First They Killed My Father_ A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers - Loung Ung [19]
With our hands in the air and bodies jumping up and down, we wave excitedly to our uncle. Uncle Leang waves one hand back and peddles his bike faster in our direction. He comes to a stop a few feet from us, and all at once we rush toward him. Blinking his eyes, he takes Ma into his arms with Pa standing quietly beside them. All the worries and fears of the past few days are now over, for at last he has found his sister. Uncle Leang hands Ma a package from his front bike rack, and while she opens the cans of tuna and other food he tells Pa that this morning other people from Phnom Penh arrived in his village. The new arrivals told him of the evacuation and how the Khmer Rouge forced everyone to leave all the cities, including Phnom Penh, Battambang, and Siem Reap. Hearing this, he got on his bike and has been looking for us all morning. He then shares with us the glorious news that Ma’s oldest brother Heang is on his way to pick us up in a wagon. A smile of joy crosses over my face, knowing I will not have to walk anymore and that in a few days we can ride in their wagon home.
Standing next to Uncle Leang, I have to tilt my head back as far as I can to see his face because he is so tall. Even then all I can see is the shape of his thin lips and wide, black nostrils that flare once every few seconds as he talks to Ma. At almost six feet tall, second Uncle Kim Leang hovers above all of us. His long thin arms and legs make him look like the stick figures I used to draw on my schoolbooks. Uncle Leang lives in a village called Krang Truop. Both Uncle Leang and Uncle Heang have lived in the countryside since before the revolution and have never lived in a city. The Khmer Rouge considers them uncorrupted model citizens for their new society. Pa says we will go and live with our uncles in their village.
The wagon, pulled by two yellow skinny cows moving very slowly, arrives later that evening. While Pa and Ma talk to my uncle, I quickly claim a seat in the wagon with Chou and Geak. Our trail takes us on a gravel road along Route 26 westward until we reach the Khmer Rouge-occupied village of Bat Deng. No matter where we go or in which direction we turn, there are people marching ahead and behind us. In the midst of the crowd, our wagon passes the Khmer Rouge village without stopping. We veer westward, leaving our roadside companions far behind. Somewhere between Bat Deng and Krang Truop, I fall asleep.
krang truop
April 1975
On the morning of April 25, eight days after leaving our wonderful home in Phnom Penh, we arrive at our destination. Krang Truop is a small and dusty village surrounded by rice fields as far as the eye can see. All around the rice paddies, little red-dirt roads wind like snakes slithering through water. In the fields, gray buffalos and brown cows graze lazily on the grass. Many have bells tied on strings around their necks, which chime when the animals slowly move their heads. When they run, they remind me of the sound of the ice cream cart in Phnom Penh. Here, instead of concrete city buildings and houses, people live in huts made out of straw that squat on four stilts above elephant grass in the middle of rice paddies.
“The kids are even messier than I am!” I exclaim, as one runs across our path, oblivious to my own ragtag appearance. “Ma’s always complaining about me—just look at them.” The children are red and dusty all over, crimson earth clinging to their clothing, skin, and hair.
Chou frowns at me and shakes her head. Though she is only three years older than I am, Chou often acts as if she knows many more things than I do. I have the larger build and can beat her up easily, though I rarely do it. Because she is shy, quiet, obedient, and doesn’t say much, all our older siblings assume what she chooses to say is of some importance and usually take her side in our fights. Because I am loud