Life under the Khmer Rouge: "How can I be proud to be Cambodian?"

     The context of this conversation is that I was in Cambodia visiting some of the people engaged in projects with CAFOD (Catholic Agency for Overseas Development). There were three people present who were offering answers to the questions that me and my friend Lizzie had. Firstly, Singha, who was the translator for the discussion. Secondly, the person we had actually intended to be talking with for the majority of the time, Erik Sen. Thirdly, Lin Rattanak, who ended up being the main conversant, was actually there in the first place simply as someone to guide us around the village and introduce us to villagers, as part of his duties as a member of the village committee. I never expected to speak with anyone about their experiences under the Khmer Rouge, but after the question I asked "Are you proud to be Cambodian?", Lin Rattanak answered explaining that he had not been able to afford to eat rice for so much of his life. I then inquired as to why this was and the resulting answer explored the turmoil that he had been in throughout his life, including his time in a collective farm.

Erik Sen (far right) and his family, in front of their house where our discussion took place. 

     Recently I have been doing a number of mini-talks on my trip and have been moved by the response of the audiences I have spoken to by the story of Lin Rattanak. As such, I have decided to put up this abridged version of the conversation I had with him on this page in full so that anyone who wants to may read it. 
    

2nd February 2017, Outside Erik Sen's House

Rod Howlett (RH): Are you proud to be Cambodian? 

Lin Rattanak (LR): How can I feel proud? I am now reaching my 50s. Through all the hardship and civil war I lived through, and as a displaced person, I have lived only 20 years of my adult life where I’ve had sufficient rice to eat. I ate white vegetables before this.

The interview is interrupted by the appearance of a woman in a straw floppy hat on a motorbike with her young daughter sitting on her lap. She has come to ask for money to pay off her own debt – the money hasn’t arrived from Thailand yet. They send her away, telling her they themselves have no money. 

RH: Was it easier to live in Cambodia in the past, has it got harder?

Erik Sen (ES): In the past, life was better. When we raised our own children (the parents of the grandchildren who are present), we carried lots of water on our shoulders – life was a bit hard but we had enough. That life seemed hard, but it’s now even harder as there’s no water to pump anymore. Maybe in the future, the children may have to migrate. 

RH:Is there any chance of this situation changing. 

ES:No, no chance of prosperity. It’s hopeless depending on the Khmer leadership – only foreign investment could make it better.

RH: Have you spent your whole life here.

ES: I spent my whole life in this community. My parents and grandparents also. My grandparents had it is easier – there was fish, forests, land etc to draw from. The state leadership [King Sihanouk] cared for the Khmer people - the current administration do not. 

RH: Would fellow villagers agree with this assessment? 

ES: Most families in village are my age. Up to 90% would agree with his judgement that Sihanouk’s administration was better than now. 

RH: Does religion help, do you have a religion?

Singha (middle) translates the words of Lin Rattanak (right) to me. 

LR: We are Buddhists. It teaches you to be a good person. We were taught the rhythm of life by of our parents, their grandparents. We were taught by the older people. Because of the civil war, this spirit has been diminished. During childhood, we were taught to help others, especially our elders. We helped harvesting their crops, supporting them. Now teenagers drink too much alcohol and don’t care for elders – whereas we shared all things. It’s always going to be worse [in terms of prosperity, economic and social,  for people in general] with the current attitude. Previously we shared to live – now we each survive each individually. We’ve resorted to working as individuals. I don’t think this can be changed now. 

RH: Tell us about your life before living in the village? 

LR: I was born in the village in the sixties. I came to realise the situation of things in 1975. I was told about the war. After I experienced all the civil war events. During Pol Pot’s regime I had a brother who went with me to the collective farm. If we wanted trousers, we would lose our shirt. If we wanted a shirt, we would lose our trousers. This was the situation. We woke up at 4am in the farm. For 50 children, they’d provide 0.5kg of rice. We ate less and were overworked. I was around 8 years old when I entered the collective farm, working for three years. Those who could not work lost their heads. If you were lazy and tried to avoid work or if you were sick – you were killed. Most of the children were killed during harvesting season. If you were hungry and you ripped off the rice wrap – because you had no cutlery – you were killed. They used bamboo to hit or use palm stems to cut their throats. They had a proverb: Keep no profit, losing is good. 

RH: How has the experienced effected you? 
LR: This experience has left me with mixed mindfulness. [This may be a reference to PTSD] 

RH: Is it worth educating the young about what happened so this never happens again? 

LR: No. If we told the new generation, they would think it is a tale. 

At this point, Lin Rattanak is recalling more things about the farm. He returns to the subject of food. 

LR: Even if you had a small bit of fish, a tiny bit – and you ate it – they would kill you. If they felt threatened, they would call a meeting, and would kill them in front of you for intimidation. 

RH: So just to be clear, did you not make friends, did you not have interactions with others, for that long? How?

 LR: Doing work here – you couldn’t look at each other – you’d be killed if you did that.

 RH: Did you ever try to escape? 

LR: No, we stayed in the camp, making no attempt to get out. 

RH: So all you did, literally, for three years, was work? 

LR:Yes, worked for 3 years. 

LR: If you planted a banana – you did the work – you were not allowed to reap your harvest.
 I ask why Lin Rattanak was in the farm and not Erik Sen? What was the difference between them? They both confirm that in fact Erik Sen had been in the farm. This had not been mentioned at all before and he had stayed largely silent during the conversation. 

RH: What is the lesson you have taken from this? 

LR: That a world of zero freedom is very dangerous. Now we have a hierarchy – during Pol Pot’s time, all were equal. Parents were known as comrades, not parents. You know, children joke these days pretending to be pulling the ploughs as cows but during Pol Pot’s regime, this happened with real humans instead of cows.
RH: What can we learn from this experience?

LR: (He answers slower and more emotionally). Not to raise resistance or war. Try to re-unite communities. 

RH: How do you feel, that despite all this hardship and evil you have experienced, you are now a member of the village committee and are helping people in your community? 

LR: Very proud. I’m happy to be bettering myself. We want a better place for our children. He appeals for better education on social morality – how to perform properly in society. In Thailand they teach Buddhism and social morality, which seems to work better to preserve the good life and the good society. 

RH: What can be done to improve this situation? 

LR: Better service from the Government is needed. Improve people's freedoms. Sometimes if you talk out of turn – they will follow you. We need respect for human rights, we need to the help poor adults through provision. Children become drug addicts, yet there's no education against this. School children of these ages are drug addicted. 

(LR returns to the subject of collective farms): I have war trauma. I can’t describe the reality of life in Pol Pot’s time. I could take three days and three nights over it. My parents were starved. They were starved, not killed, in a farm for adults.

There is a silence after this. All that can be heard is the chugging of a tractor engine in the main yard.

L-R: Me, Singha, Lin Rattanak. Walking back to the main village after our conversation. 

The translator (Singha) asks me (I must look in disbelief, as I felt): Do you not believe this? It’s true. I believe him. LR continues showing how they would hold the gun towards the children. We begin to walk back to the main village. 

LR: A man would stand at the end of a row of child workers with a gun. He would shoot any one who did not work or was lazy – he could see them all from one end of the line to the other. 

The conversation peters out as we reach the main village, each party retreating into their own  silent thoughts.