When Broken Glass Floats: Growing Up Under the Khmer Rouge Paperback (19 page)

“Don’t cry, don’t cry,” she stammers softly. She rubs around the wound. When I grow quiet, she gently tilts my foot to let some of the powder fall into the palm of her hand. About a third of the medicine falls into her hand. Carefully, she guides the leftover medicine back into the vial—surely as precious as gold.

For days I apply penicillin to my wound. About two weeks later, it looks better. The tissue starts to grow, slowly filling in what was once hollow. I’m in awe of the power of the body to heal, given the simple ingredients of rest and medicine. Most of the bloody pus disappears, and I can walk and get my own food ration.

The kind doctor has offered to apply penicillin powder to my wound, to care for it herself, but I politely decline. The offer of nursing care is sweet, thoughtful—a gesture of personal kindness I haven’t seen among the Khmer Rouge. And yet, she has already helped me more than I could have dreamed possible—the clinic, the medicine, bringing me a ration of rice gruel when I couldn’t walk. She checks on me every day. Her kindness begins to reshape my view of the Khmer Rouge. Not everyone has a heart of stone, only living to serve
Angka
. Not all thrive on the power and cruelty. Some retain a seed of human goodness.

When my foot is nearly healed, a brigade leader orders me to return to work near Phnom Srais. The doctor comforts me. She says I’ll be okay as long as I clean my wound after working and apply penicillin to it at night. She acts as a surrogate mother, as good a friend as any child could ever ask for.

We toil under the unwavering gaze of
chhlops
and brigade leaders, dressed in black uniforms standing on the bank. Yet I see them through different eyes. Is their cruelty a mask, hiding humanity deep within? The world is no longer as black as their uniforms, as white as rice. At least I have shelter and better food rations, solid rice rather than the rice gruel. I only wish I could share this rice with
Mak
, Avy, and Map.

Each day is the same. They wake us early in the morning. During the working hours, they watch us. A stretch of children laboring in the fierce sun like a mass construction line clawing the earth, leaving a long, wide ditch that lengthens slowly each day.

Later, Communist leaders announce that a mobile brigade is coming from Phnom Kambour to help us. The arrival of this brigade means I might see Chea, Ra, and Aunt Rin, if they have survived.

My wish comes true. As soon as the brigade leaders shout that it’s time for lunch, we peel away from the ditch, scattering into the open field, heading to the cooking area located a mile away. Suddenly the wave of children in front of me starts to run. In the distance, I see a mass of people in gray, discolored uniforms swarming around the cooking area. Some stand in lines while others are sitting or squatting on the ground.

“We should hurry before they give all the food to the mobile brigade,” says a girl, running past me, followed by others.

“Athy, Athy! Wait for me.” I turn. I stop when I realize it’s Ary. She waves tiredly at me, her face dark yet white.

Out of breath, she reports, “Athy, I’m tired. I can’t run anymore. Let’s walk instead.”

I tell Ary to walk faster, worried that the food will be gone, distributed to the troop of the mobile brigade. I can hear her lungs labor, her mouth gulping air. We both hobble on, stiff-legged. Our stomachs growl.

Hundreds of children and young adults cluster around the cooking area, which is open, without a shelter to shield it from the rain or sun. The natural landmark is a dead tree, leafless with only the brittle skeleton of tree branches sticking out. People hover close by, sitting and squatting on the dirt, shoving rice into their mouths. Ary and I wait in a children’s line, our eyes stealing glances at the rice and thin fish soup people are already devouring. Suddenly a faint eager voice calls out my name, “Athy!” again and again.

I turn, looking for the voice. I see Chea emerging from the waiting lines and people sitting on the ground. It’s hard to believe this is my sister. The image makes my heart ache—she’s thin, her face darkened and worn by the sun. Her clothes are very old, grayish-black pants and a rag of a shirt with an old faded scarf around her neck.

“Chea, Chea,” I croon. I’m giddy with jubilation and frozen with shock at the deterioration of my sister’s beauty. I’ve heard that many in the brigades have died from exhaustion and illness. Yet she’s running to me, her eyes glowing. She would have opened her arms wide to embrace me if space permitted it. I don’t care about being in line, I don’t care about eating. Chea is food for my soul.

“Athy, where are you staying?” Chea inquires urgently. Her face closes in on mine, but she recoils, horror-stricken.

“Your eyes have white lines of tissue in them.” She gently lifts my eyelids with her fingers, then spits out her blunt conclusion. “Your eyes look bad. You could go blind, Athy.”

Her words scare me, and I blink hard—my eyes suddenly feeling heavier than they felt before. Chea has to leave right away, but she promises me that she’ll look for me. I find my way back to the food line. I know I’ve had problems with my eyes. When I wake, my lashes are glued together. And it’s been hard to see, my eyes squint painfully under the sun. I’m frightened about the possibility of going blind.

The following day Chea sneaks over to see me briefly during mealtimes. One evening, during the ration, Chea seems anxious. She waves, signaling me to come to her. “Athy, do you want to go with Ra and me to see
Mak
? We’re going to see her and bring her rice.”

The thought overwhelms me. “I’m scared, Chea. I want to go, too, but I’m scared. I’m afraid they’ll catch us on the way.”

“It’s okay. We’re going at night, and we’ll walk in the woods and not through villages. My coworker knows a way. Don’t worry. I’ll come to get you at your shelter when it gets dark. I have to go now,” she says, touching my shoulder, a gesture of reassurance that comforts me.

Night sets in. Chea, Ra, two other women, and I stoop and crawl past shelters, out of the labor camp. The only thing I hear is my own breathing and theirs, soft whispers of air. The sound of our footsteps is muffled by sandy earth. The trees along the oxcart path cloak us, but they also darken our way. My eyes, which strain in bright sunshine, are of little use at night, but we don’t run into anything. Chea’s coworker must know her way around these villages. I wonder if she’s one of the “old people.” I can’t tell. In the dark, I see only shadows, the dim silhouettes of Chea and Ra. I recognize Chea only by her voice. There, I put my trust.

We leave the oxcart path, turning onto a different path flanked by trees, bushes, shrubs. It looks familiar: This is the oxcart path that snakes through many villages, leading us close to Daakpo village. Though we are still in the woods, there is more light. Our fears lessen as we get a glimpse of the familiar community of huts, all in shadow.

The two coworkers go their separate ways to their families. My sisters and I head to our mother, cautiously weaving past the sleeping huts. We walk quietly into the hut, trying not to scare
Mak
, Avy, or Map, who are already asleep.

“
Mak
….” Chea sticks her head into the doorless hut, whispering.

“
Mak
!” Ra echoes in an enthusiastic whisper. I join in, climbing into the hut for our secret homecoming.

Scooting close to
Mak
in the dark hut, it’s hard to believe that I’m actually back with her, Chea, Ra, Avy, and Map.
Mak
awakes, confused to find us all in the hut.

“
Mak
, we’ve brought you rice,” I whisper, producing a pouch of rice the size of a small melon from my scarf. She puts her arms around me. Chea and Ra sit by her side, their eyes gazing at
Mak
’s silhouette, loving her in the Cambodian way. In our voices,
Mak
can feel our longing to be near her as clearly as any physical embrace. Our escape, the effort to bring food, speaks louder than any warm words we might offer.

“Achea [Chea], did you all sneak out? Aren’t you scared the
chhlops
will catch you?”
Mak
softly inquires, her voice concerned.

Chea answers, “There are other people who sneak out to see their families, not just us.” Her voice is at ease, reassuring.

Tenderly,
Mak
warns us, “Always be careful. Look after
p’yoon
, Athy, too. She’s small.” If they torture us, she says, it will kill her. Again, she warns us to be careful.

Chea reassures
Mak
about how careful we are.
Mak
turns to the rice. She asks Ra to wake Avy and Map up to eat, too. The moon wanes, its luminescence fading near the entrance to our hut.
Mak
, Avy, and Map eat quickly. Into their mouths the rice flies.

“
Preah
, the rice is delicious, sweet,”
Mak
softly exclaims, her voice grateful. “I haven’t had solid rice for so long. Having rice is like going to heaven.”

After eating,
Mak
updates us on their life in Daakpo. All they have to eat are leaves from the woods or the fleshy tubers from water plants nine-year-old Avy picks in a nearby lake. Sometimes they’re lucky—
Mak
or Avy catches a few crickets or toads.
Mak
speaks of their hunger easily, as if it were a natural condition.

It’s very late, perhaps after midnight. I can tell time only by how silent Daakpo is. Quickly I fall asleep. Before long I hear Chea’s voice. “Athy, it’s time to go. We have to go back. Those two people are here. Get up, Athy.”

Chea helps me off the platform of the hut and into the woods, safely back to the labor camp through the inky early morning darkness.

Here in the labor camps, Chea is our mother. She, Ra, and I continue to sneak a scant ration of rice back to
Mak
, saved from our rations. Every week I look forward to this escape, to spending as much time as we can with
Mak
, Avy, and Map. Since
Angka
orchestrates our lives, we don’t know how long our good fortune will last. But for the moment we allow ourselves a small sliver of pride.

Just the hope of seeing
Mak
creates a horizon for me in a world with no horizons. Even during our short visits, she cares for me, comforts me. For my infected eyes, she tells me to use my pee, caught in a leaf folded into a cone. She instructs me on how to do it, holding the point above my infected eyes, releasing the stinging yellow liquid in slow, steady drips. She says a woman’s milk will also help—I’ve heard that before, too, but where do I find a woman with milk? There are so few babies.

The only time I see adults show any interest in each other is among the Khmer Rouge
mekorgs
, the children’s brigade leaders, who flirt with each other. Workers would watch and nod. “They have the flesh,” they explain. “Without flesh and blood, there is no desire.”

There is only work. The irrigation canal is near completion, to be finished by an adult brigade. I’m surprised that children are being allowed to return to their respective villages. My eyes have healed from the infection, “cured” with my own pee. In addition to the infection, I’ve suffered from an ailment called “blind chicken,” which caused my eyes to stop working at night. During mandatory meetings Ary had to hold my hand, guiding me there and back to my shelter. As the infection subsides, so does the night blindness.

With my sight restored, my eyes again open. There is more to see.

U
nder the Khmer Rouge, reunions are precious but brief, appearing like a sudden summer shower that opens the sweet plumeria, and ending just as quickly. After Phnom Srais, children are sent back to villages to work with the adults, mostly mothers now, to clear woods and to weed fields for planting yams. The work site is within walking distance, perhaps two to three miles. But at least we are together again. We fall back into comfortable chores, gathering leaves to cook with rice and salt, going on forays for firewood or water. Back in Phnom Penh, we did household chores without thinking, and the conversation was casual—Chea talking about a history test or plans with her friends. Now we perform our daily tasks mostly in silence, lost in our private thoughts and afraid to look too far into the future. At night I lie on the floor of our hut and try to absorb the feeling of those I love held tight under one roof. The soft sounds of night breathing, a concerto of crickets, cicadas, and small frogs. I lock these things into my mind for safekeeping.

In weeks, Chea and Ra are gone, sent to another labor camp. The day the Khmer Rouge line them up I see them off, my feet dragging. I’ve learned to hate these good-byes, for with them comes the fear that I’ll never see them again. As they walk to join the end of the line, I’m shocked to see Aunt Rin also standing in line. My pretty aunt, her eyes flooded with tears, her body thin and pale. I say nothing but her name. She turns away, coping with her grief, her feelings so raw that she can’t face separation again. I let her be, praying for her to summon the strength and courage to fight and stay alive.

In a matter of minutes—too soon—the line begins moving. Before they leave, I want to say good-bye to Aunt Rin. I want to run and hug Chea and Ra, or even just hold their hand one last time, or call their name, but my tongue freezes. Only my eyes work. I search for Aunt Rin, watching her until I can see no more than her feet moving, fading between people before and behind her. Chea and Ra drift away, too.

Our family ebbs and flows like the tide. With one wave, Chea and Ra are gone, but Than returns from a labor camp, a relief to
Mak
. Again, Ry finds a refuge at the hospital Peth Preahneth Preah by pretending to be sick. It is a tricky gamble. By staying behind, she escapes possible death from exhaustion and labor, but she must be clever to avoid amoebic dysentery, grown rampant among patients at the hospital. The rest of the family—
Mak
, Avy, Map, and I—have to survive our own way, working in the woods since we’re not in the age group needed at the labor camp. Than does whatever the informants and village leader tell him, plowing the rice field or working in the woods with the quickly shrinking pool of men, mainly fathers.

These days, we clear small plants, weeding out grass in open fields surrounded by trees, one of which is wild, a mango tree. During lunch break under a generous shade of trees—while the Khmer Rouge leaders sit among themselves away from us—
Mak
and the other women reminisce about old times. Following their meals of rice gruel with edible leaves and salt, they talk about their favorite foods. It sounds like cruel torture to talk of things we cannot have, but there is a comfort in these conversations.

Rice ration is at its lowest point again. Edema is also widespread. Avy’s body is swollen, her eyes nearly shut. Sprouting between her eyelids are her long eyelashes, her hair wiry. Her skin is wan, inflated with fluid that seems ready to burst through her thin skin. The rest of us have edema, but not as bad. This is the randomness of starvation. She has been spared the rigors of labor camp, but still her body is protesting, giving up.

To supplement our small ration, Than sneaks out to fish. Only thirteen, two years older than I am, Than seems to have taken on the role of a grown man, head of the household. Late at night, he walks a long way to a lake where he has planted a fishing net, staked out in the shallows and hidden away where no one can see or steal it. One night he brings home a dozen fish, each the size of a tablespoon.

Mak
asks Ry—who usually comes back from the hospital to see us at night—to clean the fish. I pour water for Than as he washes mud off his skinny legs.
Mak
gathers the firewood to cook the fish. We have not had fish or any real meat for weeks, aside from occasional toads, crickets, tadpoles, or tiny lizards in the woods.

The fish is ready, brown, shriveled, a small spread on a plate before Than. Than hands
Mak
a few fish; Map two, Avy one, Ry one, and me also one. He keeps four for himself. I savor the fish, biting a little at a time as if I’m licking cold ice cream. Than also eats it slowly, his mouth busy telling about his trip to the lake.

Mak
watches Than, proud of him. Avy has already finished her fish, her hand reaching, her swollen eyes imploring. She interrupts, “Than, can I have a little fish?”

Than’s distracted but goes on with his adventure. I notice Avy’s patience, her ability to stifle her hunger. I can’t remember the last time our family really sat down together and just listened to one of us.

“Than, can I have a little fish?” Avy persists, her hand weakly reaching forward.

Than breaks off half of a fish and murmurs, “She eats everything, ants, anything, that’s why her face is like that,” Than says, irritated. “I tell her not to, but she’s stubborn. She doesn’t listen.” He looks at
Mak
as if wanting her to agree with him.

Mak
tenderly suggests, “Don’t be mad at
p’yoon
. She’s hungry,
koon
.”

Than glares at Avy, then spits out, “Stubborn!” He throws half of the fish at her. It falls through the crack in the floor. Avy scrambles. She hops off the hut, her head moving, her eyes searching hungrily. I can’t fathom what Than has just done, the cruelty. We are all shocked. Yet Than is somehow enraged, his body almost trembling, seemingly for no other reason than the mild disrespect of his young, starving sister. His face churns with emotions even as we watch.

“Why did you do that,
koon
?”
Mak
finally says.

Avy cries, sobbing desperately. Ry and I help her find the fish beneath our hut. Gently, we lift small tree branches, one by one, from the pile of firewood where the fish fell. When we find it, she desperately blows away the dirt that has coated it. She eats it, and she cries, trembling, as if losing and finding this scrap of fish would make the difference between life and death. As soon as she finishes her fish, her body relaxes. Her disfigured legs, now blown up to absurd proportions, slowly carry her into the hut. She says little, accepting her condition and treatment.

Than is quiet, but we can feel remorse in his silence. Tonight has brought us brief joy, then grief. Agony at the realization that the Khmer Rouge have shaped us, made our tempers brittle and our hunger sharp. Led us to the point where we could be as cruel to one another as they are to us.

The rice distribution comes to a complete stop. Starvation revisits us. Avy’s edema gets worse, the fluid seeping out from pink cracks between her toes. She walks slowly, like a turtle, her body stiffened with the fluid that continues to build behind her thin, bloodless skin. One day
Mak
and I return home from the woods and she’s gone, disappeared to Peth Preahneth Preah with Ry. There, she gets a food ration, not much, but better than nothing.
She’ll die there
, I fear. I don’t know of anyone who has ever returned. To our knowledge, there’s no proper medicine, yet we send her there, to this crude excuse for a hospital—filthy and unsanitized, humming with flies that congregate on patient’s eyes, the sick squeezed onto the floor between rusty twin beds. However, Ry’s there to take care of her.

Time passes. It’s been a month since Avy left for Peth Preahneth Preah. At home, we fight our own battles.
Mak
, Map, and I are also afflicted with edema. Than has again been sent somewhere to work, but my thoughts don’t stray to be with him. Starvation has blurred my mind too much to care for anyone. Each day I barely have the energy to keep my heart beating.

Ry returns to Daakpo, her eyes empty, her stomach protruding with sickness. With the weariness of an old woman, fifteen-year-old Ry sinks to the floor of our hut. Her eyes are dry, her face guilty and sad as she reports to us Avy’s death. Softly, she explains: “Last night I noticed the change in Avy’s body. Her jaws locked, her body stiffened. I wondered about it, but I didn’t understand why she was that way. This morning I got up and looked at her, she’s changed. Stiff, very thin. Her edema’s gone. When I looked at her feet, I saw ants around the webs of her toes. The fluid oozed out of her burst skin, through her feet. I gazed at her bony face and I wanted to cry, but I couldn’t. I don’t understand. I couldn’t even cry when the hospital workers took her to be buried. Maybe I’ve seen too many deaths.”

Mak
doesn’t cry, her eyes fall upon Ry. Map looks on, too young to speak and too little to understand death. Listening to Ry’s description of Avy’s death, I fear the fluid building even now within me, within
Mak
—our arms, faces, and hands grow taut. I can feel panic rise in my throat. Avy’s death cements my determination to live. In my mind, I tell myself that I must search for edible leaves, toads, mice, crickets, whatever I need to stay alive.

Avy’s death lingers in Ry’s mind. Her inability to mourn continues to haunt her. In desperation, she turns to Buddhism, an institution long since destroyed and disdained by the Khmer Rouge. In spite of that, she finds a way to make things right for herself. She remembers reincarnation, the idea that after death we are re-born. She reconciles her internal conflicts this way, as our parents and elders did before the Khmer Rouge’s takeover. She talks to Avy’s spirit.

“If
bang
lives to get married, may
p’yoon
’s spirit conceive in
bang
’s womb.
Bang
wants another chance to take care of you.” Ry finally sobs, her heart beseeching, her soul comforted. Her mind is at peace, she tells me.

I find myself thinking about Buddhism, too. I think of those who’ve died and hope they will be reincarnated to make up for this life, returning when freedom and peace have been installed in Cambodia. Like Ry, thinking this way, I’m more at ease, comforted that I’ll see my family again.

Mak
and I become very ill. In addition to edema, malaria has returned. The day is warm, but
Mak
and I shiver with cold that seems to seep from inside our bodies. I lie behind her watching her back tremble as my own body shivers. Three-year-old Map sits by us baffled, as if he wants to help us but doesn’t know how. Now and then, I fall asleep.

“
Mak
and Thy are sick.” My mind picks up Map’s soft, small voice.

I vaguely feel the vibration of feet climbing into the hut. It seems like a dream.

“
Mak
, I’m back…. Athy, Athy, wake up,” a voice commands, stern but anxious. I feel a hand shake my shoulder.
It’s Ra
, my mind acknowledges, feeling delirious.

Ra lifts me and
Mak
, assuring us she’ll “coin” our backs, a traditional remedy in which a coin is rubbed repeatedly along both sides of the spine and other areas to promote healing. Then she performs another procedure, a remedy Cambodians call
choup
. Placing a small ember of burning wood into a vial, Ra presses it horizontally against my forehead, above my eyebrows. Being so sick, I can’t feel the hot vial. But my forehead is burned badly, leaving a permanent scar.

Energy gradually comes back to me. Looking at Ra tending to
Mak
, I’m grateful. Deep down I think that
Mak
and I would have died, but Ra has come, pulling us back from the hands of death.

Ra tells us grim stories of Phnom Korg Va, a disease-stricken place where many laborers have died from exhaustion, inadequate rest, and lack of medicine. The work camp had become a mountain of death. Among those who have perished is Aunt Rin. I’m sorry to hear this news, yet in an odd way I’m not really sad. Death is a constant, and we’ve become numb to the shock of it. People die here and there, all around us, falling like flies that have been sprayed with poison.

I brace for more bad news, news about Chea, but Ra quickly assures us that she is still alive, but being forced to work hard. She is closely watched by her brigade leader, the same woman who has viewed Chea as an enemy since the day Chea defended the quiet chatter of Ra and Ry at the work site in Daakpo.

A premonition prompted Ra’s return. Her conscience kept telling her something bad was happening to
Mak
. She knew she needed to leave. For days she stayed at a clinic, asking for malaria medicine, with our family in mind.
Modern medicine? Does it still exist?
I’m surprised that the Khmer Rouge endorse its use when they loathe everything modern. Ra talks like a storyteller, with great animation in her eyes and gestures, almost like a small child sharing an exciting story.
Mak
asks how she was able to leave Phnom Korg Va and why Chea couldn’t come with her.

Ra smiles, a warm smile, her eyes bright. She reports, “I forged a letter saying my
mekorg
allows me to return to the village because you’re very ill. I signed her name.” Ra smiles again. “I ran from Phnom Korg Va at early dusk and showed the letter at every checkpoint. They let me through, no questions asked. I hitchhiked, riding on oxcarts from village to village, until I got close to here.” Ra takes a deep breath, her face relieved, her eyes gazing into
Mak
’s.