by Loung Ung
Soon it is time for Kim to go off on his own path. He stops us and again repeats Ma’s instructions without emotion. Although he is only twelve his eyes have the look of an old man. Without words of goodbye or good luck, he turns and walks away from us. I want to run to him and put my arms around him, hold him the way I held Pa and Keav in my mind. I don’t know if or when I will ever see him again. I don’t want to bear the sadness of missing him. With my hands clenched into fists by my sides, I stand there and my eyes follow his body until I can no longer see him.
Though it goes against Ma’s warnings, Chou and I cannot separate ourselves so we head off in the same direction. With no food or water, we walk in silence all through the morning as the sun beats down on us. Our eyes look everywhere for signs of human life but find none. All around us, the trees are brown, their green leaves, wilted in the heat of the white sky, hang quietly on the branches. The only sound comes from our feet and the pebbles that roll away from our toes. As the sun climbs above our head, our stomachs grumble in unison, asking for food which of course we don’t have. In silence, Chou and I follow the red dirt trail winding and stretching before us. As our bodies grow tired and weak, we long to sit and rest in the shade, but we force ourselves on; we do not know where or when our trail will end. It is afternoon when we finally see a camp.
The camp consists of six straw-roofed huts, very much like ours, except they are longer and wider. Opposite them are two open huts that are used as the communal kitchen and three smaller huts where the supervisors live. The camp is surrounded by huge vegetable gardens on all sides. In one, about fifty young children squat in a row, pulling weeds and planting vegetables. Another fifty children lined up at the wells are in the process of watering the gardens. Buckets of water are passed from one person to another, the last person with the bucket pours the water onto the garden and runs the bucket back to the well.
Standing at the gate, we are greeted by the camp supervisor. She is as tall as Ma but much bigger and more intimidating. Her black hair is cut chin-length and square, the same style as the rest of us. From her large, round face, her black eyes peer at us. “What are you doing here?”
“Met Bong, my sister and I are looking for a place to live.” In Khmer I address the supervisor as comrade elder sister” with as much strength in my voice as I can muster.
“This is a children’s work camp. Why are you not living with your parents?”
“Met Bong, our parents died a long time ago. We are orphans and have been living with different families, but they no longer want us.” My heart races with guilt as the lies spill out of my mouth. In the Chinese culture it is believed that if you speak of someone’s death out loud, it will come true. By telling the comrade sister my parents are dead, I have put a marker on Ma’s grave.
“Did they die at the reeducation camp?” Met Bong asks. I hear Chou’s gasp for breath and warn her not to say anything with my eyes.
“No, Met Bong. We were farmers living in the countryside. I was too young to remember, but I know they died fighting for the Civil War.” I am amazed how easily the lies come out of my mouth. Met Bong seems to believe the lies, or maybe she simply does not care. She is in charge of a hundred kids and does not care if her workforce is increased by two more.
“How old are you and your sister.”
“I am seven, and she is ten.”
“All right, come in.”
This is a girls’ camp for those who are considered too weak to work in the rice fields. We are considered useless because we cannot help out the war effort directly. Yet from morning till night we work in the scorching sun, growing food for the army. From sunrise to sunset, we plant crops and vegetables in the garden, stopping for only dinner and lunch. Each night we fall into an exhausted sleep, wedged closely together on a wooden bamboo plank with fifty other girls, the other fifty in another hut.
Nothing at the camp is wasted, especially water. The well water is strictly for the gardens and cooking; to wash ourselves and our clothes we must walk a mile to the pond. After a long day of roasting in the sun, no one is thrilled about the walk for a wash, so we rarely bathe. Everything is collected and reused: old clothes become scarves, old food is dried and saved, and human waste is remixed as topsoil.
After our first evening meal, Chou and I are told to gather around the bonfire for nightly lessons. When we get there we see that all the other children are already there. We squat on the ground waiting for the Met Bong to read the latest news or propaganda from the Angkar. In a voice full of fury and adulation, Met Bong yells out, “Angkar is all-powerful! Angkar is the savior and liberator of the Khmer people!” Then one hundred children erupt into four fast claps, their fisted arms raised to the sky, and scream “Angkar! Angkar! Angkar!” Chou and I follow suit, though we do not understand the propaganda of what Met Bong is saying. “Today the Angkar’s soldiers drove away our enemy, the hated Youn, out of our country!”
“Angkar! Angkar! Angkar!”
“Though there are many more Youns than Khmer soldiers, our soldiers are stronger fighters and will defeat the Youns! Thanks to the Angkar!”
“Angkar! Angkar! Angkar!”
“You are the children of the Angkar! Though you are weak, the Angkar still loves you. Many people have hurt you, but from now on the Angkar will protect you!”
Every night we gather to hear such news and propaganda, and are told of how the Angkar loves us and will protect us. Every night I sit there and imitate their movements while hatred incubates inside me, growing larger and larger. Their Angkar may have protected them, but it never protected me—it killed Keav and Pa. Their Angkar does not protect me when the other children bully Chou and me.
The children despise me and consider me inferior because of my light skin. When I walk by them, my ears ring from their cruel words and their spit eats through my skin like acid. They throw mud at me, claiming it will darken my ugly white skin. Other times, they stick their legs out and trip me, causing me to fall and scrape my knees. Met Bong always turns the other way. At first, I do nothing and take their abuse silently, not wanting to attract any attention to myself. Each time I fall, I dream of breaking their bones. I have not survived this much to be defeated by them.
While washing up for dinner one evening, one of the bullies, Rarnie, walks up and pinches my arm. “Stupid Chinese-Youn!” She hisses at me. My face burns and my blood boils with hatred. As if possessed by a will of their own, my arms reach for her neck and my hands close around her throat, squeezing hard. Her face turns white with confusion. She gasps for air, chokes under the pressure of my fingers. She grabs my arms, her nails scratching my skin. I refuse to let go. Sharp pain explodes on my shin as she kicks me. My anger makes me feel six feet tall, and I lunge at her with my body, knocking her to the ground. Sitting on her chest, my eyes pierce hers. My hands slap her face. I yell “Die! Die!” Ramie’s eyes widen with fear as blood pours out of her nose and stains my hands. Still I cannot stop. I want to see her dead. “Die! I hate you! I am going to kill you!” My small fingers wrap themselves around her throat again, trying to squeeze out her life. I hate her. I hate them all.
Two hands grab me by my arms, twisting them painfully back. Another set of hands grabs my hair, pulling it back, dragging me off Rarnie. Still I struggle to free myself, my feet kicking dust in her face. “I’m going to kill you!” I scream at her as a large hand slaps my cheek, sending me to the ground. “Enough!” Met Bong screams. “There will be no killing tonight!”
“She attacked me first!” Rarnie, sitting up, points at me.
“I don’t care who started it.” She points to Rarnie, “Go and wash up.” She then turns to me: her eyes bore into me, she leans toward me, and yells, “You are so strong to get into a fight? You have to water this whole garden tonight. You cannot sleep until you finish. And no food for you tonight!” Before leaving, Met Bong instructs another girl to guard me and make sure I do as I am told.
As I struggle to get up, the crowd around m
e slowly dissipates. Chou comes over and offers her hand, but I refuse it. I grab the water pail and start to water the garden. I work while the girls eat their dinner, recite propaganda at the nightly lessons, and get ready to go to bed. I do not cry, scream, or beg for mercy. I occupy my mind with thoughts of revenge and massacre. In my head, I make a list of all the wrongs done to me. I will make them suffer twice the blows I’ve suffered by their hands. Many hours into the night, Met Bong approaches and tells me to go to sleep. Without looking at her, I drop my pail and walk in my hut to fall into an exhausted sleep.
The girls stop abusing me after the fight with Rarnie. But they continue to pick on Chou because she looks weak and shows her fear. It has been three weeks since Chou and I arrived at the camp. Trailing behind a group of girls, carrying our spare set of black pajama clothes in our hands, we walk to the river for our first wash.
“Chou, don’t let them beat you up! Don’t let them think they can get away with it,” I tell her.
“But they can beat me and get away with it. I cannot win against them.”
“So what? I can take any one of them, but if they gang up on me, they can beat me. I don’t let them know that. I don’t care if I win, but I will draw blood. I will get in my punches.
“Chou, I dream of the day when we have power again. I will come back for them. I will get them back and beat them until I am tired. I won’t forget, not ever.”
“Why would you want to remember? I dream of the day when things are nice again, and I can leave all this behind.”
Chou does not understand. I need the new memories that make me angry to replace the old ones that make me sad. My rage makes me want to live just to come back and take my revenge. At the pond, the girls run into the water still fully dressed, splashing and laughing at each other’s attempt to swim. While Chou scrubs the grime off her clothes, I float face up in the water. Thinking of Keav, I allow myself to sink as the water laps over my cheeks, eyes, and nose. Rising above the surface again, I feel the weeks’ mud dissolve and slide off my skin, my nails, the creases in my neck and toes. The water washes away the dirt, but it will never put out the fire of hate I have for the Khmer Rouge.
child soldiers
August 1977
The months pass and the government continues to increase our food ration, allowing me to grow a little stronger. It has been three months since we left Ro Leap and last saw Kim, Ma, and Geak. I think about them every day and wonder how they are. At night when all the other children are fast asleep, Chou and I whisper to each other about Ma and Geak. I hope that Meng, Khouy, and Kim are able to visit Ma and make sure she is well. My heart lifts a little knowing that Ma has Geak to keep her from being too lonely.
The other children have stopped picking on me because I am a fighter. While I have also improved my reputation as a worker, because she is weak, Chou has been taken out of the garden and demoted to a cook. She actually likes it better because she no longer has to associate with the other children.
But since I am strong, it was only after three months of being at the camp when Met Bong told me she had some “good news.”
“You are the youngest girl here, but you work harder than everyone else. The Angkar needs people like you,” she says and smiles. “It’s really too bad you are not a boy,” she adds. When she sees that I am not jumping with joy at the news, her face scowls. “Your number one duty is to the Angkar and no one else. You should be happy with yourself. This camp is for the weaklings. The camp you are going to is for the bigger, stronger children. There you will be trained as a soldier so you can soon help fight the war. You will learn many more things there than the children here.” Her face beams with pride when she finishes.
“Yes, Met Bong, I am happy to go,” I lie. I don’t understand Met Bong’s elation. I do not want to sacrifice for the country that killed my pa.
At the break of dawn, I pack my clothes and my food bowl. Chou stands beside me with her head down. I do not want to leave Chou behind, but I cannot refuse the reassignment. Hooking our elbows together, we walk to the gate to meet Met Bong.
“Chou, you’re older than me, stop being so weak,” I whisper as we hug, our arms wrapped tightly around each other. “We will always be sisters even though you were found in a trashcan.” Chou cries harder, her tears wetting my hair. Met Bong breaks our bond and tells me it’s time to go. Chou refuses to let go of my hand. With all my strength, I pull it from her grasp and run away. Though my heart aches, I do not look back.
Met Bong leads me to another camp an hour’s walk away. I do not know what to expect of the new camp, but when Met Bong says it is a child soldier training camp, I presume it will be a big place with many weapons and soldiers living there. But the new camp is almost identical to the old one. It is supervised by another Met Bong with similar features and characteristics, who is just as zealous a believer in the Angkar as my previous supervisor. While they talk, I am left alone to contemplate my new home.
The new work camp sits at the edge of a rice field and is surrounded by forest. All around the huts, tall palm trees sway lightly in the wind. In one, a young boy is cutting down a cluster of palm fruits with a silver cleaver. He looks about twelve or fourteen years old, has a round face, black wavy hair, and a small, dark sinewy body. I marvel at how his toes and fingers grip the tree like a monkey. While one hand holds on to a few sturdy leaves, the other wields the cleaver, separating the fruit from the tree. As if sensing my stare, the boy stops his work and turns to me. Our eyes meet and hold for a few seconds. He smiles and waves to me, but the cleaver is still in his hand. This familiar gesture of human friendship that I have become so unused to is made all the more unfamiliar as he chops the air with the knife. I smile back at him before turning my attention back to the camp.
The camp houses about eighty girls, their ages ranging from ten to fifteen. I have yet to turn eight. Unlike the other camp, not all the girls are orphans. Many have families living in nearby villages. All have been selected by either their village chief or work supervisor to live here. There is a similarly operated boys’ camp not far from us on the other side of the rice field, with approximately another eighty boys supervised by their comrade brother, or Met Bong Preuf. I am told that occasionally the two camps gather together for lessons on the Angkar, and afterward, they celebrate the Angkar’s victories with dances and songs.
My first night at the camp the two groups gather around a roaring bonfire to listen to the latest propaganda. The two Met Bongs stand before us and take turns preaching their message. “The Angkar is our savior! The Angkar is our liberator! We owe everything to the Angkar! We are strong because of the Angkar!” Having heard it many times, I know when to break into the obligatory claps and screams. “Our Khmer soldiers today killed five hundred Youns trying invade our country! The Youns have many more soldiers, but they are stupid and are cowards! One Khmer soldier can kill ten Youns!”
“Angkar! Angkar! Angkar!” we scream our replies.
“The Youns have many more weapons, but our Khmer soldiers are stronger, smarter, and fearless! The Youns are like the devils and some refuse to die!” Their voices rising higher and higher, the Met Bongs tell us how our Khmer soldiers kill the Youns! Our Khmer soldiers gut the Youns with knives, spilling their insides on the dirt. They cut off the Youns’ heads as warnings to other Youns invading Kampuchea. The Met Bongs pace around the circle of children as if possessed by powerful spirits, their arms shaking furiously at the sky, their lips moving faster and faster as they spit words about the glory of the Angkar and our unbeatable Khmer soldiers—words condemning the Youns and detailing their gory fate. The children’s furor matches that of the Met Bongs.
“You are the children of the Angkar! In you lies our future. The Angkar knows you are pure in heart, uncorrupted by evil influences, still able to learn the ways of the Angkar! That is why the Angkar loves you above all else. That is why the Angkar gives you so much power. You are our saviors. You have the power!”
“Angkar! Angkar! Angkar!” we thunder in appreciation.
“The Youns hate you. They want to come and take away the Khmer’s treasures, including you. The Youns know you are our treasure.” Squatting down, the Met Bongs look us in our eyes and tell us the Youns have already infiltrated our towns and villages to try to capture us. But the Angkar will protect us if we give it our total loyalty. This means we must report to the Angkar suspected infiltrators and traitors. If we hear anyone at all—our friends, neighbors, cousins, even our own parents—speak things against the Angkar, we must report them to the Met Bongs. My heart stops. Though the Met Bongs’ lips continue to move and words continue to come out, I can no longer hear them. Pa was against the Angkar! That must be why Pa was killed. Ma is against the Angkar and they must never know this. With my fist raised I scream the obligatory “Angkars!”
When the speeches are over, the circle opens up and the kids gather to one side of the fire. Four boys get up from the crowd, with mandolins and homemade drums in hand. They stand to the side of the crowd and start to play their instruments. They beat the drums and strum the mandolins while their feet tap the ground. They look at each other, brows arching, eyes narrowing, mouths opening with bared teeth. But they do not look angry; in fact, they look happy! When they finish, they tease each other about who missed what notes. All of a sudden, they burst into loud laughter! The sound is nasal, shrill, and genuine. I have not heard anyone laugh genuinely since the Khmer Rouge takeover. In Ro Leap, we lived with so much fear that there was no room for laughter. We were afraid to laugh lest it draw attention to our family.
