just outside Phnom Phen. The Highway is always so busy - bicycles, cars, motos, ox carts drawn by water buffalo. Even sometimes elephants walk by. A big park and a lake are just across the road, and in the distance the small village of Takau, across the Mekong River.
Ba’s brother and his family live next door. We are in and out of each other’s homes all day, like no walls. Our houses are the same; small, concrete, two stories, three walls front to back, a large middle room open to the sky.
We live behind grandmother’s old house which sits set back from the highway behind tall stalks of lemongrass, vines of purple passion flowers, banana plants, palm and banyan trees. An ancient kou tree is just outside her front door. Sign of good luck.
Our families cook outside –ocre, shellfish, plantain, hot peppers - while we chase the cats and chickens in the tiny alleys between the houses. The Buddhist Temple is just one house away. In the morning, the little kids study Khmer and Buddhism. Everybody visits Temple when they have a problem. Bring roast pig, fruit, pork rolls, flowers. Gifts for the monk when you have a problem.
My family doesn’t have many problems until Mae becomes ill. Every three years, she and my father have another child. But something goes wrong with the last baby. One day Mae is pregnant. Then one day baby is gone. Nobody says anything. Nobody even thinks to ask. But suddenly it seems like Mae is always frightened. Her heart beats fast under her shirt. Her throat pulses like frog. She cannot sleep. I lie next to her every night now, massaging her to help her sleep.
Many times my family comes to temple to ask monk what to do.
He shakes fortune sticks, lets them fall, says “pick one.”
Then he tells you what he sees. Sticks show different answers every time, but we always do what monk says. Otherwise, bad luck.
But after Mae become sick, our family never finds luck again. Whatever that spirit that come into her body, it just settle right in.
At night I dream about the purple ghost. Always the same dream. It tiptoes out from under my bed, huge thorned horns first, and sits right on top of my head, terrifying with its sharp bloody nails and long forked tongue.
“I have caught you,” it snears. “Now you will never get away.”
I know better than to tell anyone about my dream. They will all think I am haunted, too. Better to stay quiet at night when I wake up frozen with fear.
***
One of the big problems always in my family is that grandma does not like Mae. She is not good enough for Ba, even though she comes from a wealthy Kandal family. Maybe my mother does not know how to read and write, but she knows so many other things. She runs her own business, she works so hard so her children can stay in school. She is very successful, makes more money than Ba to support the family. She never complains.
“She so dumb,” Grandma always say.
I just don’t understand. Why Grandma travel so far to ask permission for Ba to marry Mae if she not want her as a daughter? Sometimes I think maybe grandma is jealous because Mae’s family is rich. They own a big fish company in the south. Every year when the fish come in, we visit. Grandma never comes and she always seems to be even meaner when we come home.
Everyone thinks an evil spirit is inside Mae, but it is Grandma who says Mae is evil, that she did something very bad to bring shame on our family. She talks to Ba at night. I hear them outside the window as I lie next to my mother, waiting for her to sleep.
“You should leave her, she bad woman,” I hear her say. “Let brother’s wife take care of kids.”
I feel such fear clutch at my heart but I know that my mother is even more afraid. I know she is only pretending to be asleep because those frogs just start croaking silently beneath the soft skin of her throat. They always give her away.
“The neighbor put a curse on her,” Grandma says. “She told me nothing will make her remove it. She hates our family.”
The frogs croak even louder.
But why we worry? Ba is such a good man. No way he is going to leave his wife. We listen as he tells his mother his decision. He is too busy to take care of Mae and he knows Grandma is too old. Big sister will leave school She will run the family. All of the children will help more with my mother’s business. Big brother must stay in school and when he comes home each day he will handle all the big decisions for the family. And my job? I will go with Mae to every healer we can find. Maybe I will have to leave school, too.
***
***
The sun is traveling up, up towards roof sky when the little bus stop at Dram-Ka.
“Staight ahead, three mile,” driver say. “You see vat. Big Buddha statue. Only one arm. Turn there. Follow nose. Incense. Very strong.”
Mae and I stop at very, very old coconut juice stand, Big holes in red canvas roof. Owner asleep on bicyle.
“Uncle, wake up. We need some drink.”
Old man so slow getting to his feet. His soiled krama is wet with sweat. Cracked lenses in glasses.
He hack off head of two baby green coconuts, slips straw inside each. I pay him rire. We walk. Now we get energy from cold white juice. Tastes so good.
Mae walk so slow. She not understand where we go.
“Why we here, Pom? Where we going? Want to go home.”
So many times I grab her arm, stop her from turning back.
“Mae, No. We go see doctor. He make you better.”
Mae’s eyes so scared. What she doing out here with little daughter? Her hands shaking so bad.
“It’s okay, Mae. I take care of you. Not too far.”
We walk in mid day heat. Dirt path between brave green rice fields. Water buffalo walk so slow. No people look up from their work. No faces, only big straw circle hats. Rice paddies stretch way back to where hazy blue sky touches field.
I wish so bad big sister here. I too little to do this. So frightened to be boss. Afraid to be with Mae. I try not to worry, link arms. Start to hum song to calm her down. So afraid I loose her. What if she just pull away and run? What I do then?
Now we in small forest. Much cooler. Noisy monkeys play high in deep green branches. Many birds talk. Walk faster, Mae. Walk faster. Maybe big tiger here. Not feel so safe. Mae so scared now, she pull away from me, try to run back.
Grab her arm, pull her with me. She crying now. Crying and screaming.
“Just walk, Mae. Just walk. You feel much better. You see.”
Very hard work, almost carrying Mae. Maybe she sick but she still strong. We fall couple times and everytime I rush to stand up before her. Pull her up. Big big bump in my throat, heart beaingt so fast, hard to breath. How I get her there?
Forest clears for a few small houses. Three, maybe four young monks sitting outside vat. Sun so hot their bright yellow robes blinding like sun.
Mae wants to sit down outside temple.
“We almost there, Mae. Just two minutes.”
We sit next to one-armed Buddha. Two children play Bay Khoum. So long since I play this game. Big board with eight small holes in front, two in back. First child drops beads one by one into eight holes until only six beads left. Then pick up all beads in hole next to empty hole. Pick all beads up. They confused about game. They not know how to play. Start yelling at each other.
I too tired to tell them. It not my place anyway. Tall monk come over to stop fighting. Lead them back into vat.
I urge Mae onto feet again. Overgrown path, sticky berry plants scratch white lines on legs and arms. Families of cats sleep under young cherry blossom trees, huge banana plants. Sandalwood smell very strong. Small hut. Old black dog stretched out in sun, Dirty white horse. No door. I push aside heavy strings of bandar beads. Look inside.
Altars, everywhere candles, little smoke pods from incense, fruit, flowers. Wrinkled old man wearning loincloth look up.
“Kru khmae? Bad spirit make my mother so sick. You help her?”
Pull fist of coins from pocket. Mae crying so hard she fall on ground. I put coins on huge altar.
Kru Khame stand, walk over to Mae, bend down. Lift her face in wrinkled brown hand. He so gentle. She stop crying like that.
“You wait outside,” he say. “No children here.”
Rain come so strong … white flower from plum tree fall on ground, some in my hair. World smell so pretty. Sit under big banyan tree, still get wet. Not know how many hours Mae inside. When she finally come out she look very calm. I take her hand and we walk across little white flowers layer ground like snowflakes. Rain stop, big clouds separate. Sky dark blue just before nightfall.
Mae sits in an old wooden chair inside a circle during a healing ceremony. People dance and sing around her. The healer plays a Cambodian drum. When the ghost comes into his body, he shakes all over and dances around like he is crazy. One day put something black in her mouth. She chews it, then they open her mouth and drop some liquid in.
Sometimes she is better for awhile.
***
I like being 16. When I comb my hair in the morning …., INow i 16 and Maenot better. Nurse soldier visit our house few days week give her medication.
He a lot older than me but soon he start coming to see me every night. So romantic. We whisper to each other in dark, he stand below my window. I don’t know if anyone hear us. We no care. One night we meet secretly outside house, hold hands and kiss and talk. He want to marry me. I know he married with a couple kids, but he tell me he not love his wife. I so young. I believe him. So exciting, being in love, having someone so handsome love me.
Nothing free in this life. One day his wife and kids comestay with him – he live only few houses away from us – and I think "I cannot do this anymore." I tell Mi he say he want to marry me.
"Why you want to marry married man?” she ask. I say not know,maybe love him.
Then soldier send someone to ask my mom if he can marry me and my mom say “No, you already married.” Even though okay in Cambodia for man to have old and young wife, Mae not want this for me. He warn them they not give me to him he going to come and kidnap me.
My parents so afraid. Make arrangements to send me to live in Phnom Phen with family Ba knows. I only 17 and Mae has to send me away.
Oh my poor mom, she never have fun. Mother in law hate her. She has lot of kids and and then she is sick. Now I leaving her.
Doctor Friend In Phnom Phen
His parents and mine have the same last name, and in Cambodia that makes you like family. When he was young he came to our house and stayed while he went to high school and college. I am four years younger than him. His family is middle class, richer than us.
Chapter 3
Takmou: 1967
• The majority of the Khmer live in rural villages either as rice farmers or fishermen and life revolves around the vat (temple) and the various Buddhist ceremonies throughout the year. However, if a Khmer becomes ill, they will frequently see a kru khmae (shaman/healer) whom they believe can diagnose which of the many spirits (neak ta) has caused the illness and recommend a course of action to propitiate the offended spirit, thereby curing the illness.
Rubbing is usually in the same areas as pinching and involves firmly rubbing of lubricated skin with a spoon or a coin in order to bring toxic "air" to the body surface. In the hot-cold theory, illness is caused by an alteration in
Unmistakable emotional disturbance is usually attributed to possession by malicious spirits; to bad karma accumulated by misdeeds in past lives; or to the bad luck of familial inheritance. Partially due to its attribution to immoral causes, mental illness is commonly denied and feared. The disturbed individuals are protected by their family and if outsiders become aware of the mental illness, great shame is brought to the family.
Downtown Takmou is always crowded, so much to see. The outside market full of merchants selling colorful silks and threads, shiny jewelry, books and clothing. So many things to eat here. Fruit stands overflow with pineapple and papaya. Plump ducks and chicken hang from long string from top canopy many stands. Smell of cooking meats and fish. Rows of tuks tuks and motobikes, bicycles.
Cars and buses with windows wide open cross bridge over Mekong, some pass by Takmou on way to Vietnam.
There are many people in line by the time we arrive, some friends from the Buddhist school. But everyone is quiet inside, the children stand still beside their parents; we all turn to look each time someone joins the line to see if it is someone we know.
I still don’t understand why this day so important. Why I need a paper to show I was born when I have been here for 8 years already?
When we reach the front desk, Ba tells the woman the date and place of my birth. Lots of other information about our family. It takes a long time before she finally hands him a fancy piece of thick white paper. He immediately folds it into his sac. Hands her a pocketful of coins.
“Let me see, Ba, let me see!” I grab onto my father’s sleeve as soon as we are outside.
“Wait, Kim. Wait.”
Ba says he is going to buy me a treat to celebrate. We stop at a fancy food stand beside the Mekong River. I choose fried bananas and coconut ice cream.
“Big treat for big girl,” he says.” Almost like your birthday.”
We sit on the lawn alongside the River, shaded by a small grove of cypress trees. The Cambodian flag snaps in a cool afternoon breeze. We watch fisherman as they work on their nets. Dirty-faced bare-chested little boys rush back and forth from the boats carrying buckets of fish to the market. A group of old men sit on wooden boxes with dominoes spread out before them on top of a rusted lobster crate.
A young man is sitting in the grass playing a guitar. I think maybe he is an American. He has yellow hair and little brown spots on his face and the music is like nothing I have ever heard before. He looks so strange here, so unexpected, like finding a pink pearl inside a cracked clam shell. I just stare in disbelief as I eat my ice cream. My father glances at me and, for just a second, looks out to see what I am staring at before turning his attention back to his own thoughts.
Finally, Ba reaches into his sac and hands me my birth certificate. The paper is heavy with a raised seal in the bottom corner marked with the date. I trace the letters of my name with my fingers. This is the first time I have seen my name printed anywhere. I feel so proud and special, maybe now everything will be different. I am important now.
When I look up again the American is gone. We ride home on the bicycle. I am so excited to show Mae my special paper. But when I run into the house she is lying quietly on her bed. Big sister lifts her fingers to her mouth to signal me no talking. I walk outside and join my other sisters. They don’t even look up when I sit down beside them. Nothing is different. Mosquito nets are always the most important thing.
***
I am daughter number three in family of five girls, one boy. We live alongside Highway 2 just outside Phnom Phen. The Highway is always so busy - bicycles, cars, motos, ox carts drawn by water buffalo. Even sometimes elephants walk by. A big park and a lake are just across the road, and in the distance the small village of Takau, across the Mekong River.
Ba’s brother and his family live next door. We are in and out of each other’s homes all day, like no walls. Our houses are the same; small, concrete, two stories, three walls front to back, a large middle room open to the sky.
We live behind grandmother’s old house which sits set back from the highway behind tall stalks of lemongrass, vines of purple passion flowers, banana plants, palm and banyan trees. An ancient kou tree is just outside her front door. Sign of good luck.
Our families cook outside –ocre, shellfish, plantain, hot peppers - while we chase the cats and chickens in the tiny alleys between the houses. The Buddhist Temple is just one house away. In the morning, the little kids study Khmer and Buddhism. Everybody visits Temple when they have a problem. Bring roast pig, fruit, pork rolls, flowers. Gifts for the monk when you have a problem.
My family doesn’t have many problems until Mae becomes ill. Every three years, she and my father have another child. But something goes wrong with the last baby. One day Mae is pregnant. Then one day baby is gone. Nobody says anything. Nobody even thinks to ask. But suddenly it seems like Mae is always frightened. Her heart beats fast under her shirt. Her throat pulses like frog. She cannot sleep. I lie next to her every night now, massaging her to help her sleep.
Many times my family comes to temple to ask monk what to do.
He shakes fortune sticks, lets them fall, says “pick one.”
Then he tells you what he sees. Sticks show different answers every time, but we always do what monk says. Otherwise, bad luck.
But after Mae become sick, our family never finds luck again. Whatever that spirit that come into her body, it just settle right in.
At night I dream about the purple ghost. Always the same dream. It tiptoes out from under my bed, huge thorned horns first, and sits right on top of my head, terrifying with its sharp bloody nails and long forked tongue.
“I have caught you,” it snears. “Now you will never get away.”
I know better than to tell anyone about my dream. They will all think I am haunted, too. Better to stay quiet at night when I wake up frozen with fear.
***
One of the big problems always in my family is that grandma does not like Mae. She is not good enough for Ba, even though she comes from a wealthy Kandal family. Maybe my mother does not know how to read and write, but she knows so many other things. She runs her own business, she works so hard so her children can stay in school. She is very successful, makes more money than Ba to support the family. She never complains.
“She so dumb,” Grandma always say.
I just don’t understand. Why Grandma travel so far to ask permission for Ba to marry Mae if she not want her as a daughter? Sometimes I think maybe grandma is jealous because Mae’s family is rich. They own a big fish company in the south. Every year when the fish come in, we visit. Grandma never comes and she always seems to be even meaner when we come home.
Everyone thinks an evil spirit is inside Mae, but it is Grandma who says Mae is evil, that she did something very bad to bring shame on our family. She talks to Ba at night. I hear them outside the window as I lie next to my mother, waiting for her to sleep.
“You should leave her, she bad woman,” I hear her say. “Let brother’s wife take care of kids.”
I feel such fear clutch at my heart but I know that my mother is even more afraid. I know she is only pretending to be asleep because those frogs just start croaking silently beneath the soft skin of her throat. They always give her away.
“The neighbor put a curse on her,” Grandma says. “She told me nothing will make her remove it. She hates our family.”
The frogs croak even louder.
But why we worry? Ba is such a good man. No way he is going to leave his wife. We listen as he tells his mother his decision. He is too busy to take care of Mae and he knows Grandma is too old. Big sister will leave school She will run the family. All of the children will help more with my mother’s business. Big brother must stay in school and when he comes home each day he will handle all the big decisions for the family. And my job? I will go with Mae to every healer we can find. Maybe I will have to leave school, too.
***
***
The sun is traveling up, up towards roof sky when the little bus stop at Dram-Ka.
“Staight ahead, three mile,” driver say. “You see vat. Big Buddha statue. Only one arm. Turn there. Follow nose. Incense. Very strong.”
Mae and I stop at very, very old coconut juice stand, Big holes in red canvas roof. Owner asleep on bicyle.
“Uncle, wake up. We need some drink.”
Old man so slow getting to his feet. His soiled krama is wet with sweat. Cracked lenses in glasses.
He hack off head of two baby green coconuts, slips straw inside each. I pay him rire. We walk. Now we get energy from cold white juice. Tastes so good.
Mae walk so slow. She not understand where we go.
“Why we here, Pom? Where we going? Want to go home.”
So many times I grab her arm, stop her from turning back.
“Mae, No. We go see doctor. He make you better.”
Mae’s eyes so scared. What she doing out here with little daughter? Her hands shaking so bad.
“It’s okay, Mae. I take care of you. Not too far.”
We walk in mid day heat. Dirt path between brave green rice fields. Water buffalo walk so slow. No people look up from their work. No faces, only big straw circle hats. Rice paddies stretch way back to where hazy blue sky touches field.
I wish so bad big sister here. I too little to do this. So frightened to be boss. Afraid to be with Mae. I try not to worry, link arms. Start to hum song to calm her down. So afraid I loose her. What if she just pull away and run? What I do then?
Now we in small forest. Much cooler. Noisy monkeys play high in deep green branches. Many birds talk. Walk faster, Mae. Walk faster. Maybe big tiger here. Not feel so safe. Mae so scared now, she pull away from me, try to run back.
Grab her arm, pull her with me. She crying now. Crying and screaming.
“Just walk, Mae. Just walk. You feel much better. You see.”
Very hard work, almost carrying Mae. Maybe she sick but she still strong. We fall couple times and everytime I rush to stand up before her. Pull her up. Big big bump in my throat, heart beaingt so fast, hard to breath. How I get her there?
Forest clears for a few small houses. Three, maybe four young monks sitting outside vat. Sun so hot their bright yellow robes blinding like sun.
Mae wants to sit down outside temple.
“We almost there, Mae. Just two minutes.”
We sit next to one-armed Buddha. Two children play Bay Khoum. So long since I play this game. Big board with eight small holes in front, two in back. First child drops beads one by one into eight holes until only six beads left. Then pick up all beads in hole next to empty hole. Pick all beads up. They confused about game. They not know how to play. Start yelling at each other.
I too tired to tell them. It not my place anyway. Tall monk come over to stop fighting. Lead them back into vat.
I urge Mae onto feet again. Overgrown path, sticky berry plants scratch white lines on legs and arms. Families of cats sleep under young cherry blossom trees, huge banana plants. Sandalwood smell very strong. Small hut. Old black dog stretched out in sun, Dirty white horse. No door. I push aside heavy strings of bandar beads. Look inside.
Altars, everywhere candles, little smoke pods from incense, fruit, flowers. Wrinkled old man wearning loincloth look up.
“Kru khmae? Bad spirit make my mother so sick. You help her?”
Pull fist of coins from pocket. Mae crying so hard she fall on ground. I put coins on huge altar.
Kru Khame stand, walk over to Mae, bend down. Lift her face in wrinkled brown hand. He so gentle. She stop crying like that.
“You wait outside,” he say. “No children here.”
Rain come so strong … white flower from plum tree fall on ground, some in my hair. World smell so pretty. Sit under big banyan tree, still get wet. Not know how many hours Mae inside. When she finally come out she look very calm. I take her hand and we walk across little white flowers layer ground like snowflakes. Rain stop, big clouds separate. Sky dark blue just before nightfall.
Mae sits in an old wooden chair inside a circle during a healing ceremony. People dance and sing around her. The healer plays a Cambodian drum. When the ghost comes into his body, he shakes all over and dances around like he is crazy. One day put something black in her mouth. She chews it, then they open her mouth and drop some liquid in.
Sometimes she is better for awhile.
***
I like being 16. When I comb my hair in the morning …., INow i 16 and Maenot better. Nurse soldier visit our house few days week give her medication.
He a lot older than me but soon he start coming to see me every night. So romantic. We whisper to each other in dark, he stand below my window. I don’t know if anyone hear us. We no care. One night we meet secretly outside house, hold hands and kiss and talk. He want to marry me. I know he married with a couple kids, but he tell me he not love his wife. I so young. I believe him. So exciting, being in love, having someone so handsome love me.
Nothing free in this life. One day his wife and kids comestay with him – he live only few houses away from us – and I think "I cannot do this anymore." I tell Mi he say he want to marry me.
"Why you want to marry married man?” she ask. I say not know,maybe love him.
Then soldier send someone to ask my mom if he can marry me and my mom say “No, you already married.” Even though okay in Cambodia for man to have old and young wife, Mae not want this for me. He warn them they not give me to him he going to come and kidnap me.
My parents so afraid. Make arrangements to send me to live in Phnom Phen with family Ba knows. I only 17 and Mae has to send me away.
Oh my poor mom, she never have fun. Mother in law hate her. She has lot of kids and and then she is sick. Now I leaving her.
Doctor Friend In Phnom Phen
His parents and mine have the same last name, and in Cambodia that makes you like family. When he was young he came to our house and stayed while he went to high school and college. I am four years younger than him. His family is middle class, richer than us.
Chapter 3
Takmou: 1967
• The majority of the Khmer live in rural villages either as rice farmers or fishermen and life revolves around the vat (temple) and the various Buddhist ceremonies throughout the year. However, if a Khmer becomes ill, they will frequently see a kru khmae (shaman/healer) whom they believe can diagnose which of the many spirits (neak ta) has caused the illness and recommend a course of action to propitiate the offended spirit, thereby curing the illness.
Rubbing is usually in the same areas as pinching and involves firmly rubbing of lubricated skin with a spoon or a coin in order to bring toxic "air" to the body surface. In the hot-cold theory, illness is caused by an alteration in
Unmistakable emotional disturbance is usually attributed to possession by malicious spirits; to bad karma accumulated by misdeeds in past lives; or to the bad luck of familial inheritance. Partially due to its attribution to immoral causes, mental illness is commonly denied and feared. The disturbed individuals are protected by their family and if outsiders become aware of the mental illness, great shame is brought to the family.
Phnom Phen: 1960s
Phnom Penh: 1960s, early 1970s
My father has a friend who is a general in the army. He makes arrangements for me to live with his family in Phnom Phen. They are my new aunt and uncle.They have six or seven kids and they are wealthy, they have a sofa and so many cars. I have never seen such a beautiful home, so much luxury.
I am treated like a member of the family. I sleep with the daughter and the baby this is the aunt?>. They give me nice clothes and I eat wonderful meals with them; spicy noodle soups and all kinds of fish, Such wonderful food. I go everywhere with them, to buy food and shop. When I go home to visit my family, I travel in a chauffered car. I never spend the night, we are all too afraid of the soldier.
Nights in Phnom Phen are magic. The family has three sons in high school and every night the older son drives us around the city. The city parks are so full of life, young people like us eating ice cream and hanging out together in the park beside the Mekong.
“Meet my cousin,” they say when friends ask about me. This is just how things are in Cambodia. You can go to live with family or
I live friends. Everyone is so close.
I am a new person in a different world. I have escaped poverty and illness and the small joyless home where there is only struggle and hard work. Illness and meager meals. This is the life that was waiting for me. My spirit chose well, afterall.
My father has a friend who is a general in the army. He makes arrangements for me to live with his family in Phnom Phen. They are my new aunt and uncle.They have six or seven kids and they are wealthy, they have a sofa and so many cars. I have never seen such a beautiful home, so much luxury.
I am treated like a member of the family. I sleep with the daughter and the baby this is the aunt?>. They give me nice clothes and I eat wonderful meals with them; spicy noodle soups and all kinds of fish, Such wonderful food. I go everywhere with them, to buy food and shop. When I go home to visit my family, I travel in a chauffered car. I never spend the night, we are all too afraid of the soldier.
Nights in Phnom Phen are magic. The family has three sons in high school and every night the older son drives us around the city. The city parks are so full of life, young people like us eating ice cream and hanging out together in the park beside the Mekong.
“Meet my cousin,” they say when friends ask about me. This is just how things are in Cambodia. You can go to live with family or
I live friends. Everyone is so close.
I am a new person in a different world. I have escaped poverty and illness and the small joyless home where there is only struggle and hard work. Illness and meager meals. This is the life that was waiting for me. My spirit chose well, afterall.
PhnomPhen: Restaurant
The country is at war and the restaurant is always full of soldiers. They all flirt with me. All of the soldiers want me to serve them.
I make my own clothes, long cambodian skirts and sexy shirts. Long hair, high heels, a lot of makeup. I am so famous, so pretty.
And now I am rich. I make so much money on tips. So many of the soldiers are married but they are in PP alone and they come to the restaurant at night to flirt. Some of them come three times a day. My brother’s wife is a waitress and she is so pretty too. They flirt with her.
The soldiers drink a lot, white and red wine with a lion lable. They have guns and sometimes the begin fighting each other at the tables. There are too many men but I want jewelry, clothing and they are sometimes so generous.
My best childhood friend Thea is in Phnom Phen in medical school
His parents and mine have the same last name, and in Cambodia that makes you like family. When he was young he came to our house and stayed while he went to high school and college. I am four years younger than him. His family is middle class, richer than us.
In Phnom Phen, Thea spoils me so bad. He takes me out all the time. One time I go to the bathroom in the restaurant and I have a worm from eating too much raw meat. I don’t know what is wrong and I come out of the bathroom and say “Gee, I have something” and he says “Oh, you have a worm” and he brings me medicine and stays with me for 24 hours, follows me around to make sure I am okay. He kisses my forehead, touches my hand.
On one of my visits home, mom tells me that Thea’s parents want him to marry a girl who is in medical school with him. Her parents are very wealthy and they are going to buy their son a house and a car when they marry. I remember that Thea’s father once told me “I don’t care who my son marries so long as he is happy.” But I get a funny feeling.
Thea keeps coming to see me at the restaurant. One night we go out to dinner. He has a blue Vespa and I sit behind him as we drive through the city.
“Do you see that house,” he asks. “That is where the girl my parents want me to marry lives. I don’t want to marry her. When you and I get married, we won’t have a big wedding.”
But he never asks and now I am 21 and mom is worried I will get pregnant. She is afraid I am going to do something stupid. I am always telling her “Don’t worry, mom. I am going to get married. You will see.”
A lot of soldiers want to marry me and three of them begin fighting over me. “Go ask my mom,” I tell them. “I will marry the man who goes to see my mother.”
Why did I do that? A couple of months later, one of the soldiers, he is an important man, but much older than me, not at all handsome, takes me up on it. He visits my mother. He has been married before and has a son. He is not in the active army. He works in the city.
We marry in my mother’s house. We close the restaurant and have a big party with a security guard outside because we are still very much in danger from the old married soldier who threatened to kidnap me.
I am married to the man who won me in a contest. We move into a small house near my second sister. It is 1973. I sit in this house day after day, waiting for him to come home. Sometimes he doesn’t come for days and days. I get pregnant without planning to I had only had sex a couple of times.
I spend a lot of time with my sister next door and her kids.
The kidnapping begins. During the night, the Khmer Rouge come. Neighbors just disappear. They are gone in the morning. No one knows. No one says anything.
I make my own clothes, long cambodian skirts and sexy shirts. Long hair, high heels, a lot of makeup. I am so famous, so pretty.
And now I am rich. I make so much money on tips. So many of the soldiers are married but they are in PP alone and they come to the restaurant at night to flirt. Some of them come three times a day. My brother’s wife is a waitress and she is so pretty too. They flirt with her.
The soldiers drink a lot, white and red wine with a lion lable. They have guns and sometimes the begin fighting each other at the tables. There are too many men but I want jewelry, clothing and they are sometimes so generous.
My best childhood friend Thea is in Phnom Phen in medical school
His parents and mine have the same last name, and in Cambodia that makes you like family. When he was young he came to our house and stayed while he went to high school and college. I am four years younger than him. His family is middle class, richer than us.
In Phnom Phen, Thea spoils me so bad. He takes me out all the time. One time I go to the bathroom in the restaurant and I have a worm from eating too much raw meat. I don’t know what is wrong and I come out of the bathroom and say “Gee, I have something” and he says “Oh, you have a worm” and he brings me medicine and stays with me for 24 hours, follows me around to make sure I am okay. He kisses my forehead, touches my hand.
On one of my visits home, mom tells me that Thea’s parents want him to marry a girl who is in medical school with him. Her parents are very wealthy and they are going to buy their son a house and a car when they marry. I remember that Thea’s father once told me “I don’t care who my son marries so long as he is happy.” But I get a funny feeling.
Thea keeps coming to see me at the restaurant. One night we go out to dinner. He has a blue Vespa and I sit behind him as we drive through the city.
“Do you see that house,” he asks. “That is where the girl my parents want me to marry lives. I don’t want to marry her. When you and I get married, we won’t have a big wedding.”
But he never asks and now I am 21 and mom is worried I will get pregnant. She is afraid I am going to do something stupid. I am always telling her “Don’t worry, mom. I am going to get married. You will see.”
A lot of soldiers want to marry me and three of them begin fighting over me. “Go ask my mom,” I tell them. “I will marry the man who goes to see my mother.”
Why did I do that? A couple of months later, one of the soldiers, he is an important man, but much older than me, not at all handsome, takes me up on it. He visits my mother. He has been married before and has a son. He is not in the active army. He works in the city.
We marry in my mother’s house. We close the restaurant and have a big party with a security guard outside because we are still very much in danger from the old married soldier who threatened to kidnap me.
I am married to the man who won me in a contest. We move into a small house near my second sister. It is 1973. I sit in this house day after day, waiting for him to come home. Sometimes he doesn’t come for days and days. I get pregnant without planning to I had only had sex a couple of times.
I spend a lot of time with my sister next door and her kids.
The kidnapping begins. During the night, the Khmer Rouge come. Neighbors just disappear. They are gone in the morning. No one knows. No one says anything.
Phnom Phen: 1973
Kou: Phnom Phen: 1973
Phnom Phen. 1973
The room is dark, like a big black sac. My breath, clutched high in my chest, is the only sound. It comes faster and faster in gasps. My hands fly to my throat.
“Oh, Mae, now it’s time for you to help me. I just can’t stay here anymore.”
Husband and I live in a small house. He never comes home. One week he’s here, the next week he doesn’t come. A lot of overtime these days, he says. And we don’t have a telephone. How is he supposed to tell me these things?
I no longer work in the restaurant with big sister. No more tips, fancy clothes, handsome flirting soldiers. Now I am seven months pregnant. Don’t know how this happened.
I feel like a little fly. Stop fighting! Trapped too deep in spider web. Now it is too late. Only 22. My life is over.
I have sucked all the oxygen from the room. I lie down on the floor and close my eyes. I pray to my spirit, “Just go away. Find another body.”
Suddenly, there are steps on the stair. Thae calls my name. Quick like that he is leaning over me. Holds my head in his hands. Maybe now everything is okay. Thae always takes care of me.
“Kim. Wake up, You okay? Wake up!”
I cry like a baby in Thae’s arms. No shame.
My sister comes with her children. They talk about me as if I am not there. Thae is worried that I am all alone. Sister has no time to take care of me.
“Kim can come stay with my family,” he says. “We will watch over her until baby comes.”
Sister helps me pack things in a small bag. I move in with Thae and his parents; I live upstairs and he lives downstairs. He is still in medical school. His parents and sister take care of me. Things are so much better now. I am not so alone.
I am by myself when the first birth pains begin. It is just before midnight. Don’t want to wake anyone. I remember Mae saying “When you are going to have your baby, clean yourself.” I take a shower.
The pain gets too bad. I go downstairs, wake ThaE. He takes me to the hospital and waits beside me until I go into the labor room.
My daughter is born early in the morning
.
“You have a daughter,” the nurse tells Thae.
“No,” he says. “Not my daughter. She is just a friend.”
Thae stays until the afternoon. My husband does not come. Mae brings dinner and Tae’s mom and sister come to check on me. Two days pass before my husband comes.
“Where were you?” I am so angry now, so ashamed. “I have your baby for two days. Why didn’t you come?”
Such disrespect for one's husband is not allowed. He moves his hand to his pocket. I know he has gun. He pretends he is going to draw it out and shoot me. His eyes glare at me with threat. But he turns and leaves.
I stay in the hospital for seven days. Only then does my husband return to take me to Takmou. We are moving in with Mae. Three of my sisters still live with her. The house is crowded but my husband is hardly ever there, he just comes and goes when he wants. Mae does not like him.
Finally, one day I am just too angry. Don’t want to be a thing he won in a contest anymore. Now I am mother. Deserve respect. He makes everything worse for everyone here.
“Why don’t you just not come anymore?” I say. “I don’t need you. When I needed you, you weren’t there.”
Now Ba is the only man in our home. Much better this way. Shrey-mom is everybody’s baby. A new joy for my family.
***
Takmou. 1974.
The old Chinese temple near our house is now a military base. The Army is drafting everyone. Soldiers are all over town. Older Brother doesn’t want to fight. He is the first to escape to Thailand. Soon after, older sister sells the restaurant in Phnom Phen and moves her family to Thailand.
My sisters and I decide to start a business. We set up a small stand alongside Highway 2. Sell cigarettes, herbs, wine to soldiers.
Shrey-mom is almost a year old when Kuan first comes to our stand. He hangs around longer than his friends. Plays with Shrey-mom and Akmow. He has such big, happy eyes. Soon he is stopping by every day.
Kuan has been in the army for two years. He flies planes. Came to Takmou six months ago. He lives in the old temple. Many of the soldiers don’t want to fight anymore, he tells me.
He talks about the US planes killing many, many Cambodians. They fight with Communists on Cambodian land. This is not our war. Lon Nil is not our leader. The US put him in there. He is just a puppet.
Kuan knows all this. Maybe the Khmer soldiers are right, he thinks. Maybe they are really freedom fighters. Afterall, Shianook is with them.
Now I don't know what to think. This is big news to me.
"What about the disappeared?" I ask.
Kuan does not know. Maybe they just leave to join Khmer, he says, maybe they don't really disappear. Maybe they are just afraid to tell anyone what they know.
“Soon it will not be safe to wear this uniform. Not safe for you to talk to me.”
It’s too late for that. Already I am in love with Kuan. He is everything I ever hoped for. Strong. Gentle. So much fun. So good to Shrey-mom and me. He treats her like his own child.
There is no fancy ceremony when I marry Kuan. Not at all like my first marriage. Just a small party. But so different from then because I am so happy.
My family loves Kuan, too. Ba says he is like another son, almost as good as having own son home again.
Now Kuan and I sleep tight together. Now we are the little fish safe in a tin. Close cover at night. Nobody bothers us.
Almost nine months in heaven. So romantic. Crazy in love. We are like the pages of an open book, tossing back and forth in a frenzy of wind, never touching down. So free, flying out here. Then the book finally slams shut. We can’t find our place. The world around us has changed so drastically. There is no return.
Maybe Kuan tries to warn me but I am still not listening. Like when I was a little girl and I thought, “Just close eyes, no one see you. You safe.”
Phnom Phen. 1973
The room is dark, like a big black sac. My breath, clutched high in my chest, is the only sound. It comes faster and faster in gasps. My hands fly to my throat.
“Oh, Mae, now it’s time for you to help me. I just can’t stay here anymore.”
Husband and I live in a small house. He never comes home. One week he’s here, the next week he doesn’t come. A lot of overtime these days, he says. And we don’t have a telephone. How is he supposed to tell me these things?
I no longer work in the restaurant with big sister. No more tips, fancy clothes, handsome flirting soldiers. Now I am seven months pregnant. Don’t know how this happened.
I feel like a little fly. Stop fighting! Trapped too deep in spider web. Now it is too late. Only 22. My life is over.
I have sucked all the oxygen from the room. I lie down on the floor and close my eyes. I pray to my spirit, “Just go away. Find another body.”
Suddenly, there are steps on the stair. Thae calls my name. Quick like that he is leaning over me. Holds my head in his hands. Maybe now everything is okay. Thae always takes care of me.
“Kim. Wake up, You okay? Wake up!”
I cry like a baby in Thae’s arms. No shame.
My sister comes with her children. They talk about me as if I am not there. Thae is worried that I am all alone. Sister has no time to take care of me.
“Kim can come stay with my family,” he says. “We will watch over her until baby comes.”
Sister helps me pack things in a small bag. I move in with Thae and his parents; I live upstairs and he lives downstairs. He is still in medical school. His parents and sister take care of me. Things are so much better now. I am not so alone.
I am by myself when the first birth pains begin. It is just before midnight. Don’t want to wake anyone. I remember Mae saying “When you are going to have your baby, clean yourself.” I take a shower.
The pain gets too bad. I go downstairs, wake ThaE. He takes me to the hospital and waits beside me until I go into the labor room.
My daughter is born early in the morning
.
“You have a daughter,” the nurse tells Thae.
“No,” he says. “Not my daughter. She is just a friend.”
Thae stays until the afternoon. My husband does not come. Mae brings dinner and Tae’s mom and sister come to check on me. Two days pass before my husband comes.
“Where were you?” I am so angry now, so ashamed. “I have your baby for two days. Why didn’t you come?”
Such disrespect for one's husband is not allowed. He moves his hand to his pocket. I know he has gun. He pretends he is going to draw it out and shoot me. His eyes glare at me with threat. But he turns and leaves.
I stay in the hospital for seven days. Only then does my husband return to take me to Takmou. We are moving in with Mae. Three of my sisters still live with her. The house is crowded but my husband is hardly ever there, he just comes and goes when he wants. Mae does not like him.
Finally, one day I am just too angry. Don’t want to be a thing he won in a contest anymore. Now I am mother. Deserve respect. He makes everything worse for everyone here.
“Why don’t you just not come anymore?” I say. “I don’t need you. When I needed you, you weren’t there.”
Now Ba is the only man in our home. Much better this way. Shrey-mom is everybody’s baby. A new joy for my family.
***
Takmou. 1974.
The old Chinese temple near our house is now a military base. The Army is drafting everyone. Soldiers are all over town. Older Brother doesn’t want to fight. He is the first to escape to Thailand. Soon after, older sister sells the restaurant in Phnom Phen and moves her family to Thailand.
My sisters and I decide to start a business. We set up a small stand alongside Highway 2. Sell cigarettes, herbs, wine to soldiers.
Shrey-mom is almost a year old when Kuan first comes to our stand. He hangs around longer than his friends. Plays with Shrey-mom and Akmow. He has such big, happy eyes. Soon he is stopping by every day.
Kuan has been in the army for two years. He flies planes. Came to Takmou six months ago. He lives in the old temple. Many of the soldiers don’t want to fight anymore, he tells me.
He talks about the US planes killing many, many Cambodians. They fight with Communists on Cambodian land. This is not our war. Lon Nil is not our leader. The US put him in there. He is just a puppet.
Kuan knows all this. Maybe the Khmer soldiers are right, he thinks. Maybe they are really freedom fighters. Afterall, Shianook is with them.
Now I don't know what to think. This is big news to me.
"What about the disappeared?" I ask.
Kuan does not know. Maybe they just leave to join Khmer, he says, maybe they don't really disappear. Maybe they are just afraid to tell anyone what they know.
“Soon it will not be safe to wear this uniform. Not safe for you to talk to me.”
It’s too late for that. Already I am in love with Kuan. He is everything I ever hoped for. Strong. Gentle. So much fun. So good to Shrey-mom and me. He treats her like his own child.
There is no fancy ceremony when I marry Kuan. Not at all like my first marriage. Just a small party. But so different from then because I am so happy.
My family loves Kuan, too. Ba says he is like another son, almost as good as having own son home again.
Now Kuan and I sleep tight together. Now we are the little fish safe in a tin. Close cover at night. Nobody bothers us.
Almost nine months in heaven. So romantic. Crazy in love. We are like the pages of an open book, tossing back and forth in a frenzy of wind, never touching down. So free, flying out here. Then the book finally slams shut. We can’t find our place. The world around us has changed so drastically. There is no return.
Maybe Kuan tries to warn me but I am still not listening. Like when I was a little girl and I thought, “Just close eyes, no one see you. You safe.”
Kandal: 1975
Kou: Kandal, 1975
Thousands and thousands of people everywhere around big temple. Lots of food. Maybe soldiers take good care of us after all. Family find place to rest in crowd. See many people we know.
Everybody think Khmer Rouge ‘freedom fighters’ now. Couple days radio says Lon Nal defeated in Phnom Phen. Everybody cheer. Good news. Now we go home!
Almost right away, big trucks drive around. Young soldiers talk through megaphones. “Not safe yet,” they tell us. “Nobody go home yet. Plenty food here. We wait.”
Young Khmer soldier know from childhood. He nothing to me.
One day he come hit me on side head say “You be good.”
“Ohhhh, now you big KR,” I pretend fear. He know he nobody. He not hurt me.
Everybody still hope but wake up one morning see KR trucks taking people away. Every city family go to host family in country. A Khmer family.
We so lucky Mae’s family so near. Only one week and Mae’s brother come to pick us up. Not everybody fit in small boat. My uncle’s son take Akmow. That night just across lake hear dog howling. Oh, Akmow. You okay. We come get you.
Next day soldier-friend come ask if he can take Akmou. Donate him to KR.
“You crazy? Never give Akmou away. He my daughter’s dog. He with us since puppy. Go away.”
Uncle warn me be careful with KR but I no care. He not frighten me.
One of children get measles. Oh that boy so very sick. He need blood from magic black dog. Ba mix herbs to cure, cut Akmou’s ear, just little cut to get magic black dog blood.
Akmou never same after this. He just sleep a lot. He such a good dog, just a wild dog. He never like girls. Sometimes I see females for him, he not interested.
Akmou die at uncles.
We go to live with Mae’s brother. Host family live short walk away, Mae, Shrey-mom and I live under house in chicken coop. Ba not sleep with us.
Things fine, start to see many people I know before. But there such sense of dread. Worst yet to come.
Uncle’s wife tell me one day, “You be careful what you talk about. Don’t say anything about your past. Don’t complain.”
Be dam kou.
I work in field playing scarecrow scare birds away. Cousin come by on bicycle.
“Quick, he say, “take you to see sister-in-law
Everyone follow him. Family so rich, Know so many people. Cook big meal for us. Give us back suitcase of Ba’s things. Tell us Pol Pot turn calendar back to Year O. Cambodia new country, separate from world, cut out everything old for blank slate. No yesterday. Never go home. Forget it. Even money not buy way home.
***
Happy day. Shrey-Mom playing in lake. Many people there, laughing having fun. First time joy.
Come home, little aunt call me.
“What wrong with you? Why you not listen to me?”
She grab scissors and cut off all my hair. I crying. “This not party. You can’t go around looking pretty. Your life going to change.”
How can life change more? What does she know she not telling me?
Every night around sunset I put Shrey-mom to bed, watch the sunset and cry. Feel so sick everyday. Know I having baby. Can’t imagine bring new baby into this world. Decide must kill baby.
Start to climb tall trees, jump off land on stomach, dive into lake so stomach hit bottom. No luck, baby continue to grow in me.
Then two of my sisters arrive; one pregnant, other with new baby maybe one month old. This make it harder. I embarassed that none of us has husband for our children.
So many of my friends from past; I wonder what has become of them.
Every morning someone else missing. Hear dogs barking at night, next day someone, maybe whole family, disappear. I know they say too much. Not follow rules. Here not possible to know who your enemy. Everyone out for themselves.
One family she without husband, just like me, one daugher. She so beautiful, husband so rich. Her mom take care of her.
She come get me every night, she talk.
“You be careful about this,” I say. “Don’t ever talk about your past. Remember, the walls have ears. Don’t ever say anything.”
She not listen. Then one day she gone. Look everywhere. Mae's friends, walk to uncle’s house. No one see her. In afternoon her mom come outside with little girl. I rush up to her; She crying, not want anyone to see.
“Where Donc?”
“Anghar come last night,” she say. “Take her away to school. Maybe she back soon.”
Oh, beautiful friend, why you not listen? Now you gone forever. No one come home from school. Everybody know that.
“Maybe they think she CIA,” sister say.
“What CIA?”
“Worst thing to be CIA. Bad people. US. That why they kill you.”
My stomach get bigger and bigger but never feel baby move. I so worried, never tell Mae I pregnant.
Then maybe 7 months pass when pains begin. Call out to Mae to tell her. She sends Ba for boiling water.
There under house where animals live baby boy born, look very healthy. Start fire under bed to keep child warm. Just like with Shrey-Mom, just like with me, Just like with Mae. Old Cambodian tradition make me feel so safe. Hold my baby, fire underneath us. No worry tonight.
***
Sky color of peacock eggs remind me of home. Oh such a mess now, no time to clean before leaving. Papers, dishes, pans, pictures, clothing, everything on floor, spilling out of cabinets. Squish nose. Musty. Dense blanket dust.
Open windows. Lotus blossom smell enters with river breeze. Maybe not so bad. Maybe half day everything clean, back in order. Like nothing happen.
Every day dream about home. Not tell anyone. Not safe to talk about past. Angkar make you disappear they hear you. Cambodia gone. Now Democratic Kampuchea. We build new country. Take five year.
I not believe them. They scare me before. Now I know they not so bad. Just no talk. No complain. Get food to eat. Stay with family. Some things okay here. Mae with her family. She happy. Not mind sleeping under house with chickens. She very strong, brave. Not blame Ba like me. Shrey-Mom play with cousins just like before. Love baby brother.
Still, I worry, what about Kuan? How he ever find me now? He not know where to look, never visit Mi family. Uniform still at house. He know something bad happen. He not know we still alive. Not even know he daddy.
Shrey-mom waking up dust with long skinny reed, drawing little pictures in dry ground as we walk towards Grandma’s house. Gentle baby songs soothe her brother to sleep; his body sags against my chest with deep sigh of release. As we round corner, see house. Two big dirty white KR trucks parked outside, small group child-sized soldiers talking to my parents. Long before see Mae's face smell her fear. Silent but all around her like halo beaming out across fields like parallel bolts of earthbound lightening. So powerful I stop walking, pull Shey-mom to my side.
“Sssssh….”
Ba calm her terror. He reach out grasp Mae's arm steady her, as he talks with soldiers. Voices so quiet. I see Ba nod his head, he bow slightly to soldiers. they return to trucks and drive away.
Mae and Ba already inside when I arrive.
“What happen? Everything okay?”
Ba is one to tell me. “Soldiers say we leave tomorrow. Go much better place. Lots of food, work for everyone. Many friends already there. You see, much better.”
“I don’t want to go,” I cry. “We happy here. Why we need to leave?”
“Okay, Kim, we okay. Much better. You see. No worry.”
Mae says nothing. Her face very still but in her throat that frog hopping around again.
Open eyes before sun. Shrey-Mom still sleeping, her head under blanket.
“Oh, little girl,” I think. “Why they not keep you here? You too little for all this trouble. How I take care of you?”
Uncle come downstairs and hand Ba a sac of rice and bundle of pickled fish. He happy for us. Still no idea where we go, but no problem, he say. Remember last time. We find you. Things go wrong, find you again.
Mae's little sister stands outside waiting. She see me and come over with small bag of rice.
“You need more food for family,” she say. “I give you this for your gold chain.”
I don’t even think about it, just unclasp chain, hand to her and turn away to join group of people walking to river. I know I never see her again. Never see any of Mae's family again.
Five or six boats waiting for us on riverbank. Ferry group after group of people to other side. Order us into big cattle trucks, no windows, a couple family each truck. One guard black uniform in back of truck with us. Not so long to train station, he tell us.
Why I the only one who sad? I watch out back of truck as we move out. See family’s house. Oh, they so rich, they no have problem. Why they stay and we go? Why they not take care of us?
At train station everyone know we going to Battambang. Stand by side of track for hour or so. People laughing, talking. Battambang such good idea, they saying. That where the Khmer Rouge first begin with big rice fields before Cambodia collapse. Battambang good place to begin new life. So lucky. Things much better there.
Seats enough for everyone on train. Late afternoon and sun still so hot. Too hot to eat. Dream about swimming now in lake near Grandma’s house. Just yesterday, we swim there. Now already so far away. Where we sleep tonight? Lean against side of traincar, try to sleep, but Po always hungry. He cry so much until I feed him. Every time think he sleep he cry again. So tired, hard to keep eyes open. At least Shrey-Mom sleeps, her head on my lap underneath her blanket. She must be so hot under there. I lift away from her face but she snatches it back without opening her eyes.
This is nighmare again, same nightmare like night we leave Phnom Phen.
Ba gets up, walks to front of traincar and fills bowl with water. Stops beside me to offer some. Just turn face away, maybe better he not see hate in my eyes. I not remember and reach towards throat to touch gold necklace. Why I do that? Why I give to little aunt? She not need it. Only thing I have left. Look out window, but don’t see anything.
Late afternoon. The train stop. Guard order us out. Only couple train cars of people, one hundred maybe, on platform. Very very old and small train station. Sign read Moum Rhoussey. By now everyone so tired, so hungry, no more laughing. One family we know but too weary to talk. Everyone sit alongside track. Waiting but not know what we waiting for.
Day finally getting cooler when next ride arrives. Small wooden wagons each drawn by two cows pull up at station. One wagon for every family. My family lucky, we get ride right away.
Man driving wagon look very mean. He tall and skinny, big scar on cheek. Horse eyes on side of head, maybe he see behind him. We all very quiet. We big family. Very crowded. Children bounce around on our laps. No complain at bumps in road.
Cart stop in front of two houses. Old couple come out from each house to great us as we arrive. Sleep tonight under houses, they say.. Even I so tired, I want to keep going. Why we have to stay here fornight? It not even dark yet, too early for bed. Why we not just keep going until we get to new home? Not understand.
No chance to ask questions. Two more carts arrive and drop off families, old people turn back into their houses. Mi cooks rice for us and we eat outside. Just as stars first start to appear, we quietly file under house, lie down in row to sleep on the ground. Everyone too tired to care. Just hoping to sleep quick through night to begin journey again.
We just close eyes when man calls out loudly from outside. So early even sun not quite awake, under house cannot yet see one another through darkness. Sisters and I remain still beside our children, but Mi rises and walks out with Ba and their sons-in-law. Hear her preparing food, fall back to sleep. Quick as that she calling us to eat. We slow getting up, leave children sleeping.
More rice and pickled fish. No talking anywhere until man who wake us comes over.
“Enough eating,” he says. “You in my group now. This your new home. Everybody go out and cut down things to make your cottage. No time to waste.”
Frog is jumping around like crazy in Mae's throat. I reach out and put my hand over, calm down. My own hand shaking so hard Mae grab and hold against her heart. Feel my head move violently back and forth, back and forth. Big sobs jerk body. Mae pull me closer into arms. So many years since she hold me. She whispering into and stroking my hair, like I baby. I fold against her reed thin body. Feel explosions of her heartbeat. It pulses throughout her body like hummingbird trapped in deadly gauze of mosquito net.
A few minutes she gently pushes me away. Grabs chin, looks into my eyes.
“Have to go help men, Kim,” she says. “You must be strong. You and your sisters stay here, take care children.”
She smiles into my eyes, she strokes my face.
“We together, Kim. We still together. No difference. Family everything, everything we need right here.”
She stands up and walks away with men. Sun rising behind them distorts their shape in new light, they much taller yet very very much like ghosts. You just reach your hand in and through the other side.
Then suddenly they disappear into morning’s shades.
Thousands and thousands of people everywhere around big temple. Lots of food. Maybe soldiers take good care of us after all. Family find place to rest in crowd. See many people we know.
Everybody think Khmer Rouge ‘freedom fighters’ now. Couple days radio says Lon Nal defeated in Phnom Phen. Everybody cheer. Good news. Now we go home!
Almost right away, big trucks drive around. Young soldiers talk through megaphones. “Not safe yet,” they tell us. “Nobody go home yet. Plenty food here. We wait.”
Young Khmer soldier know from childhood. He nothing to me.
One day he come hit me on side head say “You be good.”
“Ohhhh, now you big KR,” I pretend fear. He know he nobody. He not hurt me.
Everybody still hope but wake up one morning see KR trucks taking people away. Every city family go to host family in country. A Khmer family.
We so lucky Mae’s family so near. Only one week and Mae’s brother come to pick us up. Not everybody fit in small boat. My uncle’s son take Akmow. That night just across lake hear dog howling. Oh, Akmow. You okay. We come get you.
Next day soldier-friend come ask if he can take Akmou. Donate him to KR.
“You crazy? Never give Akmou away. He my daughter’s dog. He with us since puppy. Go away.”
Uncle warn me be careful with KR but I no care. He not frighten me.
One of children get measles. Oh that boy so very sick. He need blood from magic black dog. Ba mix herbs to cure, cut Akmou’s ear, just little cut to get magic black dog blood.
Akmou never same after this. He just sleep a lot. He such a good dog, just a wild dog. He never like girls. Sometimes I see females for him, he not interested.
Akmou die at uncles.
We go to live with Mae’s brother. Host family live short walk away, Mae, Shrey-mom and I live under house in chicken coop. Ba not sleep with us.
Things fine, start to see many people I know before. But there such sense of dread. Worst yet to come.
Uncle’s wife tell me one day, “You be careful what you talk about. Don’t say anything about your past. Don’t complain.”
Be dam kou.
I work in field playing scarecrow scare birds away. Cousin come by on bicycle.
“Quick, he say, “take you to see sister-in-law
Everyone follow him. Family so rich, Know so many people. Cook big meal for us. Give us back suitcase of Ba’s things. Tell us Pol Pot turn calendar back to Year O. Cambodia new country, separate from world, cut out everything old for blank slate. No yesterday. Never go home. Forget it. Even money not buy way home.
***
Happy day. Shrey-Mom playing in lake. Many people there, laughing having fun. First time joy.
Come home, little aunt call me.
“What wrong with you? Why you not listen to me?”
She grab scissors and cut off all my hair. I crying. “This not party. You can’t go around looking pretty. Your life going to change.”
How can life change more? What does she know she not telling me?
Every night around sunset I put Shrey-mom to bed, watch the sunset and cry. Feel so sick everyday. Know I having baby. Can’t imagine bring new baby into this world. Decide must kill baby.
Start to climb tall trees, jump off land on stomach, dive into lake so stomach hit bottom. No luck, baby continue to grow in me.
Then two of my sisters arrive; one pregnant, other with new baby maybe one month old. This make it harder. I embarassed that none of us has husband for our children.
So many of my friends from past; I wonder what has become of them.
Every morning someone else missing. Hear dogs barking at night, next day someone, maybe whole family, disappear. I know they say too much. Not follow rules. Here not possible to know who your enemy. Everyone out for themselves.
One family she without husband, just like me, one daugher. She so beautiful, husband so rich. Her mom take care of her.
She come get me every night, she talk.
“You be careful about this,” I say. “Don’t ever talk about your past. Remember, the walls have ears. Don’t ever say anything.”
She not listen. Then one day she gone. Look everywhere. Mae's friends, walk to uncle’s house. No one see her. In afternoon her mom come outside with little girl. I rush up to her; She crying, not want anyone to see.
“Where Donc?”
“Anghar come last night,” she say. “Take her away to school. Maybe she back soon.”
Oh, beautiful friend, why you not listen? Now you gone forever. No one come home from school. Everybody know that.
“Maybe they think she CIA,” sister say.
“What CIA?”
“Worst thing to be CIA. Bad people. US. That why they kill you.”
My stomach get bigger and bigger but never feel baby move. I so worried, never tell Mae I pregnant.
Then maybe 7 months pass when pains begin. Call out to Mae to tell her. She sends Ba for boiling water.
There under house where animals live baby boy born, look very healthy. Start fire under bed to keep child warm. Just like with Shrey-Mom, just like with me, Just like with Mae. Old Cambodian tradition make me feel so safe. Hold my baby, fire underneath us. No worry tonight.
***
Sky color of peacock eggs remind me of home. Oh such a mess now, no time to clean before leaving. Papers, dishes, pans, pictures, clothing, everything on floor, spilling out of cabinets. Squish nose. Musty. Dense blanket dust.
Open windows. Lotus blossom smell enters with river breeze. Maybe not so bad. Maybe half day everything clean, back in order. Like nothing happen.
Every day dream about home. Not tell anyone. Not safe to talk about past. Angkar make you disappear they hear you. Cambodia gone. Now Democratic Kampuchea. We build new country. Take five year.
I not believe them. They scare me before. Now I know they not so bad. Just no talk. No complain. Get food to eat. Stay with family. Some things okay here. Mae with her family. She happy. Not mind sleeping under house with chickens. She very strong, brave. Not blame Ba like me. Shrey-Mom play with cousins just like before. Love baby brother.
Still, I worry, what about Kuan? How he ever find me now? He not know where to look, never visit Mi family. Uniform still at house. He know something bad happen. He not know we still alive. Not even know he daddy.
Shrey-mom waking up dust with long skinny reed, drawing little pictures in dry ground as we walk towards Grandma’s house. Gentle baby songs soothe her brother to sleep; his body sags against my chest with deep sigh of release. As we round corner, see house. Two big dirty white KR trucks parked outside, small group child-sized soldiers talking to my parents. Long before see Mae's face smell her fear. Silent but all around her like halo beaming out across fields like parallel bolts of earthbound lightening. So powerful I stop walking, pull Shey-mom to my side.
“Sssssh….”
Ba calm her terror. He reach out grasp Mae's arm steady her, as he talks with soldiers. Voices so quiet. I see Ba nod his head, he bow slightly to soldiers. they return to trucks and drive away.
Mae and Ba already inside when I arrive.
“What happen? Everything okay?”
Ba is one to tell me. “Soldiers say we leave tomorrow. Go much better place. Lots of food, work for everyone. Many friends already there. You see, much better.”
“I don’t want to go,” I cry. “We happy here. Why we need to leave?”
“Okay, Kim, we okay. Much better. You see. No worry.”
Mae says nothing. Her face very still but in her throat that frog hopping around again.
Open eyes before sun. Shrey-Mom still sleeping, her head under blanket.
“Oh, little girl,” I think. “Why they not keep you here? You too little for all this trouble. How I take care of you?”
Uncle come downstairs and hand Ba a sac of rice and bundle of pickled fish. He happy for us. Still no idea where we go, but no problem, he say. Remember last time. We find you. Things go wrong, find you again.
Mae's little sister stands outside waiting. She see me and come over with small bag of rice.
“You need more food for family,” she say. “I give you this for your gold chain.”
I don’t even think about it, just unclasp chain, hand to her and turn away to join group of people walking to river. I know I never see her again. Never see any of Mae's family again.
Five or six boats waiting for us on riverbank. Ferry group after group of people to other side. Order us into big cattle trucks, no windows, a couple family each truck. One guard black uniform in back of truck with us. Not so long to train station, he tell us.
Why I the only one who sad? I watch out back of truck as we move out. See family’s house. Oh, they so rich, they no have problem. Why they stay and we go? Why they not take care of us?
At train station everyone know we going to Battambang. Stand by side of track for hour or so. People laughing, talking. Battambang such good idea, they saying. That where the Khmer Rouge first begin with big rice fields before Cambodia collapse. Battambang good place to begin new life. So lucky. Things much better there.
Seats enough for everyone on train. Late afternoon and sun still so hot. Too hot to eat. Dream about swimming now in lake near Grandma’s house. Just yesterday, we swim there. Now already so far away. Where we sleep tonight? Lean against side of traincar, try to sleep, but Po always hungry. He cry so much until I feed him. Every time think he sleep he cry again. So tired, hard to keep eyes open. At least Shrey-Mom sleeps, her head on my lap underneath her blanket. She must be so hot under there. I lift away from her face but she snatches it back without opening her eyes.
This is nighmare again, same nightmare like night we leave Phnom Phen.
Ba gets up, walks to front of traincar and fills bowl with water. Stops beside me to offer some. Just turn face away, maybe better he not see hate in my eyes. I not remember and reach towards throat to touch gold necklace. Why I do that? Why I give to little aunt? She not need it. Only thing I have left. Look out window, but don’t see anything.
Late afternoon. The train stop. Guard order us out. Only couple train cars of people, one hundred maybe, on platform. Very very old and small train station. Sign read Moum Rhoussey. By now everyone so tired, so hungry, no more laughing. One family we know but too weary to talk. Everyone sit alongside track. Waiting but not know what we waiting for.
Day finally getting cooler when next ride arrives. Small wooden wagons each drawn by two cows pull up at station. One wagon for every family. My family lucky, we get ride right away.
Man driving wagon look very mean. He tall and skinny, big scar on cheek. Horse eyes on side of head, maybe he see behind him. We all very quiet. We big family. Very crowded. Children bounce around on our laps. No complain at bumps in road.
Cart stop in front of two houses. Old couple come out from each house to great us as we arrive. Sleep tonight under houses, they say.. Even I so tired, I want to keep going. Why we have to stay here fornight? It not even dark yet, too early for bed. Why we not just keep going until we get to new home? Not understand.
No chance to ask questions. Two more carts arrive and drop off families, old people turn back into their houses. Mi cooks rice for us and we eat outside. Just as stars first start to appear, we quietly file under house, lie down in row to sleep on the ground. Everyone too tired to care. Just hoping to sleep quick through night to begin journey again.
We just close eyes when man calls out loudly from outside. So early even sun not quite awake, under house cannot yet see one another through darkness. Sisters and I remain still beside our children, but Mi rises and walks out with Ba and their sons-in-law. Hear her preparing food, fall back to sleep. Quick as that she calling us to eat. We slow getting up, leave children sleeping.
More rice and pickled fish. No talking anywhere until man who wake us comes over.
“Enough eating,” he says. “You in my group now. This your new home. Everybody go out and cut down things to make your cottage. No time to waste.”
Frog is jumping around like crazy in Mae's throat. I reach out and put my hand over, calm down. My own hand shaking so hard Mae grab and hold against her heart. Feel my head move violently back and forth, back and forth. Big sobs jerk body. Mae pull me closer into arms. So many years since she hold me. She whispering into and stroking my hair, like I baby. I fold against her reed thin body. Feel explosions of her heartbeat. It pulses throughout her body like hummingbird trapped in deadly gauze of mosquito net.
A few minutes she gently pushes me away. Grabs chin, looks into my eyes.
“Have to go help men, Kim,” she says. “You must be strong. You and your sisters stay here, take care children.”
She smiles into my eyes, she strokes my face.
“We together, Kim. We still together. No difference. Family everything, everything we need right here.”
She stands up and walks away with men. Sun rising behind them distorts their shape in new light, they much taller yet very very much like ghosts. You just reach your hand in and through the other side.
Then suddenly they disappear into morning’s shades.
Death
Shrey-mom singing as she pus baby in the hammock. She look up when Ba walk inside. She so young. I know she worry about Ba. She know he weak and sick because we have so little food.
‘Oh, grandpa!” So excited to see him, she has good news. “You know, last night I dream about food. All night plates and plates of food. I wake up not hungry. Maybe we have a lot of food later.”
Ba stop beside her and gently pat her on the head.
“Oh Shrey-mom. You are only a little girl. Already you know that dreaming about food is about eating a lot of food. Such a wise girl.”
We look each other know so well power of dreams, you can wake up feeling as if you eating all night, even though you starving. Until now, we did not know how close my daughter to death.
Dream food not last long though. just mind tricks. Body big empty cavern.
Now I can feel energy from water. Under rain I feel a lot of energy. Water keep me alive.
Everyone starving. Most of all we worry about Mae and Ba. They both so weak.
One day I hatch plan. Number Two sister has chicken for eggs. No way she part with that chicken. Like pet to her. So late in night when everyone sleeping. younger sister and I tiptoe outside to find chicken. We know exactly where that chicken is, underneath the house. I grab it and wring its neck.
Early next morning, I boil chicken and give to my parents and daughter to eat. It last couple days. Sister never figure out what happen to her chicken.
Shrey-mom always cover her face when she sleep. When she born she always cover her eyes. One day when I getting ready to go to work she beg me stay home.
“You know what happen when you leave, Mae? Uncle come into our room, he look everywhere for food. They think I sleep, but I see them.
I tell them what she say. She tell truth.
“We thought you sleeping,” her Uncle say.
***
Ba’s body swelling. Every day I come home from work and he worse. Mae too weak to take care of him.
We so frightened. Only hope to save Ba is to send him to hospital where they have thick rice soup.
“If I go, I don’t think I don’t think I will see any of you again.”
We know this true; other people go, no one ever come home
I have no choice. I have to convince him. I have to worry about Mae, too.
“We bring you back later,” I say. “I promise. Only way.”
The trip to hospital take half day. I walk there and tell person in charge that Ba very sick. Cart come take him away.
Mae go see him after one week. Second time she go she cannot find him there.
They don’t come to tell you when someone die. They just bury them.
We know Ba gone.
Wonder why we get up with sun. Why we bother? Why we not just give up, lie down and wait to die?
Mae lie down beside me. She so small now bones rub against mine. Her skin dry like lizard. She stroke my hand. Hear her breathe, still soft, so comforting when she so close.
“You must stay strong, Donc,” she say. “Babies to take care of.”
Son crying on my chest. Beside me Shrey-mom asleep, her head hidden underneath small blanket.
Why I have these babies? If I not have babies I free to die.
Mae know what I thinking. My sisters and I still her babies. That why she still here.
She reach across me, take my son onto her breast. Rock and sing to him. He fall asleep and still she sing. I rest my head on her shoulder. Can still smell flowers in her hair.
***
Just a couple day ago I begin worry about my daughter.
Shrey-mom start to swell.
"Nothing really wrong," I say to myself. "She just getting fat."
Already two of my nieces starve to death. But not Shrey-Mom. I not see how weak she is.
Every day I come home from fields and she still lying in bed. One day she just no get up. That day it rain so hard.
“Get up, Shrey-Mom. Get up. You have to eat. Get up.” I pull her out of the bed. Her body so limp.
“No, no.”
My daughter not say anything else, she know she dying. I hold her up try feed her. She refuse food.
Whole family gather around us. They sit quiet as I hold her through night. She just sleep, open eyes one or two times to say “Oh, Mae.”
Mae come to sit beside me.
“She leaving us, daughter. You know that just before you die you see your real mom. Say good-bye to her, let her go.”
We just sit together crying. Outside rain so hard like the whole world cry too.
I think about day when we first arrive here. Anghar soldier come talk to me. Shrey-mom playing with her cousins. She so pretty, still healthy, still strong. Her laughter still full of joy
"You want to give daughter to me?” he ask. “She grow up healthy in my family. Lots of food. Go to school. A good life.”
How I know how bad life become? Never think day come I not able care for my daughter.
"Is he crazy?" I think. "Why he even think such a thing?"
But now tonight I so angry at myself.
“Oh, if only I had given Shrey-Mom to that man. She still be alive today.”
Morning come. I find Anghar officer. Tell him what happen.
“Go to work,” he say. “We get her body and bury her.”
I wrap Shrey-mom in blanket and leave her on bed. I go to work. No choice. No time off to grieve. Hundreds of people die every day.
Walk home with my group. Why even go home, my little girl’s body gone, tossed into big hole with other dead bodies. No one she know. No one know where hole is. Shovel after shovel of earth cover her. Never find.
“We have to take care of boy,” Mae say that night.
All night long, night after night, I breast feed my son. I so skinny can no longer sit on bed, my bones need cushion, many pillows. I cannot make milk, my son so little, just shrinking away.
He die so soon after Shrey- Mom. Now only 3 children in family – older sister’s children.
Mae
Every night after dinner, Mae and I sit in front of our house and watch people walk by. I can always tell by their faces if they are going to die soon. I always tell Mae.
“Why you say that?” she ask. “How you know this?”
“I can see face of death,” I say.
One day I come home Mae lying down spread out. Arms outstretched. I see that face again. That face is awful face.
“Mae! Wake up! Wake up! Why your face like that?”
She open her eyes. “What face?”
“The face like I always tell you. The face just before you die.”
“I don’t try to do that kind of face.”
I can only cry. Too late now to escape with Mae. Too late to keep promise to take her with me.
Only a few days and already little sister and I can no longer care for her. No choice but to put her in hospital. We walk by hospital every morning on way to work and every night on way home from.
Always we so tired and so hungry. One night we not stop to see how she is.
Next morning we pick some cucumbers from vines growing near our house and begin walking toward hospital. Little sister so much faster than me, always stronger and faster, always complaining about how slow I walk. Now she race ahead to hospital. When I get there, she outside. Face very frightened. She scream when she see me.
“Hurry, hurry. I think Mae dead.”
We race into her room. Mae dying. Grab spoon and start scraping off sickness. She start to get color again. Open her eyes. She better.
“You have to stay alive, Mae. You cannot die. Just a little longer. Things will change. You must be strong.”
Everybody crying. But we have to leave. If we do not work, no food.
That night again we so tired not stop at hospital. Next morning, same, sister run off ahead. Now she sobbing.
“Mae dead.” She say this like it my fault, like Mae maybe live if I not so slow.
Mae’s gown pulled up over face. Bottom of body naked. Feces between legs. All these people around her. How could they leave her so exposed, for everyone to see? Why they not cover her?
Sister and I clean her body. We leave her there in bed and go to fields. Never see her again.
‘Oh, grandpa!” So excited to see him, she has good news. “You know, last night I dream about food. All night plates and plates of food. I wake up not hungry. Maybe we have a lot of food later.”
Ba stop beside her and gently pat her on the head.
“Oh Shrey-mom. You are only a little girl. Already you know that dreaming about food is about eating a lot of food. Such a wise girl.”
We look each other know so well power of dreams, you can wake up feeling as if you eating all night, even though you starving. Until now, we did not know how close my daughter to death.
Dream food not last long though. just mind tricks. Body big empty cavern.
Now I can feel energy from water. Under rain I feel a lot of energy. Water keep me alive.
Everyone starving. Most of all we worry about Mae and Ba. They both so weak.
One day I hatch plan. Number Two sister has chicken for eggs. No way she part with that chicken. Like pet to her. So late in night when everyone sleeping. younger sister and I tiptoe outside to find chicken. We know exactly where that chicken is, underneath the house. I grab it and wring its neck.
Early next morning, I boil chicken and give to my parents and daughter to eat. It last couple days. Sister never figure out what happen to her chicken.
Shrey-mom always cover her face when she sleep. When she born she always cover her eyes. One day when I getting ready to go to work she beg me stay home.
“You know what happen when you leave, Mae? Uncle come into our room, he look everywhere for food. They think I sleep, but I see them.
I tell them what she say. She tell truth.
“We thought you sleeping,” her Uncle say.
***
Ba’s body swelling. Every day I come home from work and he worse. Mae too weak to take care of him.
We so frightened. Only hope to save Ba is to send him to hospital where they have thick rice soup.
“If I go, I don’t think I don’t think I will see any of you again.”
We know this true; other people go, no one ever come home
I have no choice. I have to convince him. I have to worry about Mae, too.
“We bring you back later,” I say. “I promise. Only way.”
The trip to hospital take half day. I walk there and tell person in charge that Ba very sick. Cart come take him away.
Mae go see him after one week. Second time she go she cannot find him there.
They don’t come to tell you when someone die. They just bury them.
We know Ba gone.
Wonder why we get up with sun. Why we bother? Why we not just give up, lie down and wait to die?
Mae lie down beside me. She so small now bones rub against mine. Her skin dry like lizard. She stroke my hand. Hear her breathe, still soft, so comforting when she so close.
“You must stay strong, Donc,” she say. “Babies to take care of.”
Son crying on my chest. Beside me Shrey-mom asleep, her head hidden underneath small blanket.
Why I have these babies? If I not have babies I free to die.
Mae know what I thinking. My sisters and I still her babies. That why she still here.
She reach across me, take my son onto her breast. Rock and sing to him. He fall asleep and still she sing. I rest my head on her shoulder. Can still smell flowers in her hair.
***
Just a couple day ago I begin worry about my daughter.
Shrey-mom start to swell.
"Nothing really wrong," I say to myself. "She just getting fat."
Already two of my nieces starve to death. But not Shrey-Mom. I not see how weak she is.
Every day I come home from fields and she still lying in bed. One day she just no get up. That day it rain so hard.
“Get up, Shrey-Mom. Get up. You have to eat. Get up.” I pull her out of the bed. Her body so limp.
“No, no.”
My daughter not say anything else, she know she dying. I hold her up try feed her. She refuse food.
Whole family gather around us. They sit quiet as I hold her through night. She just sleep, open eyes one or two times to say “Oh, Mae.”
Mae come to sit beside me.
“She leaving us, daughter. You know that just before you die you see your real mom. Say good-bye to her, let her go.”
We just sit together crying. Outside rain so hard like the whole world cry too.
I think about day when we first arrive here. Anghar soldier come talk to me. Shrey-mom playing with her cousins. She so pretty, still healthy, still strong. Her laughter still full of joy
"You want to give daughter to me?” he ask. “She grow up healthy in my family. Lots of food. Go to school. A good life.”
How I know how bad life become? Never think day come I not able care for my daughter.
"Is he crazy?" I think. "Why he even think such a thing?"
But now tonight I so angry at myself.
“Oh, if only I had given Shrey-Mom to that man. She still be alive today.”
Morning come. I find Anghar officer. Tell him what happen.
“Go to work,” he say. “We get her body and bury her.”
I wrap Shrey-mom in blanket and leave her on bed. I go to work. No choice. No time off to grieve. Hundreds of people die every day.
Walk home with my group. Why even go home, my little girl’s body gone, tossed into big hole with other dead bodies. No one she know. No one know where hole is. Shovel after shovel of earth cover her. Never find.
“We have to take care of boy,” Mae say that night.
All night long, night after night, I breast feed my son. I so skinny can no longer sit on bed, my bones need cushion, many pillows. I cannot make milk, my son so little, just shrinking away.
He die so soon after Shrey- Mom. Now only 3 children in family – older sister’s children.
Mae
Every night after dinner, Mae and I sit in front of our house and watch people walk by. I can always tell by their faces if they are going to die soon. I always tell Mae.
“Why you say that?” she ask. “How you know this?”
“I can see face of death,” I say.
One day I come home Mae lying down spread out. Arms outstretched. I see that face again. That face is awful face.
“Mae! Wake up! Wake up! Why your face like that?”
She open her eyes. “What face?”
“The face like I always tell you. The face just before you die.”
“I don’t try to do that kind of face.”
I can only cry. Too late now to escape with Mae. Too late to keep promise to take her with me.
Only a few days and already little sister and I can no longer care for her. No choice but to put her in hospital. We walk by hospital every morning on way to work and every night on way home from.
Always we so tired and so hungry. One night we not stop to see how she is.
Next morning we pick some cucumbers from vines growing near our house and begin walking toward hospital. Little sister so much faster than me, always stronger and faster, always complaining about how slow I walk. Now she race ahead to hospital. When I get there, she outside. Face very frightened. She scream when she see me.
“Hurry, hurry. I think Mae dead.”
We race into her room. Mae dying. Grab spoon and start scraping off sickness. She start to get color again. Open her eyes. She better.
“You have to stay alive, Mae. You cannot die. Just a little longer. Things will change. You must be strong.”
Everybody crying. But we have to leave. If we do not work, no food.
That night again we so tired not stop at hospital. Next morning, same, sister run off ahead. Now she sobbing.
“Mae dead.” She say this like it my fault, like Mae maybe live if I not so slow.
Mae’s gown pulled up over face. Bottom of body naked. Feces between legs. All these people around her. How could they leave her so exposed, for everyone to see? Why they not cover her?
Sister and I clean her body. We leave her there in bed and go to fields. Never see her again.
Another Death
Brother-in-law stay in bed this morning. His eyes very bright
“Oh, Kim, such a beutfiul dream. Do you remember Thom? He in my dream. Just down road, he say, so much food you not believe. I follow him down into village, big market all kinds of food, sardines, bananas, pineapples, noodle soup. Free. We eat everything.”
Everybody love share these dreams, feel so good, so happy this morning I no patience to listen, too hungry. Rush out to join my group. Angry at him, why he not get up to work? He need real food, not dream food.
Only corn to eat now. Over a month. Brother-in-law always so clever. He never stop finding new things to eat. He catches ginkos crawling on the walls, under the trees. Takes off skin look like chicken, he cook them. He not find anything for week now.
Lunch time. Brother-in-law sleeping. He wake up when my niece return from dining room with bowl of food. He sits up and grabs her, tries to take her food.
“Give me food, give me food,” he yell at his daughter.
She scream back, “No, no, don’t take my food.”
I rush between them, slap his arm away.
“Gee, why you do this?” I ask, placing the bowl firmly in my niece’s hands, shooing her away to eat. “ You always do this.”
“You know I so hungry.”
“Why don’t you just wait? I hungry, too.”
When the bell rings for our food, brother-in-law asks me:
“Can you get my food, too? Too weak to get up. cannot go.”
I go to dining area and fill our bowls and rush back with food. I hand bowl to him. He still lying in bed.
“Thank you,” he whispers. “Just leave bowl on my chest.”
I place bowl there and begin eating my meal. He folds his arms around the bowl. Not try to eat anything.
I finish my meal and walk over to wake him. He is dead.
Sister, children and I cry next to his body. This death is my fault. Why I not realize how sick he was? Why I not realize he going to die when he tell me dream this morning? Why I get so angry at him?.
“I am so sorry,” I cry. “I didn’t know that you were that starving”
The KR come to take his body away. A few months later his wife is also dead. They take her away, too.
“Oh, Kim, such a beutfiul dream. Do you remember Thom? He in my dream. Just down road, he say, so much food you not believe. I follow him down into village, big market all kinds of food, sardines, bananas, pineapples, noodle soup. Free. We eat everything.”
Everybody love share these dreams, feel so good, so happy this morning I no patience to listen, too hungry. Rush out to join my group. Angry at him, why he not get up to work? He need real food, not dream food.
Only corn to eat now. Over a month. Brother-in-law always so clever. He never stop finding new things to eat. He catches ginkos crawling on the walls, under the trees. Takes off skin look like chicken, he cook them. He not find anything for week now.
Lunch time. Brother-in-law sleeping. He wake up when my niece return from dining room with bowl of food. He sits up and grabs her, tries to take her food.
“Give me food, give me food,” he yell at his daughter.
She scream back, “No, no, don’t take my food.”
I rush between them, slap his arm away.
“Gee, why you do this?” I ask, placing the bowl firmly in my niece’s hands, shooing her away to eat. “ You always do this.”
“You know I so hungry.”
“Why don’t you just wait? I hungry, too.”
When the bell rings for our food, brother-in-law asks me:
“Can you get my food, too? Too weak to get up. cannot go.”
I go to dining area and fill our bowls and rush back with food. I hand bowl to him. He still lying in bed.
“Thank you,” he whispers. “Just leave bowl on my chest.”
I place bowl there and begin eating my meal. He folds his arms around the bowl. Not try to eat anything.
I finish my meal and walk over to wake him. He is dead.
Sister, children and I cry next to his body. This death is my fault. Why I not realize how sick he was? Why I not realize he going to die when he tell me dream this morning? Why I get so angry at him?.
“I am so sorry,” I cry. “I didn’t know that you were that starving”
The KR come to take his body away. A few months later his wife is also dead. They take her away, too.
Time Passing
Time just goes by, nothing changes. Now I only have two sarongs, a few shirts to wear. No shoes. I make myself a hat from palm tree leaves. Brush my teeth with sand.
Every day we wake in the dark. The bell rings calling us to eat. We sit together in our work groups on long tables, there is one bowl of soup for four people. A small bowl of salt. If you are lucky, you sometimes find a snail on the walk to work, hide it in your pocket to eat when noone is looking.
Pick rice, replant field. Pick rice. Replant field. Pick rice. A day, a week, a month Work on one row, dig, finish, move to next row. Walk home to eat. Rest one or two hours. Back to fields.
The Khmer Rouge knows we need more energy to work and a nurse comes to give everyone vitamin shots.
But I am one of the unlucky ones. My body soon turns feverish and my arms swells and reddens. It quickly becomes so painful I cannot work.
“Just cut off my arm," I scream at the hospital. "I cannot sleep.”
A nurse cuts a big hole in my arm to get out infection, puts a bandage over it and send me back to the fields. I am not strong enough to work in the fields yet so Iwork picking up cow dung around the camp.
Every week we go to the Angkar meeting. We sit on haystacks. Everyone has to go unless you are too sick to walk. Group leader talks about who is lazy, who is bad. Always talks about crops, how to make more food to eat.
"Work harder," they say. "No difference if you used to be a doctor lady. Get that out of your head. Now you are Angkar. Everybody is the same. Work hard or you will die."
Now our job is even more difficult. We are working to get three rice crops a year.
It never matters how hard we work. There is never enough food and the harder we work the less food we get. The soup is now water and a scoop of corn.
Then the chicken pox come, kills everybody’s children, even Khmer Rouge. Not matter to me anymore. All my children have already starved to death. What do I care?
When all the children die, they put me to work with the old people. My old friend Tha tries to work on the row next to me so he can help me finish.
“Oh my good friend,” he says. “I remember you when you first came. You were so beautiful.”
Tha is always a friend to me. He teaches me how to collect water to make palm milk from leaves. He always hides food in his pocket for me. Even though his son is a general in Khmer Rouge, still he work in fields. Gets few favors.
Every day we wake in the dark. The bell rings calling us to eat. We sit together in our work groups on long tables, there is one bowl of soup for four people. A small bowl of salt. If you are lucky, you sometimes find a snail on the walk to work, hide it in your pocket to eat when noone is looking.
Pick rice, replant field. Pick rice. Replant field. Pick rice. A day, a week, a month Work on one row, dig, finish, move to next row. Walk home to eat. Rest one or two hours. Back to fields.
The Khmer Rouge knows we need more energy to work and a nurse comes to give everyone vitamin shots.
But I am one of the unlucky ones. My body soon turns feverish and my arms swells and reddens. It quickly becomes so painful I cannot work.
“Just cut off my arm," I scream at the hospital. "I cannot sleep.”
A nurse cuts a big hole in my arm to get out infection, puts a bandage over it and send me back to the fields. I am not strong enough to work in the fields yet so Iwork picking up cow dung around the camp.
Every week we go to the Angkar meeting. We sit on haystacks. Everyone has to go unless you are too sick to walk. Group leader talks about who is lazy, who is bad. Always talks about crops, how to make more food to eat.
"Work harder," they say. "No difference if you used to be a doctor lady. Get that out of your head. Now you are Angkar. Everybody is the same. Work hard or you will die."
Now our job is even more difficult. We are working to get three rice crops a year.
It never matters how hard we work. There is never enough food and the harder we work the less food we get. The soup is now water and a scoop of corn.
Then the chicken pox come, kills everybody’s children, even Khmer Rouge. Not matter to me anymore. All my children have already starved to death. What do I care?
When all the children die, they put me to work with the old people. My old friend Tha tries to work on the row next to me so he can help me finish.
“Oh my good friend,” he says. “I remember you when you first came. You were so beautiful.”
Tha is always a friend to me. He teaches me how to collect water to make palm milk from leaves. He always hides food in his pocket for me. Even though his son is a general in Khmer Rouge, still he work in fields. Gets few favors.
I am swallowed by a huge chunk of coal, devoured in the very act of awakening. I breath like a mummy in endless black silence.
Familiar sounds filter through; my spirit has left my body and gazes into this thick cocoon. I surrender into peacefulness, maybe this at last is my death.
A tiny lavendar butterfly brushes lightly against the dark cocoon. Her near transparent wings whish as she lightly lands atop the darkness, just off center to the right. Her wings flitter in miniscule movements up and down. I imagine that she must have a bee’s stinger because it appears as if she is driving a thin sharp drill into the darkness.
Behind my eyes a brilliant yellow disk, with rivets like the margins of songs on a vinyl record. Strands and small pebbles of black
“Kim, Wake up!”
I open my eyes. Sister is sitting beside me on the bamboosl slats. Her face appears distorted, as if I am viewing her through asilly waved mirror. It expands, shrinks, stretches taut, bends ... impossibly grotesque.
“I thought I was dead,” I whisper. “Everything was black.”
“Chicken blindness,” she says. Night blindness.”
Her voice is total fear. What is it, I wonder. She worries that now she has to take care of me? She worries that I am getting too sick and won’t be able to work? But I see no worry in her eyes. Only frustration, maybe anger.
I sit up quickly and try to stand. I have to show her I can take care of myself.
The room spins around me like I am caught inside a small tornado. I reach for the wall to support me. Even before I feel the earth settle still beneath my feet, she is already out the door.
“Don’t be late,” she calls back. “We don’t want any trouble.”
Chicken blindness soon becomes almost comforting. Most days, my vision clears with the growing sunlight as we walk to the fields. I begin looking forward to these sightless hours; it feels safe inside my black cocoon, far away from the horrors of life around me. Even my memories are lost. I feel free. Everyone acts as if I am not even there.
My chicken eyes have not been with me long as I rush one evening back from the pond, so angry that there is not enough water left to even wash myself. The sun is setting, already darkness swells behind my eyes. Maybe I have a fever, maybe I am possessed by some wicked spirit. Because when I see my neighbor with his two children, I loose my head.
“They say they make our country better,” I say, as I approach them. “The country is not better! Now we have no water to take a bath. How can they do this?”
Right away, I know this is a mistake, their silence is so loud. My neighbor turns away as if he doesn't recognize me. Then I notice the young man standing with them. Some stranger. Whatever, I think. Just someone new to the camp.
Two weeks go by. I am sitting in front of my house. Two Khmer officers walk from the dining tent.
“Oh, somebody is in trouble,” I think. “Somebody else will disappear today.”
The Army officers are getting closer. Hut by hut, everyone looks so happy as they pass by, realizing they are safe. But now they are right in front of my home. My blood turns to ice. Big grasshoppers bounce in heart. My teeth click click click.
Two big shadows stop in front of me. I can feel my eyes roll back in my head in horror.
“You come to Kamatoo right now,” one of them says. I look up. He is so ugly, a big broken nose, a face pocked like plucked chicken.A big, big belly.
“Nothing is wrong.” The other solder is tall and skinny, not like me, more normal skinny and he smiles as he reaches down and grabs my arm.
“Major just wants to talk to you about school.”
I dig my feet into the brittle soil. Struggle against this man so hard. Where does this energy come from?
“No school for me. I do not want to die.” I scream and my sisters run outside and grab onto each other. I fight these horrible men. Fight for my life. All this time, I think I do not want to go on, I want to leave this body, I pray that my eyes do not open. Why do I want to live so bad now? So strange, I think. So strange that you fight so hard. What for? You are only going to die anyway.
“You don’t want me, Big mistake. Please. Who will take care of my little sister?”
“Go with them,” big sister cries. “Just a couple of days and you'll come home. You have to go.”
I know she doesn't believe this. She is trying to comfort me, to comfort herself.
***
We walk, rice field after rice field, single file, one in front, one in back. The sun sinks in the sky. Oh, how I want Mae. Where is she now? I m so tired, my legs are so weak. I stumble, fall to the ground. Need rest.
“Go, go.” The soldier behind me is very impatient. He wants me to walk faster.
I fall again and grab onto weeds but he rip me up and pushes me forward with the butt of his rifle.
Now finally my tears, too, are frightened away.
“Don’t hurt me, please. Don’t hurt me.”
We walk maybe half a day before arriving at a giant temple. A rush of hope, of happy childhood days enlivens me. Maybe it is not so bad, I think. Maybe it is some kind of school after all.
They push me up the steps and through the large door. All I can think about is water.
The smell of stale rotten air gags me as we enter. Nothing in my life could have prepared me for this.
Line after line of college students sit on the floor, legs in front of them. Long chains stretch from one end of the temple to the other, binding their cuffed feet together, like small dried fish rotting in a can, packed tight against each other.
Death faces. Hundreds and hundreds of death faces.
Tortured screams cut through the air from behind a huge Buddha near the back of the temple. The death faces do no change as behind them a man is dragged outside still screaming.
The soldiers push me down at the end of a row near the middle of the room. They do not chain my feet.
Oh, I do not know how I can sit here with this terror, just waiting for death. I pray. I call out to Mae, "Take me away, Come back for me, Mae."
This is a mistake. When mayor sees me he will know. He will be angry with the guardds for wasting his time. He'll send me home. Oh, my sisters will be so happy. They will teat me the best. Share more of their food with me. Everyone in the camp will be so happy.
It is night when the guards finally bring us rice and dried fish. I fall asleep and wake up later when something hits me in the back. I sit up and feel around in the darkness until my fingers curl aroud the familiar shape of a mango.
In the morning I eat mango with rice. No one else eating, though. They are all too sick. Close to dying. Do I have death face, too? How would I know this? I have not seen my face in years.
When they finally come for me, I know where they are taking me; back behind the Buddha, into the torture room. A big man stands in front of me.
“Uncle, please don’t hurt me. Please.” I place my hands under my chin. “Whatever I said, I didn't mean anything. I am just so hungry, so starving.”
He doesn't care what I say. He only wants to ask me about my life before the camps.
“My husband was a rhickshaw man.” I just repeat and repeat this, time after time as e tries to trip me up in my story.
‘I sold fruit, sometimes clothes.”
They ask so many questions. I know they want to hit me. But they know I am going to die soon. Why bother?
Finally, the big man waves me away.
We leave the torture room and the guards let me go outside to the bathroom. I see two naked men whose arms and legs are chained to the temple wall. And then I see that man, that man from the camp who had been with my neighbor. He smiles at me. He is a spy. He told them about me. Oh, I am so stupid.
Next day the guards take me again behind the Buddha.
“Mut,” the mayor says. “You are going to tell us the truth or you will die like the others.”
“No truth to tell, uncle. This is a big mistake. Please, don’t hurt me.”
They wrap my head in plastic bag and stretch it tight across my face, "Tell the truth or you die."
My hands tear at the plastic. My breath sucks the fabric deep into my throat.
I look out behind mask, everything is so slow. Why are they screaming at me? Why are they twisting my fingers, kicking my legs with their filthy feet? Suddenly I feel so peaceful inside. I Just want to sleep now. No pain. My eyes are closing.
I dream about Mae. She is right beside me. My finger hurts so bad and she comes and blows on it.
I hear someone calling me and open my eyes. I am back among the death faces in the temple.
“I thought you were dead.” A ghost-girl is sitting beside me. Where is Mae? I look down at my finger, feel her breath. Then I close my eyes again, go home to my mother.
They come for me one more time. Ask the same questions but they don't use the plastic bag again. The Mayor tell me to take buckets of shit and dump them outside. Two buckets, but I am so weak I need two hands for each bucket.
The big man is gone when I return. A guard yells “Wash your hands. Come with me.”
We are on a bicycle now.
“Where are you taking me? Where are we going?” He doesn't answer, just keeps pedaling.
“Where you think you going?” he finally ask. I look and look around me. I am so frightened I have no idea where I am. Time goes by and I just flop back and forth on the back of that bike, like an old rag doll.
“Oh, look at that tree there. It looks like we are near my house. Are we near my camp?”
The guard thinks I am crazy because we are right next to my house and I don't even recognize things.
the guard takes me to the leader's house. I lam ucky, he say. From now on be careful. Next time I will not be so lucky.
I walk home. Oh so many people are happy to see me, so many tears and hugs. I didn't realize how many people even know me.
I pull away from these strangers, They scare me. They look like monkeys. They turned into monkeys while I was gone. What happened? Maybe I do not belong here anymore.
“You don't know me, Dong? I am your sister.”
One of the monkeys takes my arm, she is crying so hard. “We thought we'd never see you again.”
I am so confused.
“Where's Mae? I want to see Mae.”
“Mae is dead. Don't you remember?"
What does she know, my sister? How could she know that Mae visited me? I will just keep my secret. Pretend I am really coming home. I remember this place but it is from so long ago, almost as far away as Takmou. Rememebering is as difficult as using a tiny thread to pull a huge fish from a bottomless river.
Familiar sounds filter through; my spirit has left my body and gazes into this thick cocoon. I surrender into peacefulness, maybe this at last is my death.
A tiny lavendar butterfly brushes lightly against the dark cocoon. Her near transparent wings whish as she lightly lands atop the darkness, just off center to the right. Her wings flitter in miniscule movements up and down. I imagine that she must have a bee’s stinger because it appears as if she is driving a thin sharp drill into the darkness.
Behind my eyes a brilliant yellow disk, with rivets like the margins of songs on a vinyl record. Strands and small pebbles of black
“Kim, Wake up!”
I open my eyes. Sister is sitting beside me on the bamboosl slats. Her face appears distorted, as if I am viewing her through asilly waved mirror. It expands, shrinks, stretches taut, bends ... impossibly grotesque.
“I thought I was dead,” I whisper. “Everything was black.”
“Chicken blindness,” she says. Night blindness.”
Her voice is total fear. What is it, I wonder. She worries that now she has to take care of me? She worries that I am getting too sick and won’t be able to work? But I see no worry in her eyes. Only frustration, maybe anger.
I sit up quickly and try to stand. I have to show her I can take care of myself.
The room spins around me like I am caught inside a small tornado. I reach for the wall to support me. Even before I feel the earth settle still beneath my feet, she is already out the door.
“Don’t be late,” she calls back. “We don’t want any trouble.”
Chicken blindness soon becomes almost comforting. Most days, my vision clears with the growing sunlight as we walk to the fields. I begin looking forward to these sightless hours; it feels safe inside my black cocoon, far away from the horrors of life around me. Even my memories are lost. I feel free. Everyone acts as if I am not even there.
My chicken eyes have not been with me long as I rush one evening back from the pond, so angry that there is not enough water left to even wash myself. The sun is setting, already darkness swells behind my eyes. Maybe I have a fever, maybe I am possessed by some wicked spirit. Because when I see my neighbor with his two children, I loose my head.
“They say they make our country better,” I say, as I approach them. “The country is not better! Now we have no water to take a bath. How can they do this?”
Right away, I know this is a mistake, their silence is so loud. My neighbor turns away as if he doesn't recognize me. Then I notice the young man standing with them. Some stranger. Whatever, I think. Just someone new to the camp.
Two weeks go by. I am sitting in front of my house. Two Khmer officers walk from the dining tent.
“Oh, somebody is in trouble,” I think. “Somebody else will disappear today.”
The Army officers are getting closer. Hut by hut, everyone looks so happy as they pass by, realizing they are safe. But now they are right in front of my home. My blood turns to ice. Big grasshoppers bounce in heart. My teeth click click click.
Two big shadows stop in front of me. I can feel my eyes roll back in my head in horror.
“You come to Kamatoo right now,” one of them says. I look up. He is so ugly, a big broken nose, a face pocked like plucked chicken.A big, big belly.
“Nothing is wrong.” The other solder is tall and skinny, not like me, more normal skinny and he smiles as he reaches down and grabs my arm.
“Major just wants to talk to you about school.”
I dig my feet into the brittle soil. Struggle against this man so hard. Where does this energy come from?
“No school for me. I do not want to die.” I scream and my sisters run outside and grab onto each other. I fight these horrible men. Fight for my life. All this time, I think I do not want to go on, I want to leave this body, I pray that my eyes do not open. Why do I want to live so bad now? So strange, I think. So strange that you fight so hard. What for? You are only going to die anyway.
“You don’t want me, Big mistake. Please. Who will take care of my little sister?”
“Go with them,” big sister cries. “Just a couple of days and you'll come home. You have to go.”
I know she doesn't believe this. She is trying to comfort me, to comfort herself.
***
We walk, rice field after rice field, single file, one in front, one in back. The sun sinks in the sky. Oh, how I want Mae. Where is she now? I m so tired, my legs are so weak. I stumble, fall to the ground. Need rest.
“Go, go.” The soldier behind me is very impatient. He wants me to walk faster.
I fall again and grab onto weeds but he rip me up and pushes me forward with the butt of his rifle.
Now finally my tears, too, are frightened away.
“Don’t hurt me, please. Don’t hurt me.”
We walk maybe half a day before arriving at a giant temple. A rush of hope, of happy childhood days enlivens me. Maybe it is not so bad, I think. Maybe it is some kind of school after all.
They push me up the steps and through the large door. All I can think about is water.
The smell of stale rotten air gags me as we enter. Nothing in my life could have prepared me for this.
Line after line of college students sit on the floor, legs in front of them. Long chains stretch from one end of the temple to the other, binding their cuffed feet together, like small dried fish rotting in a can, packed tight against each other.
Death faces. Hundreds and hundreds of death faces.
Tortured screams cut through the air from behind a huge Buddha near the back of the temple. The death faces do no change as behind them a man is dragged outside still screaming.
The soldiers push me down at the end of a row near the middle of the room. They do not chain my feet.
Oh, I do not know how I can sit here with this terror, just waiting for death. I pray. I call out to Mae, "Take me away, Come back for me, Mae."
This is a mistake. When mayor sees me he will know. He will be angry with the guardds for wasting his time. He'll send me home. Oh, my sisters will be so happy. They will teat me the best. Share more of their food with me. Everyone in the camp will be so happy.
It is night when the guards finally bring us rice and dried fish. I fall asleep and wake up later when something hits me in the back. I sit up and feel around in the darkness until my fingers curl aroud the familiar shape of a mango.
In the morning I eat mango with rice. No one else eating, though. They are all too sick. Close to dying. Do I have death face, too? How would I know this? I have not seen my face in years.
When they finally come for me, I know where they are taking me; back behind the Buddha, into the torture room. A big man stands in front of me.
“Uncle, please don’t hurt me. Please.” I place my hands under my chin. “Whatever I said, I didn't mean anything. I am just so hungry, so starving.”
He doesn't care what I say. He only wants to ask me about my life before the camps.
“My husband was a rhickshaw man.” I just repeat and repeat this, time after time as e tries to trip me up in my story.
‘I sold fruit, sometimes clothes.”
They ask so many questions. I know they want to hit me. But they know I am going to die soon. Why bother?
Finally, the big man waves me away.
We leave the torture room and the guards let me go outside to the bathroom. I see two naked men whose arms and legs are chained to the temple wall. And then I see that man, that man from the camp who had been with my neighbor. He smiles at me. He is a spy. He told them about me. Oh, I am so stupid.
Next day the guards take me again behind the Buddha.
“Mut,” the mayor says. “You are going to tell us the truth or you will die like the others.”
“No truth to tell, uncle. This is a big mistake. Please, don’t hurt me.”
They wrap my head in plastic bag and stretch it tight across my face, "Tell the truth or you die."
My hands tear at the plastic. My breath sucks the fabric deep into my throat.
I look out behind mask, everything is so slow. Why are they screaming at me? Why are they twisting my fingers, kicking my legs with their filthy feet? Suddenly I feel so peaceful inside. I Just want to sleep now. No pain. My eyes are closing.
I dream about Mae. She is right beside me. My finger hurts so bad and she comes and blows on it.
I hear someone calling me and open my eyes. I am back among the death faces in the temple.
“I thought you were dead.” A ghost-girl is sitting beside me. Where is Mae? I look down at my finger, feel her breath. Then I close my eyes again, go home to my mother.
They come for me one more time. Ask the same questions but they don't use the plastic bag again. The Mayor tell me to take buckets of shit and dump them outside. Two buckets, but I am so weak I need two hands for each bucket.
The big man is gone when I return. A guard yells “Wash your hands. Come with me.”
We are on a bicycle now.
“Where are you taking me? Where are we going?” He doesn't answer, just keeps pedaling.
“Where you think you going?” he finally ask. I look and look around me. I am so frightened I have no idea where I am. Time goes by and I just flop back and forth on the back of that bike, like an old rag doll.
“Oh, look at that tree there. It looks like we are near my house. Are we near my camp?”
The guard thinks I am crazy because we are right next to my house and I don't even recognize things.
the guard takes me to the leader's house. I lam ucky, he say. From now on be careful. Next time I will not be so lucky.
I walk home. Oh so many people are happy to see me, so many tears and hugs. I didn't realize how many people even know me.
I pull away from these strangers, They scare me. They look like monkeys. They turned into monkeys while I was gone. What happened? Maybe I do not belong here anymore.
“You don't know me, Dong? I am your sister.”
One of the monkeys takes my arm, she is crying so hard. “We thought we'd never see you again.”
I am so confused.
“Where's Mae? I want to see Mae.”
“Mae is dead. Don't you remember?"
What does she know, my sister? How could she know that Mae visited me? I will just keep my secret. Pretend I am really coming home. I remember this place but it is from so long ago, almost as far away as Takmou. Rememebering is as difficult as using a tiny thread to pull a huge fish from a bottomless river.
Sick
Noise chattering teeth wake me. Heavy heat press down on me like turtle shell. Trapped inside thick black blanket freeze with fever. Too guilty to call sister. She need all her strength. Enough to work for both of us now. Pull damp skirt up around waist. Pee through bamboo mat.
No shame, too sick.
Lie still, listen heavy rain. Like every time, worry what if this time eyes stay sleeping? Wide awake terror rush into body, hard to breathe.
For weeks we work in vast rain chest-high water fix broken damn. Need water for next rice crop. Big boss sit and watch us work. See him point to me, ask question to man next to him. Maybe twenty times I fall in rushing water. Only carry one small block clay each time. Too weak, I no help. What he do with me? Big noise as wall of mud slide free from bank. Big boss distracted, look away.
I safe for now.
Each day we eat lunch in field beside the damn. no break from the work. Wash clothes at night, still damp, heavy with mud each morning.
Rain no stop. Every day just after noon I get fever, shaking “ooh, so cold” .then burn with heat
Now too sick to work. Just lie on mat. Sometimes Ta comes to see me, sneak me a couple dry fish. He never talk, just leave food. Crawl over to egg-size piece dry fish wrapped in banana. Enough food for week.
Sometimes my neighbor bring me lunch. More dry fish. Add to dry rice, soak in water. Oh, so hungry. Food all I think about. Sometimes so hungry I eat rain for energy.
“Why you so scared,” I ask myself. “What worse could happen? They kill you because you blind? That a blessing.”
Sound nearby distract me. Woman crying. She call to her mother.
“Wake up, Mae. Wake up.”
She live three huts away. Like me, her mother too sick to work for long time now. Last time I see her, her legs swollen big, skin cracked like dry bark dying stump old oak tree. No way she live long. Her spirit ready to leave. Who want to be that person now? She all dried out, brown inside, no branches left.
Crying, crying, so loud. Want to warn her. “Stop now or they take you, too. Why you carry on so? You had your mom much longer than we did. You lucky.”
So angry. She wake everyone, now everyone tired at work. She so selfish.
Smell of rotting earth, mildew, my pee so powerful I feel stomach in throat. Hot, burning. I turn my head, vomit hot bile.
Sister sleep through everything. When she wake in morning, she notice nothing, smell nothing. She leave bowl hot rice water, Not word.
Much later. So hot. I crawl to open door for air. Older woman walk by. Oh, someone to help me.
“Wait, wait,” Maybe I delirious, I reach out arm. “Will you be my mom?” She has mean face, deep lines, mouth curved down, muddy thin legs. She pass, not even look at me.
Crying dry tears… crying when they come with cart and take neighbor’s body away. She come home to empty house tonight. Now she like me, no life to live for.
Much later I open eyes. Green lizard in mint tree. Just outside. Maybe my body no move, but hunger still move inside me.
“Oh, you lizard, I going to eat you.” That lizard, he know he safe. He play in that tree, tease me forever. No danger from me.
Deep inside just want to die. Sleep, Wake up. Still here. Still starving. Still here.
Only couple day and sister carry me to hospital where Mae die.
“My sister no swallow food,” she say. Then she leave for work.Not even hug me good-bye ,she know what happen to people in hospital. Maybe never see me again.
***
Nurse use herbs and incense burn nine holes on my stomach. My throat so hot, gas come up. Only rice come out. Body stop digesting food. Burn my stomach two more times, get better.
Why you make me better? Why you not let me die? Why you want me live so hungry? This not living. Better dead.
Lie in bed day after day watching ducks through slats in hospital floor. Quacking big plump white ducks. You just like green salamander, you mean ducks. You know you safe from me. Give me strength to catch you like I catch sister’s chicken. You be so good in soup. When not watching ducks look out into field outside hospital. Every day see Group leader Pong leave with empty sac and head out on long trip across fieds.
Pong many jobs. He mind cows, herd cattle and collect food. I watch every day from hospital; he come home with all sorts of things. Big sack of vegetables. He feed family. His wife so strong, she monster.
“You sick today?” she ask. “Okay, okay. No problem. Just stay home. But no eat.” This what she do with Mae. This how she treat eveyone.
Soon I know exactly what time Pong return. See him from far away. Big sack of food over shoulder. One day I find cane, walk out sit under a tree wait for him. He see me and stop. Give me all kinds of vegetable. Ah, so good, eating sour tamarind before they ripe.
Few days later very very sick man lying on mat beside me. So much pain he cry out every minute. Oh,he going to die soon. Nurse come over, give him something round and black, like Hershey kiss. Very quick he silent, making soft sounds now. He change like that,not same sick anguish man see before.
“What she give you?”
“Something help me go to bathroom. When I go only puss and blood.This helping me.” Then he just fall asleep.
Everyday, sometimes two times nurse give man this hershey kiss medicine. He become so happy. He even start talking to me.
So one day I see nurse come and start groan.
“Oh my stomach hurt so bad. When I poo only blood.”
She give me small piece of medicine. It tastes so good and so I ask again and again. Finally, I give man all of my tamarind and he give me a few magic kisses. Soon I feel so good. Think I too drunk. Fall asleep. Nurses think I am dead. Sister comes to see me and still I sleep. When I wake up find out secret; magic kisses marijuana.
***
I stronger every day and then so hungry. I work around cafeteria so can eat extra food. After they clean fish I say “Oh, don’t throw that away, I take it.” Gather fish heads, skin, liver and make soup. Someone tell me liver help eyes. Soon I see again.
I one of lucky ones, I guess. Soon I leave hospital. Walk home so slow. Nothing there for me anyway.
***
Year One
Oh, how I want to eat clams. There is a small shallow pond green with algae and I walk in and see clams. I start to pick them out of the water.
“What are you doing in there? Get out, get out,” someone call.
I ignore and continue to gather clams.
My sister and I sent to a place far away from our home. The KR are not too strict anymore. After work, you can go find whatever you want to eat. Usually, the men go to find food for the women but we have no man in our family. My sister goes with a neighbor. It is so hot, you have to rest two hours after you eat.
The men tell us to go to the creek. The mud comes up above your knees and dyou stand there until you see a bubble. That means there is a fish underneath. But I am so weak, it is hard for me to walk that far and then when I arrive I get stuck in the mud. I see a big fish, as big as your calf.
“That fish, that fish. My fish,” I call out. I see a man I know from a long time ago, from the train ride to Battambang. He is a mean man. One time he killed his own dog and made a curry. “Can you get it for me? Can you help me?”
He looks over in my direction and sees the fish. He wades over through the mud and grabs it. He walks away. I walk home empty handed, alongside all these men with buckets full of fish. I am so sad. You think a god or angel take care of me because as I am walking around the big cow footprints I suddenly see a fish as big as half an arm swimming in the black water of a cow hole.
I saw a fish big as half arm, swim a little in cow hole. My fish! I catch it and carry it home.
Winter walk to lake to clean,
I have to slide down to get bath and I have to climb up …
I cannot climb too high. Sit down by bamboo gtree and I saw a different, shiney black and fat he is across from me. I got a bamboo stick, oh today
I hity himn with stick on head. One twice nothing he run away.
What they hell you want to eat that thnng? Sister.
The shrimp and we not too hungry anymore. People saying amazing happen. The shrimp in little water. At night shrimp light up and the head of the fish light up too.
The country maybe goihg to be better. For 4 year no birds.
A scarecrow just fly over. I think going to be better.
Things likght up at night.
My group say okay we have to go to the mountain only old people don’t go and just have baby.
Where are we going? 10-15 people walked 2-3 days to get there. We sleep under cow wagon. Nobody youch anybody.
Me and my sister always together. They tell us to go into jungle woods. You have to build tent. We buld all together tent. We sleep on bamboo. Very like party. Don’t have private kitchen. Bowl soup full bowl 2x a day they give uyou lunch and dinner.d
I say okay who ever take care of this mountain, my friend, when yhou get into mtn,, yuou get lost so easy. Go to clean, cut. I think they want to kill you.
I walk by myself, if you want me to be alive you make sure yuou don’t make me hungry. You make me die. You better stop make me hungry. Make me very sick so I can go to clinic again. 2 days im complaining. 3rd day eat at night, I cannot get up and I just lay dowsn there. I hear cannot get up, cannot hear.
2 days my sister feed me a little bit. They take me carry me hammock nylong to cinic, in mountain. Penon Takpoo .
thousands of thousands of peole move everyone to mountains. Clinic, hd to poop. Carried me to toilet. She have to hold me to pee to poop. No bone.
I sleep, whatever
I hear they make somethingh for me to eat. Long vegetable.
They put worm in vegetable, and burn until soft, ddrink it.
Dropper for 7 days, took me back to
Have meeting and people get married, big meeting and then they say today we have 10 couples (singel teenagert at least 10-20 couples) they build them a small house and they give them brand new KR and black panst and black shirts.
On the way frojm mountain I am in a cow wagon with 2 other nurses one man and one woman, man controled wagaon and woman sat with me. I am sleeping. I remember they cross all snall little creek. I got so wet for lunch time they stop at this house. They park under the tree. After they eat they come to ask me, you hungry, I open eyes, I shake my head and open my eyes yes.
White rice, I was shaking and soup with sour fish … that thing saved my life. They so mad. They think I am fakikngn. I feel I have more energy. I lay back. When you are in a coma you hear, my spirit go so deep and deep in jungle, when I hear someone call my name, I come back. Keep going. See all the trees, just go and go… shaking me or nurse want to …. Come back but I cannot talk.
After eat take whole day to come to my house. But me in KR clinic. Thjey still hage a couple nurse in there. Stay thre every day I can come go round find some veg cook own food. The whole town is empty so
Get better and better.
We hear buns I go to my housel. Neighbor say some peole heave sound of gun. Where th gun come from
Maybe things going to be better.
My neighbor who had babies they made chicken soup, you know how to make a chicken soup,. I cook outside. When soup is done one the guys put marijuana in soup. I eat the most b ecause I am always hungry. Afater I eat I sleep the whole day and then by that time the vietnames come comde to Bakenbaum. Neighbor say hey you get up.
The kr startt to escape. They open up the stockade of food. Wow, I cannot get up.
You don’t get up, vn come maybe they going to kill you.
Go to place stock all food.
I sew backpack. 5 can of rice
It is almost night time; we better run. Run where? We better stick together because when the vn come, they buried a man and
Buried man 3 h3ad and build fire, make tea, when cambodian man get too hot. Don’t move you are gfoing to spill my water.
Thai -ong
1979 vn
comed and
polpot? Pol pot? They pass us through. “dee dee’ (go,go)
we run and hear the guns.
Mountain peole relese us.
We ran the whole night. After second night I saw my sister. KR escape
Oh lets run back to the mountain. But the moutain ran bnac to us so we meet each other.
By that tikme we have a loty of food. We are free
We go home. We found an empty house. After that a lot of peple don’t come home. Two sisters.
By that time we can have a lot of rice and we went to find rice so I got big bag of rice. Very first time we cook own food first time free to do whatever you want You are with 2 and 6; , not seen £1, 3 or number 5
Ta come home too. No more involve with him because ta and ye together
I go to take a bath in a lake because I have to go. Tgry to avoid him.
One time I saw 3 or 4 dry fish; he just drop off and gone. I saw dry fish, I told 2 sister, I don’t want to eat these fish because ta put spirfits in them. He make me fall in love.
Oh why don’t yhou cross it 3x?
A no I am going to throw these awsay. I don’t want to get crazy.
Ok, you don’t want to eat. Let me eat.”
Younger sister, now a lot of man go to the lake aboutg a couple day to go there a lot of fish and you stay here you wait for me im going to go get a couple men and go with them and get some fish.
She left for a couple of days. I go to my neighbor and give them a coin and massage, and after I do it they gave me food.
Tjhis one famliy she like sister to me. She married she has husband, who is very good with finding food she have d2 sons. After we got free she got a lot of rice and gold necklaces. While my sister to to get fish, her husband come back home to visitg all gthe friend here,
Husband says she is in bb and wants to see. Neighbor says oh we want to go because her father is over there too. Lets go tomorrow.
1 thailand
3 man excaped to thailand
5 somewhere ???
2 and 6 in combodia. Home home.
No shame, too sick.
Lie still, listen heavy rain. Like every time, worry what if this time eyes stay sleeping? Wide awake terror rush into body, hard to breathe.
For weeks we work in vast rain chest-high water fix broken damn. Need water for next rice crop. Big boss sit and watch us work. See him point to me, ask question to man next to him. Maybe twenty times I fall in rushing water. Only carry one small block clay each time. Too weak, I no help. What he do with me? Big noise as wall of mud slide free from bank. Big boss distracted, look away.
I safe for now.
Each day we eat lunch in field beside the damn. no break from the work. Wash clothes at night, still damp, heavy with mud each morning.
Rain no stop. Every day just after noon I get fever, shaking “ooh, so cold” .then burn with heat
Now too sick to work. Just lie on mat. Sometimes Ta comes to see me, sneak me a couple dry fish. He never talk, just leave food. Crawl over to egg-size piece dry fish wrapped in banana. Enough food for week.
Sometimes my neighbor bring me lunch. More dry fish. Add to dry rice, soak in water. Oh, so hungry. Food all I think about. Sometimes so hungry I eat rain for energy.
“Why you so scared,” I ask myself. “What worse could happen? They kill you because you blind? That a blessing.”
Sound nearby distract me. Woman crying. She call to her mother.
“Wake up, Mae. Wake up.”
She live three huts away. Like me, her mother too sick to work for long time now. Last time I see her, her legs swollen big, skin cracked like dry bark dying stump old oak tree. No way she live long. Her spirit ready to leave. Who want to be that person now? She all dried out, brown inside, no branches left.
Crying, crying, so loud. Want to warn her. “Stop now or they take you, too. Why you carry on so? You had your mom much longer than we did. You lucky.”
So angry. She wake everyone, now everyone tired at work. She so selfish.
Smell of rotting earth, mildew, my pee so powerful I feel stomach in throat. Hot, burning. I turn my head, vomit hot bile.
Sister sleep through everything. When she wake in morning, she notice nothing, smell nothing. She leave bowl hot rice water, Not word.
Much later. So hot. I crawl to open door for air. Older woman walk by. Oh, someone to help me.
“Wait, wait,” Maybe I delirious, I reach out arm. “Will you be my mom?” She has mean face, deep lines, mouth curved down, muddy thin legs. She pass, not even look at me.
Crying dry tears… crying when they come with cart and take neighbor’s body away. She come home to empty house tonight. Now she like me, no life to live for.
Much later I open eyes. Green lizard in mint tree. Just outside. Maybe my body no move, but hunger still move inside me.
“Oh, you lizard, I going to eat you.” That lizard, he know he safe. He play in that tree, tease me forever. No danger from me.
Deep inside just want to die. Sleep, Wake up. Still here. Still starving. Still here.
Only couple day and sister carry me to hospital where Mae die.
“My sister no swallow food,” she say. Then she leave for work.Not even hug me good-bye ,she know what happen to people in hospital. Maybe never see me again.
***
Nurse use herbs and incense burn nine holes on my stomach. My throat so hot, gas come up. Only rice come out. Body stop digesting food. Burn my stomach two more times, get better.
Why you make me better? Why you not let me die? Why you want me live so hungry? This not living. Better dead.
Lie in bed day after day watching ducks through slats in hospital floor. Quacking big plump white ducks. You just like green salamander, you mean ducks. You know you safe from me. Give me strength to catch you like I catch sister’s chicken. You be so good in soup. When not watching ducks look out into field outside hospital. Every day see Group leader Pong leave with empty sac and head out on long trip across fieds.
Pong many jobs. He mind cows, herd cattle and collect food. I watch every day from hospital; he come home with all sorts of things. Big sack of vegetables. He feed family. His wife so strong, she monster.
“You sick today?” she ask. “Okay, okay. No problem. Just stay home. But no eat.” This what she do with Mae. This how she treat eveyone.
Soon I know exactly what time Pong return. See him from far away. Big sack of food over shoulder. One day I find cane, walk out sit under a tree wait for him. He see me and stop. Give me all kinds of vegetable. Ah, so good, eating sour tamarind before they ripe.
Few days later very very sick man lying on mat beside me. So much pain he cry out every minute. Oh,he going to die soon. Nurse come over, give him something round and black, like Hershey kiss. Very quick he silent, making soft sounds now. He change like that,not same sick anguish man see before.
“What she give you?”
“Something help me go to bathroom. When I go only puss and blood.This helping me.” Then he just fall asleep.
Everyday, sometimes two times nurse give man this hershey kiss medicine. He become so happy. He even start talking to me.
So one day I see nurse come and start groan.
“Oh my stomach hurt so bad. When I poo only blood.”
She give me small piece of medicine. It tastes so good and so I ask again and again. Finally, I give man all of my tamarind and he give me a few magic kisses. Soon I feel so good. Think I too drunk. Fall asleep. Nurses think I am dead. Sister comes to see me and still I sleep. When I wake up find out secret; magic kisses marijuana.
***
I stronger every day and then so hungry. I work around cafeteria so can eat extra food. After they clean fish I say “Oh, don’t throw that away, I take it.” Gather fish heads, skin, liver and make soup. Someone tell me liver help eyes. Soon I see again.
I one of lucky ones, I guess. Soon I leave hospital. Walk home so slow. Nothing there for me anyway.
***
Year One
Oh, how I want to eat clams. There is a small shallow pond green with algae and I walk in and see clams. I start to pick them out of the water.
“What are you doing in there? Get out, get out,” someone call.
I ignore and continue to gather clams.
My sister and I sent to a place far away from our home. The KR are not too strict anymore. After work, you can go find whatever you want to eat. Usually, the men go to find food for the women but we have no man in our family. My sister goes with a neighbor. It is so hot, you have to rest two hours after you eat.
The men tell us to go to the creek. The mud comes up above your knees and dyou stand there until you see a bubble. That means there is a fish underneath. But I am so weak, it is hard for me to walk that far and then when I arrive I get stuck in the mud. I see a big fish, as big as your calf.
“That fish, that fish. My fish,” I call out. I see a man I know from a long time ago, from the train ride to Battambang. He is a mean man. One time he killed his own dog and made a curry. “Can you get it for me? Can you help me?”
He looks over in my direction and sees the fish. He wades over through the mud and grabs it. He walks away. I walk home empty handed, alongside all these men with buckets full of fish. I am so sad. You think a god or angel take care of me because as I am walking around the big cow footprints I suddenly see a fish as big as half an arm swimming in the black water of a cow hole.
I saw a fish big as half arm, swim a little in cow hole. My fish! I catch it and carry it home.
Winter walk to lake to clean,
I have to slide down to get bath and I have to climb up …
I cannot climb too high. Sit down by bamboo gtree and I saw a different, shiney black and fat he is across from me. I got a bamboo stick, oh today
I hity himn with stick on head. One twice nothing he run away.
What they hell you want to eat that thnng? Sister.
The shrimp and we not too hungry anymore. People saying amazing happen. The shrimp in little water. At night shrimp light up and the head of the fish light up too.
The country maybe goihg to be better. For 4 year no birds.
A scarecrow just fly over. I think going to be better.
Things likght up at night.
My group say okay we have to go to the mountain only old people don’t go and just have baby.
Where are we going? 10-15 people walked 2-3 days to get there. We sleep under cow wagon. Nobody youch anybody.
Me and my sister always together. They tell us to go into jungle woods. You have to build tent. We buld all together tent. We sleep on bamboo. Very like party. Don’t have private kitchen. Bowl soup full bowl 2x a day they give uyou lunch and dinner.d
I say okay who ever take care of this mountain, my friend, when yhou get into mtn,, yuou get lost so easy. Go to clean, cut. I think they want to kill you.
I walk by myself, if you want me to be alive you make sure yuou don’t make me hungry. You make me die. You better stop make me hungry. Make me very sick so I can go to clinic again. 2 days im complaining. 3rd day eat at night, I cannot get up and I just lay dowsn there. I hear cannot get up, cannot hear.
2 days my sister feed me a little bit. They take me carry me hammock nylong to cinic, in mountain. Penon Takpoo .
thousands of thousands of peole move everyone to mountains. Clinic, hd to poop. Carried me to toilet. She have to hold me to pee to poop. No bone.
I sleep, whatever
I hear they make somethingh for me to eat. Long vegetable.
They put worm in vegetable, and burn until soft, ddrink it.
Dropper for 7 days, took me back to
Have meeting and people get married, big meeting and then they say today we have 10 couples (singel teenagert at least 10-20 couples) they build them a small house and they give them brand new KR and black panst and black shirts.
On the way frojm mountain I am in a cow wagon with 2 other nurses one man and one woman, man controled wagaon and woman sat with me. I am sleeping. I remember they cross all snall little creek. I got so wet for lunch time they stop at this house. They park under the tree. After they eat they come to ask me, you hungry, I open eyes, I shake my head and open my eyes yes.
White rice, I was shaking and soup with sour fish … that thing saved my life. They so mad. They think I am fakikngn. I feel I have more energy. I lay back. When you are in a coma you hear, my spirit go so deep and deep in jungle, when I hear someone call my name, I come back. Keep going. See all the trees, just go and go… shaking me or nurse want to …. Come back but I cannot talk.
After eat take whole day to come to my house. But me in KR clinic. Thjey still hage a couple nurse in there. Stay thre every day I can come go round find some veg cook own food. The whole town is empty so
Get better and better.
We hear buns I go to my housel. Neighbor say some peole heave sound of gun. Where th gun come from
Maybe things going to be better.
My neighbor who had babies they made chicken soup, you know how to make a chicken soup,. I cook outside. When soup is done one the guys put marijuana in soup. I eat the most b ecause I am always hungry. Afater I eat I sleep the whole day and then by that time the vietnames come comde to Bakenbaum. Neighbor say hey you get up.
The kr startt to escape. They open up the stockade of food. Wow, I cannot get up.
You don’t get up, vn come maybe they going to kill you.
Go to place stock all food.
I sew backpack. 5 can of rice
It is almost night time; we better run. Run where? We better stick together because when the vn come, they buried a man and
Buried man 3 h3ad and build fire, make tea, when cambodian man get too hot. Don’t move you are gfoing to spill my water.
Thai -ong
1979 vn
comed and
polpot? Pol pot? They pass us through. “dee dee’ (go,go)
we run and hear the guns.
Mountain peole relese us.
We ran the whole night. After second night I saw my sister. KR escape
Oh lets run back to the mountain. But the moutain ran bnac to us so we meet each other.
By that tikme we have a loty of food. We are free
We go home. We found an empty house. After that a lot of peple don’t come home. Two sisters.
By that time we can have a lot of rice and we went to find rice so I got big bag of rice. Very first time we cook own food first time free to do whatever you want You are with 2 and 6; , not seen £1, 3 or number 5
Ta come home too. No more involve with him because ta and ye together
I go to take a bath in a lake because I have to go. Tgry to avoid him.
One time I saw 3 or 4 dry fish; he just drop off and gone. I saw dry fish, I told 2 sister, I don’t want to eat these fish because ta put spirfits in them. He make me fall in love.
Oh why don’t yhou cross it 3x?
A no I am going to throw these awsay. I don’t want to get crazy.
Ok, you don’t want to eat. Let me eat.”
Younger sister, now a lot of man go to the lake aboutg a couple day to go there a lot of fish and you stay here you wait for me im going to go get a couple men and go with them and get some fish.
She left for a couple of days. I go to my neighbor and give them a coin and massage, and after I do it they gave me food.
Tjhis one famliy she like sister to me. She married she has husband, who is very good with finding food she have d2 sons. After we got free she got a lot of rice and gold necklaces. While my sister to to get fish, her husband come back home to visitg all gthe friend here,
Husband says she is in bb and wants to see. Neighbor says oh we want to go because her father is over there too. Lets go tomorrow.
1 thailand
3 man excaped to thailand
5 somewhere ???
2 and 6 in combodia. Home home.
Home & Departure
Back home
Friend let me borrow one of her new sarongs. I wear it when I decide to walk to Battambang with her friend. She going to see daughter. I want to see Battambang. So pretty, everyone say. Number one city,
So far walk for 2 nights and 3 days. Everytme it is too hot we cannot walk, sleep under tree of empty house.
Wow! Big temple. Go inside and find friend. She so happy to see me. I am so tired I cannot walk anymore so when it time to go back I say no, too sore. Come back later. Give her sarong to bring back with her. Send message to sister “come here, big city. We buy big bag rice, make living.”
I become maid to friend so she let me stay with her. I cook, clean, shop, give kid shower, give her massage. Wash clothes. One day I ask to borrow some money to do a business for myself.
She cut me a little business. I walk far away to buy oranges. I bring to market and sell to make extra money. Sometimes I buy meat and exchange for rice.
Every night the takes boat across river to watch soap opera with best friend. I not go with her, boatride make me too sick. But I afraid to stay in temple alone at night. So dark.
After couple weeks no more gold for me.
“Time for you to get married and move away,” she say. “Can’t afford to take care of yo anymore.”
Gee my god, what can I do? Where the man can I marry?
No longer pretty young girl. No man want me now. I cannot go back to sister.
Every day she complain not enough gold to keep you. Find new home. SoI start sending notes to the camp to try to contact sister Finally, I see man from camp, ask about sister.
Sister return to Phnom Phen, he say. She go with others, walk for one or two months.
Khmer control the camp, but they don’t know what to do. They so mean.
Friend let me borrow one of her new sarongs. I wear it when I decide to walk to Battambang with her friend. She going to see daughter. I want to see Battambang. So pretty, everyone say. Number one city,
So far walk for 2 nights and 3 days. Everytme it is too hot we cannot walk, sleep under tree of empty house.
Wow! Big temple. Go inside and find friend. She so happy to see me. I am so tired I cannot walk anymore so when it time to go back I say no, too sore. Come back later. Give her sarong to bring back with her. Send message to sister “come here, big city. We buy big bag rice, make living.”
I become maid to friend so she let me stay with her. I cook, clean, shop, give kid shower, give her massage. Wash clothes. One day I ask to borrow some money to do a business for myself.
She cut me a little business. I walk far away to buy oranges. I bring to market and sell to make extra money. Sometimes I buy meat and exchange for rice.
Every night the takes boat across river to watch soap opera with best friend. I not go with her, boatride make me too sick. But I afraid to stay in temple alone at night. So dark.
After couple weeks no more gold for me.
“Time for you to get married and move away,” she say. “Can’t afford to take care of yo anymore.”
Gee my god, what can I do? Where the man can I marry?
No longer pretty young girl. No man want me now. I cannot go back to sister.
Every day she complain not enough gold to keep you. Find new home. SoI start sending notes to the camp to try to contact sister Finally, I see man from camp, ask about sister.
Sister return to Phnom Phen, he say. She go with others, walk for one or two months.
Khmer control the camp, but they don’t know what to do. They so mean.
Sisophan: Arrival
Every day the same. I am maid. I go to lake, carry back water. My knees still not better. I cannot bend down and come up. I take one pot at a time. Carry on my shoulder. Back and forth two or three times. Then Fix food. After she eat, sleep.
I have no place to go. I know she not want me anymore.
One day I am carrying water. Just so tired. I hear a someone call out my name.
“Bong!”
I turn and see young man hurry toward me. “Remember me, Bong? Remember me? From Phnom Phen?”
It my aunt’s son Sealion, the boy who once drove around the city with us in a fancy car, eating ice cream by the lake.
Oh, I start to cry. Finding family. They like my family.
We both so happy to find each other.
“Come with me, I take you to meet my mom.” He grab my pot of water and we walk together. My aunt live just behind temple. When I walk in she cry so hard. We all cry.
“Where your family? “She ask.
I tell her about Mae and Ba, about my two children. About my sisters’ children. About camp. She lost 3 of her seven children.
I tell her about where I am living in the temple, about how I am working for this woman. Trying to find a place to stay.
That all over now, she tell me. You come to live with me now. You come and you be like an older sister to Siphal.
Oh my life so happy. Aunt has a lot of gold. I take care of them, cook, watch Siphal.
Country full of Vietnamese army. We see them everywhere, when we go to the wells to clean our clothes, when we shop in markets for food and clothes. Siphal 18 now. Her skin so white soldiers love her skin. Soldiers always staring at her. I have to protect her, be body guard.
We in Battambang few months when Sea Lion tells about camp near border of Thailand. He say maybe if you lucky you get to leave and go to United States. Every day more news. Aunt decides we leave for Sisophan near the border. She rent a horse with a wagon for three of us. Horse so wild knock me out of wagon into mud.
Sea Lion already there.
I have no place to go. I know she not want me anymore.
One day I am carrying water. Just so tired. I hear a someone call out my name.
“Bong!”
I turn and see young man hurry toward me. “Remember me, Bong? Remember me? From Phnom Phen?”
It my aunt’s son Sealion, the boy who once drove around the city with us in a fancy car, eating ice cream by the lake.
Oh, I start to cry. Finding family. They like my family.
We both so happy to find each other.
“Come with me, I take you to meet my mom.” He grab my pot of water and we walk together. My aunt live just behind temple. When I walk in she cry so hard. We all cry.
“Where your family? “She ask.
I tell her about Mae and Ba, about my two children. About my sisters’ children. About camp. She lost 3 of her seven children.
I tell her about where I am living in the temple, about how I am working for this woman. Trying to find a place to stay.
That all over now, she tell me. You come to live with me now. You come and you be like an older sister to Siphal.
Oh my life so happy. Aunt has a lot of gold. I take care of them, cook, watch Siphal.
Country full of Vietnamese army. We see them everywhere, when we go to the wells to clean our clothes, when we shop in markets for food and clothes. Siphal 18 now. Her skin so white soldiers love her skin. Soldiers always staring at her. I have to protect her, be body guard.
We in Battambang few months when Sea Lion tells about camp near border of Thailand. He say maybe if you lucky you get to leave and go to United States. Every day more news. Aunt decides we leave for Sisophan near the border. She rent a horse with a wagon for three of us. Horse so wild knock me out of wagon into mud.
Sea Lion already there.
Sisophan: Departure
J and I return from shoping Sea Lion sitting beside Aunt. He so excited. He going to join small group of people travel to refugee camp on Thailand border. Many people going to buy supplies, bring back to families here. He leave today.
Aunt very nervous. Word comes from two of Sea Lion’s friends that he safe, journey not so dangerous.
Now my turn, Aunt say. She want me to travel to refugee camp where Sea Lion waits, buy big bag of rice and carry it home for us. She tie a sliver of gold in small sac give it to me.
Leave early in the morning and walk across ponds. Sea Lion’s friends so fast. Ponds so deep they take off pants to get across. Water up to my chest.
I already so tired. We walk into jungle. Sea Lion’s friends too fast for me. They leave me behind. A lot of people escape now, they walk past me to and from the camp, some carry groceries back to Sisophan to trade.
Later day group of men sit near me. I move closer but they do not want to talk to me. They share little bit rice with me. Group come by heading to Battambang.
“Be careful,” they say. You have to run so fast. The Vietnamese shoot at you."
***
I stand and look down at her. She so brave. She hurt trying to take care of family.
“I loose my family. My daughter, my son. Mae and Ba. You so lucky. Not alone.”
I do not think she hear me anymore. She lay down, close her eyes
"You stay on path with others.Jungle full of mines. Still long way to go.”
I walk until sunset, still in jungle. Not think I ever get there.
“Oh my god, why don’t you push me a little bit harder? I cannot walk. My eyes not see so good anymore”
What that? I stop to listen. Music, music from a radio. Not too far..
So happy. Don’t know where energy come from. Jungle behind me. Land clear, no longer so dark. I walk so fast, trip over my feet. Finally, camp in front of me. People everywhere. Even hear laughter. I walk down aisle after aisle of people, little sqres of families. Looking for Sea Lion.
So dark now. Finally, I find him. He hug me, happy to see me.
“Why it take you so long” “
He take me to section of camp where he has bedding. “You rest here, I get some food for us.”
All around me people talk, babies cry. I not used to so much noise. I smell food cooking. But I so tired. I lie down on Sea Lion’s mat.close my eyes. When I open them again, sun is high in sky. Bowl of rice and vegetables. Large bucket of water and cup. I look around. What is this new world? All these people? Like me? Still alive. I try to sit up but too weak. My legs on fire. I lie there and reach out for vegetables. Too weak to eat, Just close eyes again. Safe for now.
Aunt very nervous. Word comes from two of Sea Lion’s friends that he safe, journey not so dangerous.
Now my turn, Aunt say. She want me to travel to refugee camp where Sea Lion waits, buy big bag of rice and carry it home for us. She tie a sliver of gold in small sac give it to me.
Leave early in the morning and walk across ponds. Sea Lion’s friends so fast. Ponds so deep they take off pants to get across. Water up to my chest.
I already so tired. We walk into jungle. Sea Lion’s friends too fast for me. They leave me behind. A lot of people escape now, they walk past me to and from the camp, some carry groceries back to Sisophan to trade.
Later day group of men sit near me. I move closer but they do not want to talk to me. They share little bit rice with me. Group come by heading to Battambang.
“Be careful,” they say. You have to run so fast. The Vietnamese shoot at you."
***
I stand and look down at her. She so brave. She hurt trying to take care of family.
“I loose my family. My daughter, my son. Mae and Ba. You so lucky. Not alone.”
I do not think she hear me anymore. She lay down, close her eyes
"You stay on path with others.Jungle full of mines. Still long way to go.”
I walk until sunset, still in jungle. Not think I ever get there.
“Oh my god, why don’t you push me a little bit harder? I cannot walk. My eyes not see so good anymore”
What that? I stop to listen. Music, music from a radio. Not too far..
So happy. Don’t know where energy come from. Jungle behind me. Land clear, no longer so dark. I walk so fast, trip over my feet. Finally, camp in front of me. People everywhere. Even hear laughter. I walk down aisle after aisle of people, little sqres of families. Looking for Sea Lion.
So dark now. Finally, I find him. He hug me, happy to see me.
“Why it take you so long” “
He take me to section of camp where he has bedding. “You rest here, I get some food for us.”
All around me people talk, babies cry. I not used to so much noise. I smell food cooking. But I so tired. I lie down on Sea Lion’s mat.close my eyes. When I open them again, sun is high in sky. Bowl of rice and vegetables. Large bucket of water and cup. I look around. What is this new world? All these people? Like me? Still alive. I try to sit up but too weak. My legs on fire. I lie there and reach out for vegetables. Too weak to eat, Just close eyes again. Safe for now.
Escape
Sealion takes me to small camp plastic tarps. He sleep in hammock, I sleep on ground on small towell. It very warm. I hear many people, Khmer Rouge run camp. Rape, rob, kill.
One day at night we hear guns. What happen? It not safe. Some time they fighting, they shooting. That night I heard the fighting. I run with people. Run run run army shooting. Charmunchun and charumthi
Run across the small river, chest high, lose shoe, run barefeet. Run so fast bullets pass me like fire. Don’t know where to go.
Oh my life, why I have to do this every time. Running running running don’t know where to go just running. When you scared you don’t know you hurt your feet. We run across rice fields. So many bullets. Duck, run through them.
I remember fortune teller tell me stranger take care of me. When danger come, when I live in camp, they don’t shoot look like you are in a war zone. You don’t curse when something dangerous come to your life. You don’t curse, don’t say bad things about other people. Don’t think bad things about them. Oh my mother, my father who die praying to your parents to whomever to take care of you.
We are hiding for each other. Poor me no one yell for me. I just come back with people with no shoes, clothing all dirty. I come to place where we sleep. Sealion say oh I am glad you are okay. Where were you? I ran too. We just sit there, look at each other and laugh. Oh my god you cannot live like this….
Tell sealion I come to buy rice and go back home…. Small little piece gold. I get at least 25 lbs of rice. Third day I have to carry rice back to Sisophan That rice so heavy I have to get up so early to carry because when I walk here I walk with no rice, can hardly make it without. He should take the rice there. Got rice on head get outside camp not quarter mile, Cannot walk, it too heavy. I put down rice under big tree. I sit down think. Pass big tree you in jungle. should I get in jungle or go back?Aunt will get mad at me.
Later see somebody walk out from jungle. Some people somebody I know and then I see my aunt and daughter. They come see me sit with bag of rice.
"Bong, bong. We here. You don’t have to carry rice bag."
I born again. So many time life come back to me.
Take rice back camp, we stay together.
One day at night we hear guns. What happen? It not safe. Some time they fighting, they shooting. That night I heard the fighting. I run with people. Run run run army shooting. Charmunchun and charumthi
Run across the small river, chest high, lose shoe, run barefeet. Run so fast bullets pass me like fire. Don’t know where to go.
Oh my life, why I have to do this every time. Running running running don’t know where to go just running. When you scared you don’t know you hurt your feet. We run across rice fields. So many bullets. Duck, run through them.
I remember fortune teller tell me stranger take care of me. When danger come, when I live in camp, they don’t shoot look like you are in a war zone. You don’t curse when something dangerous come to your life. You don’t curse, don’t say bad things about other people. Don’t think bad things about them. Oh my mother, my father who die praying to your parents to whomever to take care of you.
We are hiding for each other. Poor me no one yell for me. I just come back with people with no shoes, clothing all dirty. I come to place where we sleep. Sealion say oh I am glad you are okay. Where were you? I ran too. We just sit there, look at each other and laugh. Oh my god you cannot live like this….
Tell sealion I come to buy rice and go back home…. Small little piece gold. I get at least 25 lbs of rice. Third day I have to carry rice back to Sisophan That rice so heavy I have to get up so early to carry because when I walk here I walk with no rice, can hardly make it without. He should take the rice there. Got rice on head get outside camp not quarter mile, Cannot walk, it too heavy. I put down rice under big tree. I sit down think. Pass big tree you in jungle. should I get in jungle or go back?Aunt will get mad at me.
Later see somebody walk out from jungle. Some people somebody I know and then I see my aunt and daughter. They come see me sit with bag of rice.
"Bong, bong. We here. You don’t have to carry rice bag."
I born again. So many time life come back to me.
Take rice back camp, we stay together.
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