First They Killed My Father_ A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers - Loung Ung [15]
“Pa, I’m very hungry and my feet hurt,” I yell to him.
“You can’t eat now. We have very little food left and we need to ration it because we have a long way to go.”
“I don’t know why we have to save it!” I stand still in the road, letting go of the rice pot to wipe dirt and tears from my cheeks. “Our three days will soon be over. We can return home. Let’s just go home. I want to go home.” The words somehow come out between halting sobs. My forty-pound body refuses to walk any more. The red dust from the road and the sweat on my body has mixed to create a layer of mud on my skin making it dry and itchy. Pa walks over to Keav and takes a ball of sticky rice out of the pot she is carrying. He comes over to me and hands me the food. My eyes look down at the ground in shame, but I take the food from him anyway. Silently, he strokes my hair while I eat my rice between choking sobs. Bending down, Pa looks me in my eyes and says softly, “They lie, the soldiers lie. We cannot go home tonight.” His words make me sob harder.
“But they said three days.”
“I know. I’m sorry you believed them, but they lied.”
“I don’t understand why they lied,” my voice quivers as I say it.
“I don’t know either, but they lied to us.” My hopes crushed, I wipe my forearm across my nose, dragging snot all over my cheek. Pa gently cleans my face with his hand, then takes the rice pot from me and says I only have to carry myself for the rest of the trip.
With Geak on her hip, Ma walks over to me and wraps my scarf around my head to protect me from the sun. I wish that I were a little baby like Geak. She doesn’t have to walk at all. Ma carries her in her arms all the way. I am miserable, but at least I have shoes. Some of the people walk barefoot in the scorching heat, carrying their life’s belongings on their backs or heads. I feel sorry for them knowing they are worse off than I am. And no matter how far we go, there are always more people along the way. When night falls, once again we make the road our home and sleep, along with the hundreds of thousands of other families fleeing Phnom Penh.
Our fourth day on the road starts the same as the all the other days. “Are we there yet?” I keep asking Kim. When I receive no attention, I proceed to sniff and cry.
“Nobody cares about me!” I moan and keep walking anyway.
By noontime we have reached the Khmer Rouge’s military checkpoint in the town of Kom Baul. The checkpoint consists of no more than a few small makeshift tents with trucks parked beside them. There are many soldiers at this base, and it is easy to recognize them because they wear identical loose-fitting black pajama pants and shirts. All carry identical guns slung across their backs. They move quickly from place to place with fingers on the triggers of their weapons, pacing back and forth in front of the crowd, yelling instructions into a bullhorn.
“This is Kom Baul base! You are not allowed to pass until we have cleared you! Stand with your family in a line! Our comrade soldiers will come and ask a few simple questions! You are to answer them truthfully and not lie to the Angkar! If you lie to the Angkar, we will find out! The Angkar is all-knowing and has eyes and ears everywhere.” This is the first time I hear the word “Angkar,” which means “the organization.” Pa says the Angkar is the new government of Cambodia. He tells us that in the past, Prince Sihanouk ruled Cambodia as a monarch. Then in 1970, unhappy with the Prince’s government, General Lon Nol, deposed him in a military coup. The Lon Nol democratic government has been fighting a civil war with the Communist Khmer