Historical Context:
On April 17, 1975, a devastating
thing occurred in the country called Cambodia in South Eastern Asia. It’s a date that is remembered by many
who suffered during this genocide. Genocide is the deliberate and systematic
extermination of a national, racial, political, or cultural group. What makes
this genocide stand out above the rest is that it occurred between the people
of the same country. A group of Cambodians, known as the Khmer Rouge went against
the base and the new people. They forced them to leave their homes in the city
to move to the countryside. They lied and told them that those areas were
unoccupied, when in fact, they were. They were also told to leave all their
possessions because they would be back in three days, but this was also another
lie. In addition,they told them that the Americans were going to bomb them,
but this is was also a lie. The reason for this lie is to ensure that there would
be very little resistance. Furthermore, in the countryside, they were forced to
work in tough conditions and were given barely any food. Most of the people
were dying of starvation and were filled with diseases. Babies were not being
nurtured and many couldn’t survive during this harsh time. When asked what
occupation they were, people would have to lie in order to live. If you were an
intellectual, then you were killed on the spot. This was to ensure that no one
would be smart enough to rebel against the leader, Pol Pot. Their slogan was:
“To spare you is no profit, to destroy you is no loss.” Some people were forced
to dig deep graves and then were hit in the head with a bamboo stick and kicked
into the hole to fall to their death. Two million people died in the span of
three years and in 1979,finally the genocide came to an end.
Summary:
Among
the two million people that were killed during this genocide, there were many
survivors and four of them live with me: both my parents and grandparents. They
have told me many stories about it and we have watched the Killing Fields
together. I’m amazed that they were able to survive; I don’t think that I
would’ve been able to. My mother was taken away from her family. She told me
once that she was allowed to come visit her parents, my grandparents, once
every two months. She had to walk four miles to get back home and part of the
time she was in a cemetery. She told me that it was really scary. In addition,
after getting home, she had to walk another mile to fetch water in big pales
for her grandmother. She would also steal some food from the neighbor and was
beat until her back bled. She was given barely any food in the area where she
was working. She was only eleven at the time, so this was extremely tough.
Since she didn’t get the vitamins that she needed from food, she stopped
growing and is now only 4’ 10’’. In
addition to that, she had to carry heavy objects on both her head and shoulder,
objects that were heavier than her. She wasn’t allowed to say that she was sick
because they would kill you if you were sick. If you couldn’t work for any
reason, they had no reason to keep you alive. She witnessed her peers being
severely beaten because they didn’t finish their assigned task in the time
given.
My
grandparents were very well liked because my grandma was a hard worker and so
was my grandpa in addition to kissing up to them every chance he got. If they
weren’t liked, then, they wouldn’t be alive today. If they weren’t alive today,
then there wouldn’t be Elizabeth Sreng. My grandma had to lie about her
occupation when she told them that she was a grocery seller when in fact she
was a computer programmer, which at the time was one of the highest paying
jobs, which is a threat to the Khmer Rouge. Her two older brothers, on the
other hand, couldn’t lie because they always lived in the country and were
known for being teachers. My grandma had to watch them being taken away to be
murdered when they were told that they were just being moved to work in a
different city. It was heartbreaking and spent countless nights crying over the
loss of her only brothers, nieces and nephews. My grandpa had to pick up human
waste from house to house in buckets every morning and delivered them to people
who would deliver them to a farm to be used as manure for the plants. My
grandparents, mom and uncle had to escape to Thailand in December of 1979.
Here, they had to stay at camps until my great-grandma on my grandpa’s side sponsored
them to come live in America. At the time, she worked with the American Embassy
and was brought to America in April of 1975, right before the genocide
occurred. They arrived here in July 1980 and they’ve been here ever since.
Furthermore,
my father, who was only thirteen when the genocide took place, had quite a
different experience from my mother because the area where he worked wasn’t as
harsh on them and he got to live with his parents. My father worked on the farm
with his father for most of the day and then would help chop up vegetables for
the whole village to eat. The worst thing that he experienced was watching some
of his siblings getting severely ill and not being able to get cured due to the
lack of medicine. His siblings were forced to go work away from the family and
didn’t have much food to eat, while he, living at home, had enough to eat. He
also witnessed his uncle being taken away to be slaughtered due to his
occupation as a teacher. His experience during this time wasn’t as bad as my
mom’s and grandparents. He learned how to plant vegetables from his dad and got
to spend quality time working alongside his father every day. Although, he
enjoyed learning how to do this, he didn’t like the fact that he had to carry
huge buckets of water to water fields of vegetables during hot days. He was
very fortunate that his dad requested to let him stay and help him work with
the planting and watering of vegetables. It wasn’t that he was the favorite out
of the eight; it was only because he was the best at the job. His parents were
separated from most of their children because their children were forced to
leave and work. They would cry every night missing their children. My father
was the only one that got to stay and live at home.
As
you can see, most Cambodians at the time, including my family, have suffered
tremendous amounts of trauma, but in a way it forced them to become stronger
and hard working. Although they spent three years and eight months hiding away
from the truth, being tortured, and watching their family members being
prosecuted, they still believe that knowledge is the key to having a successful
life which is what they try to pass on to me. Both my parents came here at the
ages of sixteen (mother) and twenty (father) not speaking a word of English.
Despite this fact, they were still able to graduate from Cal State Long Beach
with bachelor’s degrees and became great teachers. Listening to their stories has
inspired me to work hard, so that one day, I can become whoever I want to be.
I
hope you have enjoyed their stories as much as I have.
Questions
to ponder:
Why did
the Cambodians choose to go against their own people?
Why were
the people living in some of the parts of the country treated differently when
communists claim that everything had to be equal?
About our
Blogger:
My name
is Elizabeth Sreng and I am a sophomore. My hobbies include reading books
hanging out with friends, and watching Glee. I chose to write about the
Cambodian genocide because I am fascinated by my family’s stories and how they
survived. I don’t think that I could have survived the torture, being separated
from my parents, and the lack of food. I hope this will help you understand how
tough it was to be living in Cambodia during this time period.
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