SU_P_16

[i] Hello.
[r] Hello.
[i] Can you tell me where you were born?
[r] I was born in Phnom Penh. On the main street.
[i] What year?
[r] What year? I’ve been in Phnom Penh since I was a little girl…
[i] What year were you born?
[r] What year? In 1950. On 1 May.
[i] And your family was…
[r] My family, there was my father, my grandfather, my mother and my brothers and sisters, we lived together. We were in business.
[i] Who in your family first came to live in Cambodia?
[r] In Cambodia, we have always lived in Cambodia.
[i] Your parents were there before you…
[r] They were all in Phnom Penh.
[i] Were they born in Cambodia?
[r] They were born in Cambodia. My grandfather fled China. He went to Phnom Penh, married my grandmother and lived in Phnom Penh. I grew up in Phnom Penh. Until… in July… In July, in 1970… 1975. On 15 April, Pol Pot took power. We were made to leave to work in the fields.
[i] And your… How many brothers and sisters do you have?
[r] Me? In total, there were seven of us. Three boys, four boys, three girls.
[i] You were…?
[r] I was the oldest. I was the eldest. My father and mother were in business in Phnom Penh, we went to school. I studied Chinese at the Catholic church. The school was called Saint Joseph.
[i] You’re Catholic?
[r] I’m Catholic, my little sister is like my mother, she’s Buddhist. My father had no beliefs. He had no beliefs. He took care of business. He went back and forth to Vietnam. He came and went. And in 1975, on 15 April, we were expelled to the countryside. From Kilometer 6 [a district of Phnom Penh], we walked until late at night. There was no light at all, it was pitch black. And in the evening, to make some rice, we had nothing on us, we had left empty-handed. When we left… there are some who… When the ‘black shirts’ came in, everyone cheered them, then they kicked everyone out. We hadn’t brought anything with us, as far as Kilometre 6. We stayed there, at night, there were no lights, it was pitch black. People were hungry. Some of them had nothing, they starved to death there. There were only dead bodies on the ground, we didn’t know, we slept there. I was sleeping on dead people. When I woke up in the morning, everyone was dead. I jumped. Then they opened the warehouses where there was sugar. They opened them up so we could help ourselves. My little brother was able to take shoes, salt, sugar, all that. My father had taken some money. We took two or three packets. He bought pork, we had three pigs slaughtered, then we cooked it, so we could eat it on the road. With my grandfather and my grandmother… My grandfather couldn’t walk, so we pushed him in a wheelchair to my great-grandmother’s hometown. In Kompong Cham. [Name of the village] To go and live there. After less than two months, we were forced to work in the fields. Working in the fields… we couldn’t eat. To start with, they gave us a very small portion, they gave us a few pots of rice, for a family of ten. A few pots of rice. My grandfather, in 1975, after the arrival of the Khmer Rouge, after a few months, he died there. My great-grandmother had extended family they lived near that place, they came to where we were, to hold a ceremony for my grandfather. I asked a Buddhist monk… He said a prayer. Then, the next day, we were forced to work in the fields, and there were no more monks. We were just refugees. We still went to work, but we had nothing to eat. They gave out small quantities. Everything was in small quantities. We didn’t have enough to eat. And if we said we were still hungry, they shot us. No one dared say anything. We worked in the evening until we were exhausted. Until we were exhausted, then we went home to sleep. We ate very little. We worked there for a few months, then they sent us to another place to work for a few months, then we left again. We just kept leaving. Until we got to another place, we couldn’t eat. We really couldn’t eat anymore. My little brother died of hunger. My father died of hunger. There were a few of us left. There was my mother, my little sister got married… The second one got married to someone. We had forced her to get married.
[i] Who was she married to?
[r] She married a Chinese man. They had forced her to marry someone else, but this young man had just proposed to her, so she married him. So they were given… They were given a house for the two of them to live in. And my little sister and I… My little brother also died, in October. In 1977. In 1978, he died. In 1977, the refugees… The ones who were very pretty were married to disabled soldiers. The ones who were able to leave were married to other people. In 1977, Vietnamese soldiers, Vietnamese people, they were shot. The Vietnamese, they shot them. I was there, they said I was Vietnamese, they tied me up. Then they wanted to take me away to shoot me. Halfway there, the village chief… My mother kept begging him, she said to him, ‘My daughter is Chinese’, she doesn’t speak Khmer very well, she speaks Chinese better. He left me there and didn’t want me to enter this village. Which was called the Chinese village. They didn’t want me to enter this village, they took me to a mountain. On that mountain, we planted… We planted corn, cotton, we worked on the mountain. Once it was finished, one day… The others said, ‘People have arrived, we have to go and help.’ I said, ‘You mustn’t go, otherwise you’ll die.’ They didn’t listen. They all died there, they were all shot. That night, they shot 20-30 people. There was me and two or three other people left, we didn’t go, and we didn’t die. I didn’t die. They didn’t let me work there, they sent us to work in the fields somewhere else. Working in the fields, once we had finished one place, we went to work in another place. In one place, where there was the most water, the rice shoots were very long, half a metre high. They forced us to plant them underwater. Even to sleep, it was underwater, everything was underwater. We, the three sisters, were always under water, with other people, 20-30 people, we always slept in the water. That’s how we slept. And everyone said, ‘Oh!’ ‘In two days, there will be more deaths’. It’s true, there were more deaths. As there were too many deaths, they said, ‘It’s no longer possible’. They have to… They have to bring them back. Once we returned, after my sister got married, there were only two of us left, we went to a youth camp. In the youth camp, they separated us. They put me in one place, my sister in another. We were separated in different places. I went… They sent me to the railways. To work on the railways. Carrying earth. Carrying sand. I kept going up and down. At that point, I nearly died again. I had nothing to eat. At night, I would get up at 3 in the morning to work. We were only given a bowl of water at midday. It was like water, when you removed the water, there were three or six grains of rice. We were starving! Then we went to another place to plant corn. I was being presumptuous. [Laughter] I was pretentious, and I went to plant corn. Then I saw a snake at my feet, I didn’t dare move. A Cambodian said to me, ‘Don’t move, I’ll go get its tail’. Then he killed the snake. It was horrible to see that. The snake had laid lots of little eggs. He took them to cook them, to make a curry, I didn’t dare eat it. Then I stepped on a plough, it toppled over, I stepped on the plough, it swelled up. I couldn’t walk anymore. I couldn’t walk, I couldn’t do anything, then the boss said, ‘This is not good, you have to go to hospital.’ They took me to hospital, that’s how I survived. Because you could eat at the hospital. After eating, I helped the patients, looked after them, here and there. I learnt how to give injections, etc. I helped them there, there was food to eat. I distributed rice to the sick, there was some left over for me. There was rice left over, I took some… I asked them, ‘There’s rice left over, throwing it away would be a waste.’ They said to me, ‘Take it’. They said in Cambodian, ‘Take it.’ ‘Take whatever you want.’ I brought some for the seriously ill, those who couldn’t walk, I gave it to them. I gave them medicine, food, I helped them wash. I looked after them as if it were my hospital, it was very clean. And the nurse was very happy, she said, ‘You work well, you save people, come and help us’. Every day, I helped them to wash, to give injections, I did everything. One of them got an abscess from an injection. It wasn’t me who gave him the injection, it was someone else. Inside his abscess, there were worms. I removed the worms, but I couldn’t cure him. He died. I managed to save three people. The seriously ill people I saved were elderly people from the village. But I don’t know this place, there were too many. There were too many places I didn’t know. I brought them there, they survived… Three of them survived. After they survived, you know, those three people thanked me. The people in the village had money, they gave me food. My mother was also ill at that time, and she also went to that hospital. I was taking care of my mother. My mother had diarrhoea with blood. I went to look for medicinal plants and asked people how to use them. I was told to look for medicinal plants that look like water bindweed, which are very long. Wow, those medicinal plants were very effective. I boiled them. I made a brew for her in three bowls. After she drank it, the bleeding stopped. And she was feeling better. Then she was cured. So my mother was discharged from hospital and went to work in the fields. She was assigned to picking cotton. I was in the hospital and not yet cured, so I couldn’t leave. I couldn’t leave. And my mother had stepped on a huge nail in her foot, which had swollen up. Her foot was swollen in the village, and no one was looking after her. I heard that, I thought to myself, I’m going to chop some wood. From the hospital to the village, I had to wait until the middle of the night to go there. To go to the village from the hospital, I would go and chop wood for my mother, so that she could boil water to treat her foot. At night, when I went there… When I got there that night, I had really bad luck, I made a mistake. I arrived in the middle of a meeting. They were in the middle of a meeting, I didn’t know. They tied me up and took me away! Oh! It stank to high heaven! It was horrible, I was sleeping there, it smelled of urine, they imprisoned me there. Yuck! I wanted to throw up, to die! I had no choice! And after 30 minutes, I started to pray. I said, ‘Dad, I’m going to die this time’. After that, someone came to save me. Someone who came on a motorbike, he said, ‘You’re not to blame. You are a kind person, I’m taking you to the village to see your mother, so that you can look after her foot.’ He set me free. And I didn’t die. For the second time. The second time I survived death. In 1977, I was brought in, the time they said I was Vietnamese. The second time… It happened twice. The third time, I ran away; they wanted to force me to get married. I refused, and at night I dragged my mother away. We went to the place where my mother worked, where there were cotton fields. When we got there, people said… My mother was so scared that she no longer had any strength in her legs, I carried her, and I said, ‘You mustn’t be afraid.’ Because I was reckless. In the middle of the night, we couldn’t see anything, in the jungle, we couldn’t see anyone, it was very quiet, we were walking… When we were spotted, some children came, I don’t know which children, ‘black shirts’… They all had black shirts with guns. We were lucky. We didn’t meet anyone. I brought my mother to the top of the mountain. At the top of the mountain, she said, ‘Since you ran away, you don’t get paid. There’s nothing to eat for you.’ My mother sacrificed herself. It wasn’t congee, even though it was made with three ladles of water. They said it was congee, but it wasn’t. She gave me one ladle out of three. She kept two for herself. I forced myself to eat it. It allowed me to survive. My mother was afraid there; she didn’t dare go out at night. I wasn’t afraid to go out. I would go and look for bananas and hide them in the ground. At night, when people were sleeping, I would take them and cook them to eat. [Laughs] After eating them, I felt better, I was a little fuller. I wasn’t allowed milk, but my mother was. I shared a bowl with my mother, a very small bowl. And I… Some people kept asking me to marry them. I didn’t want to get married. I said I’d rather die. They said to me, ‘If you don’t go and get married, you’re going to die.’ I had no choice. I said I didn’t want to go. If I have to die, I’ll die. I said to my mother, ‘If I die, bring me… don’t bury me, throw me in the river.’ That’s what I said to my mum, and she said to me, ‘You’re talking nonsense! You haven’t even died yet, and you’re saying this kind of thing.’ I said, ‘You don’t believe me, you’ll see!’ And it’s true, they came to get me, I didn’t want to go. I didn’t want to, and my mum said… She went to beg the village chief and said, ‘Now, we have to wait until we finish working in the fields, finish the work before we can go down. Then she will get married.’ He said, ‘Yes, yes, yes.’ She said that, she gave him her consent. She gave him her consent, but I didn’t want to get married, I’d rather die, I didn’t want to live. I said, ‘I’m going to die, I don’t want to be involved in this’. Then I went downstairs, but there was no more problem. There was no more problem, the matter was no longer an issue. Later, I went back to the hospital because I still couldn’t walk. They forced me to go to the hospital. I stayed in hospital. I was treated until… until it was almost over. It was almost 1979, it was almost the end, at that point, people arrived. They said, ‘It’s not possible, you’re still in hospital, all you do is eat, you’re fat, all clean.’ They said, ‘It’s not possible, you have to go back to the village.’ I went back to the village there, I was weaving straw… to make… roofs… thatched roofs. That’s what I was doing. There was a young man there who had power. He kept… he wanted to be with me, I didn’t care, he kept bothering me. I said to my mum, ‘He won’t stop bothering me, I can’t work, let’s go!’ So we went to another place. Oh! We just kept running away. One place after another. My mum said, ‘You want to run away like that, I’m too tired, I can’t go with you.’ So my mother and I went our separate ways. My mother stayed in the village, I went elsewhere. I did this and that, I worked in the fields, on the roads, etc., I just kept leaving. Until… 1977. In 1977, 1978. My father said, in my dream, he said to me, ‘You have to hold on for another year, then you can leave the country.’ And I said, ‘I’m already dead, how could I leave?’ I thought that. When I woke up, they wanted to take me away by force to bury me. They said I was dead. Then I woke up, there was a woman who was called… her name was Cambodian, she predicted the future, she could predict the future, she said, ‘Wow, your destiny is long, you won’t die. Did you ask your father when you were going to go abroad?’ I said, ‘Yes! I asked. Later, I could leave the country.’ She said to me, “In how many years?” “My father said, we have to hold out until 1979.” I didn’t know when that was, at that moment, I was confused. She said, ’1979? 1979 is soon, it’s next year!’ She told me that I could get out next year. I said that I didn’t know, I just dreamt about it. Then she said to me, ‘Don’t you want to ask your father to live with him?’ I said, ‘My father is dead, how can I live with him, he doesn’t want me to live with him, he pushed me so that I would come down.’ And I woke up with a start. She said to me, ‘Wow, you really have a long destiny. Your life would be pretty good later on.’ So I left. In 1979, I left, I left to work, I left alone on the road, I looked for a road to walk on, I followed people on the road, to a place called Kompong Thom. From Kompong Thom, I walked to Kilometer 6. I followed people on the road, I was a woman alone, I just followed the crowd. We walked through the jungle. They said that if we didn’t take the road through the jungle, there would be tigers and snakes coming out… That night, I walked hard until I reached the jungle. In the jungle, there was a family, a mother and son, and there were many others there, cooking. I had nothing, I had empty hands. So I helped them wash the rice, so that an elderly person could eat. The elderly person said to me, ‘You’re not bad, young lady. You’re helpful.’ She said, ‘Come and eat with us.’ They had a meal to eat. After eating, I went to see the river. It was horrible! Some had eaten too much. They were tired, they drank water and swelled up, they swelled up and died there. I jumped out of my skin, I thought to myself, ‘My God, here I am once again coming across dead people.’ All I saw on the road were dead people, it was horrible! Then I arrived at Kilometre 6. At Kilometre 6, I found my mother and my sister. I was planting soya over there to sell it. I was planting soya… I was living with someone, down in a little corner. And that person said, ‘You don’t know how to do anything, what are you going to do?’ I said, ‘I don’t know how. Can you teach me?’ She said, ‘It’s not possible, I’m in business, I’m not going to teach you.’ So I secretly watched how she grew the soya. Then I managed to get some shoots. I went to Phnom Penh, I wanted to go to my house to get some things. The Vietnamese military were watching at the time. I went back to my house and saw that it was full of shoes! They didn’t want me to go in, so I just looked. I looked and, wow, it was full of shoes. How could I go and get my jewellery in there? I couldn’t. So I left. I went to stay with other people… You know, at night, there was no light or anything. I hid at someone’s house. The house where I hid was full of… The house was very beautiful, but it was full of urine and excrement. It was horrible! It stank to high heaven! I didn’t find anything. A friend of mine who had escaped with me had found her jewellery. She had taken it to sell. I had nothing. Then I saw that in one house there was a drawer with a box. There was tobacco with rolling papers, thin papers, two boxes of it. I said to myself, I mustn’t leave empty-handed, I have to get those two tins. I managed to sell those two tins. I was able to sell the two tins and start my business. I took the money and exchanged it for mung beans. I took mung beans to grow soya. I sold a cup, a small bag, I made a fortune! I earned so much money, I couldn’t eat it all by myself! My mother had heard about this from the countryside, with my brother-in-law, they also did… they cycled to do business. When he heard that I was earning well, he brought my mother and they took the Vietnamese army bus… It cost 2 cents per person. And me… They had no money, they came to take mine, I only had that money to trade, and they took it all! I didn’t have much left to buy rice to feed them again. So we were together and my mother helped me sell soybeans. So I went to try and sell this and that. My sister and brother-in-law helped us too. They made tofu to sell.
[i] What period was that?
[r] It was 1979.
[i] The Khmer Rouge was finished?
[r] Yes, it was over.
[i] Where was it?
[r] Now?
[i] What you’re talking about.
[r] At Kilometre 6. At Kilometre 6.
[i] Where is that?
[r] ‘Kilometre 6’, how do you say that in French?
[i] Is it in Cambodia?
[r] In Cambodia, Kilometre 6. We were trading there, it’s where we grew soya. After that period, one of my little sisters, someone asked for her hand in marriage, she married him. We had to borrow plates and bowls, I took care of that on my own, so that she could get married. We had five ceremonies. And… Oh! Being the eldest was difficult! I was carrying so much on my head that it almost broke. Once I brought things back, I still had to bring things to people. I had to give people red envelopes, they didn’t even want to take them, they said, ‘We fled together…’, they had a good heart. They said, ‘We fled together, no need to take your money’. I didn’t have any money to give them either. People helped us, we helped them a little too. Over there, we earned money. I lived with my sister for a while, then I had no more business to do. I started selling fried doughnuts, white sugar cakes, soya milk, above Kilometer 6, where the goods vehicles passed. There, I sold sitting with a small table to sell for a while, then with my aunt… She was my great-uncle’s daughter, she was an aunt. She survived the Khmer Rouge. In October 1979, it was almost New Year, she had fled. She met me and said, ‘Oh, [name of interviewee], you earn a lot of money selling that! It’s not going well here, let’s go near the ‘Pont d’acier’ (Steel Bridge) to earn some money. Business is going great at the Pont d’acier!’ “I don’t have a place to stay there, how am I going to get there?” She said, “It doesn’t matter, we can sleep on the street.” She said that. So I left with her. Then I borrowed some rice from my sister. My sister didn’t help me. My little sister didn’t help me, so I went to Mile 6 empty-handed. That night, I fasted. Because I didn’t have any rice or anything, how could I eat? So I fasted, and my aunt said to make congee, she said ‘Come and eat!’, There are six of you, there’s just me, what can I eat? A tiny, tiny bowl, I don’t want any. I’ll leave it for the two of you. I drink water, that’s enough for me. I slept until morning. The village chief asked me, ‘Why don’t you want to find somewhere to live? There are lots of places to live over there, why don’t you go and look for one? Why are you sleeping on the floor?’ I said, ‘Can we live there?’ He said, ‘Yes, we can!’ ‘If you find somewhere to live, it’s yours!’ That’s what he said. I said, ‘In that case, okay. Let’s each look for one. Seven people, seven places.’ But my aunt and uncle were afraid of ghosts, they didn’t dare. So I was the only one to find a place of 20 square metres, they came to huddle with me, I said to them, ‘How silly you are! Each of you take one, in future you can sell them!’ They didn’t want to listen to me. They said they were afraid of ghosts, they didn’t dare. I had no choice of accommodation. So there were seven of us living together. We lived on the top floor. I liked the fact that it was high up. So I continued to sell fried doughnuts. Selling ten doughnuts, I only earned two jars [of rice]. She didn’t even give me any. His wife was selfish. So I waited for her husband to come home. He said, ‘When he came home, he saw me, he was really happy, he said to me, “You’re a girl from a good family, but here, we have nothing to give you…”. I said, ’The past is behind us. Let’s not talk about it anymore. Now I have no rice, nothing. I’ll ask you for ten pots of rice. When I sell ten… I don’t even earn two pots when I sell fried doughnuts. And her husband said, he said to his wife, ‘Why don’t you give it to her?’ His wife said, ‘We’ve sold everything, tell her to come tomorrow, we’ll give her ten.’ I sold all ten in half an hour, and there were no more. When there were no more, I said, I was bold, I said, ‘If I sell 200, I can earn 20 pots.’ His wife didn’t want to. She didn’t want to, but I ignored her. So I went to help sell fried doughnuts. I helped her make them. Then she saw that I was hard-working, that I helped her clean this and that, she saw that I was hard-working. So she said, ‘Take them, take them…’ In less than two hours, I had earned 20 coins. Then I did something else, I sold cakes that people had made, I earned two coins, that made 22 coins in total. In a day, I earned 22 pots, that made 2 gold coins. At the time, rice grains were more expensive than gold. I exchanged the rice grains for gold, which I saved. Then I found out that my mother didn’t have any rice grains, so I brought her some for her to eat. I rested once a week, and I brought some to my mother at Kilometre 6. I earned money easily, in a short time, I earned 20 to 30 jars. And I had a place to live. I told my mother to come and live there, but she didn’t want to. She stayed to live at Kilometre 6, while I lived near the Pont d’acier. I lived there until my cousin, who was in the countryside, said it was the end of the Khmer Rouge and that she didn’t want to live there anymore and wanted to live with me. I said, ‘Okay, if you want to live with me, okay.’ So I had to feed her. Her aunt had entrusted her to me. Her aunt had gone to Vietnam. She wanted to bring her, but she said it wasn’t possible, she had to find the route first before bringing her to Vietnam. Then her aunt found the route to Vietnam, she sent someone to come and get my cousin. My cousin said she didn’t dare go, ‘If I go there on my own, he’ll have to drag me, I don’t dare.’ So she dragged me along with her, while I was working for someone, making fried noodles. I did the washing up, I helped out with everything. I was entitled to two or even three meals a day. At 1 o’clock in the morning, I had to light the fire to make the stock for the noodles. And then, at 12 o’clock at midday, a meal, and in the evening, a meal, so I didn’t have to cook. I had eight jars of rice grains. They gave me eight jars of rice grains a day, I could get rich. I had three meals with them, so I didn’t have to cook. And my cousin was there, I had to feed her. She cooked the rice herself, and she took eight jars of rice to sell, but it didn’t work. So she lost my money. I said, ‘Don’t sell any more. Just eat.’ I told her that. Then we came to get her. She stayed for just a few months, then we came to get her. She didn’t dare go. So she forced me to go. She wanted to force me, I said, ‘I have work. If you take me, when I come back, there won’t be any work left.’ She said, ‘Come live there! There’s room there.’ I listened to her, and we went to Vietnam. When we arrived in Vietnam… Her aunt argued with me. She said, ‘You came here, but I didn’t tell you to come.’ And on the road, they put us in prison. Because she was wearing… red shoes from Cambodia, she wasn’t allowed to wear them, they caught her and not me. They said I was Vietnamese, she was Chinese, er Cambodian. They said that red was Cambodia, so they caught her. So she was scared, and she dragged me with her, so that I would go to prison too. Inside the prison, I only knew two sentences in Vietnamese. I said, ‘Why are you imprisoning me?’ They spoke Vietnamese to her, those two soldiers kept laughing, I didn’t know they wanted money, I didn’t have any money left. They had taken all the money I had on me. There was 20 or 30 cents left. I said, ‘If you take that 20 or 30 cents, I won’t be able to eat’. So they gave us back the 20 or 30 cents, my cousin said she was very hungry, we asked them to go out to eat. To buy something to eat. I said to my cousin, ‘You’re just crying, why are you crying? You’re crying but it’s no use! Don’t cry! Just follow me!’ I was bold. Then I took her out to eat, and we came back. Then the guy who was supposed to take us to Vietnam arrived, and he negotiated with the boss. He was asking four gold coins for one person. He said it was four gold coins to set us free. Two people was eight coins. I said, ‘My goodness, eight coins, but I don’t have four coins. My cousin’s four coins, her aunt had taken them out for her, she hadn’t taken them out for me. What could we do? The man who was supposed to take us, he took two gold coins from me, and he said that if she gave them for her niece, but not for me, in that case, he wouldn’t take us both. The aunt who was in Vietnam had no choice. She phoned them to tell them that now it was eight coins for both of them. This aunt wasn’t really my aunt, she was my cousin’s aunt. She said, ‘What if you only take my niece, but not…’ My name is [name of interviewee]. She said, ‘Don’t come with [name of interviewee].’ The guy who was supposed to bring us, he had already taken my two coins from me, he definitely wanted to bring me.’ He said, “I took her coins, I have to keep my word, and bring her to Cholon.” She had no choice, she took eight coins. When we arrived in… When I arrived in Vietnam, my aunt gave me a good telling-off. She said, ‘You’ve come here and you’re in the way. Go and make some congee,’ and she invited me to eat. ‘Come and eat!’ I was very angry, I was very depressed. I had no money, she lent it to me at the beginning. She said to me, ‘I don’t want to put you up. Go and get your best friend. Your friend called Lak. Go and get her.’ I said, ‘How am I going to do that? I don’t know my way around Vietnam, how am I going to find her?’ She said, ‘Get out, walk down the street, and it’s on the corner.’ She forced me to go down, I had no choice. She took me to get a perm. Suddenly, I looked even more like a Vietnamese woman. [Laughter] I looked like a Vietnamese woman. She said to me, ‘With the perm, you look like a Vietnamese woman, you look just right.’ The owner of the ground floor brought me in and said, ‘You really look like a Vietnamese woman, you don’t look like a Khmer. I said, “How can I find my friend, where is Lak?” He said, ’Walk that way and you’ll see her.’ I didn’t find her there, she had gone to work, I didn’t know. It was 7 o’clock in the evening, I was walking down the street, and I said to myself, ‘My God, if I get caught by the military, what am I going to do?’ It would be even worse if they took me to the refugee camp. I don’t know it, I can’t even say a word in Vietnamese. They told me to come to Vietnam, damn it! I was scared. I thought to myself, this is horrible, this time it’s even worse than Pol Pot. I thought about that. She knew, she was eating ice cream, she came out and jumped on me, I jumped, I was shaking, I said, ‘Who are you?’ I screamed very loudly, she told me, ‘Don’t scream.’ I am Lak. I was so happy. I was reassured. And she said, she said, ‘Go on, eat.’ I said, ‘I don’t feel like eating at all, because I’ve been told not to eat, hearing that, I’m not hungry anymore, how can I still want to eat?’ She said, ‘Come, come, come, I’ll take you to eat, to a lady’s house.’ Someone who didn’t know me and who took me in, she put me up, she fed me. I said, ‘Look, an aunt I know doesn’t even care about me. Now someone I don’t know has taken me in.’ She said, ‘Take your friend to eat. She can even stay with you.’ So I said to my friend Lak, I said, ‘Lak, do you have any money?’ She said, ‘Why?’ ‘I borrowed four gold coins from someone, she wants them back tomorrow, I don’t have any money. I don’t even have a cent on me.’ She said, ‘It doesn’t matter, I’ll give you 5 gold coins, go and give them back to her.’ Early in the morning, I went to give them back to her. Do you know what my aunt said? ‘Wow, your friend has money?’ I said, ‘Yes, she has money and she has a kind heart.’ I told her that. I was angry. I was angry. I said, ‘She has money and she has more heart than you. Knowing you is useless to me.’ I didn’t want to say any more, I took the 5 gold coins, she gave me change, she gave me Vietnamese change. I didn’t know how much it was worth, what she gave me back, I gave it to my friend. I said, ‘Lak, this is what she gave me back, I don’t have enough to give you the money back.’ She said, ‘Oh! Your aunt even ripped you off!’ I said, ‘Let her rip me off, now I don’t owe her anything. I don’t care if there’s enough money. For now, I’ll borrow it from you. I’ll borrow five gold coins. I’ll pay you back when I get to France.’ “What? To France?” She jumped. I said, ’So how are we going to do it? I don’t have any money left.’ She said to me, ‘In that case, come with me and help me sell cigarettes.’ So I went with her on her bike to sell cigarettes. And a Vietnamese lady who had bought cigarettes from her said to me, ‘You know how to ride a bike, you know how to ride a motorbike?’ I said, ‘I can do anything. I’m very brave, I can do anything.’ ‘Perfect! I’m looking for someone to look after my house. I’ll give you a dong a day. In Vietnamese currency. You’ll earn 30 a month. Food, lodging, etc. I said, ‘Wow, that’s good too.’ I didn’t have anywhere to sleep, I didn’t want to stay with people for too long. So I went to her place to work for a month, two months. After two months, I wrote a letter to my cousin, so that he could apply for me to come to France. Before that I was in Phnom Penh, but I went to Vietnam, it didn’t work out. He wrote to me to say, ‘It’s not possible, we have to reapply.’ I said, ‘When will it be done?’ ‘There’s no point, if it’s possible, I’ll come, if not, too bad.’ I thought about it. I went shopping at the market and met a cousin. She said to me, ‘I met you in Phnom Penh, I’ve met you here too, you’re a long way from home! You’ve come all this way on your own, you’re really brave!’ I said, ‘Yes, I am brave, but today, I don’t have a penny to my name.’ ‘Where are you living at the moment?’ I said, ‘I’m staying with some people.’ She said, ‘That’s good, there’s a lady who’s looking for someone to be a nanny and help her cook. Do you want to do it?’ I said, ‘Okay, I’ll do it.’ So I went to Saigon, to Cholon to work for this lady. She sold incense sticks wholesale. Her house was huge. When I arrived there, I started washing the laundry, cooking rice, etc. And late in the evening, when I had finished, when I had time, I went to the cinema. I loved going to the cinema. Every evening, I would buy a ticket for one dong to see a film, then at 9 o’clock I would go home to sleep. And I was daring, I didn’t turn on the light, I slept on the third floor. The others slept downstairs, I slept on the third. I didn’t know that there were ghosts on the second floor. [Laughter] I didn’t know, so I went up to the third floor. At night, to go to the toilet, you had to go all the way down. And I was daring, I didn’t turn on the light, I went down from the third floor, my aunt was so scared she fainted! [Laughter] She said, ‘Next time, you can’t not turn on the light, you have to turn on the light!’ I said, ‘Why?’ Under Pol Pot, I was used to being in the dark. Coming here, there was too much light, I wasn’t used to it. So I told her, ‘You didn’t live under Pol Pot.’ She said, ‘Why?’ I said, ‘You’re not bold, you know I’m very bold. I’m not afraid.’ She said, “You know, on the second floor, someone hanged themselves. Have you seen any ghosts?” “No, I haven’t seen any!” [Laughter] And she said, “You’re right.” I worked for her for 4 months, I had been in Vietnam for 6 months. 6 months. Then I was forced to go to the Sông Bé refugee camp. That night, it was very funny, the soldiers arrived. The soldiers arrived, then… Where did we go to hide? We hid in the doghouse. Up there, in the doghouse. We went inside to hide with my aunt’s daughter. We were afraid the soldiers would catch us, but they didn’t find us. They hadn’t looked in the dog kennel. The kennel was big, we had both hidden inside it. When the soldiers left, my aunt was so scared, she said, ‘It’s not possible, tomorrow you have to go back to Cambodia, you can’t live in Vietnam. And in Sông Bé, you have no one, you will die if you go to Sông Bé. I said, ‘In that case, what can we do?’ She said, ‘It doesn’t matter.’ She had a friend who brought people to Cambodia. She gave him two gold coins to bring me to Cambodia. To Cambodia.
[i] Did you go back to Cambodia?
[r] Yes, again. In Cambodia, I went to look for my boss. I looked for my boss, my boss had moved somewhere else to be the boss of a café. He told me to roast the coffee, to do the serving, I did everything. I did everything. I worked there for two months. I was housed and fed, so his wife was jealous. She said that… I loved her husband. I didn’t want to get involved in that kind of thing. So I worked for two months, then I left again, for Battambang. In Battambang, I sold ice cubes. For a year. At New Year, I met a young man on a bicycle, whose life I had saved. At Kilometre 6, he had nothing to eat, I had asked the boss to give him something to eat. He saw me, he recognised me, I didn’t remember him. He had come to get an ice-cold drink, he said to me, ‘You could leave, why don’t you leave?’ I said, ‘Leave where?’ ‘Leave for France! Go abroad! Anyone with papers can leave. If there are requests from relatives abroad, you can leave. Why don’t you leave?’ He asked me, “After the Chinese New Year, do you want to leave?” I said, “Yes! Will you help me leave?” He said, “Yes. Do you know how to ride a bike?” I said, ’Yes.’ ‘In that case, cycle to the border, all the way to Thailand.’ So I cycled to Camp 007. Then I sold the bike. So I had some money. Then I met a friend, whose mother said to me, ’I’m miserable.’ I said, ‘Why, don’t you have anything to eat?’ She said, ‘I don’t have anything to eat.’ I said, ‘I said, it’s okay, wait for me, I have money, I’ll buy you something to eat.’ Then I stayed at her place for the night. The next morning, I cycled to 007, the UN refugee camp. There were doctors from all over the world who had come to treat people. I slept there. I helped the doctor’s wife deliver babies. I cooked and did the laundry. Then the doctor said to me, ‘Do you want to leave? I’ll introduce you to two soldiers who can help you to leave. I said, “OK. But I don’t have any money, I’ll tell you that straight away.” He said, ’If you have family abroad, that’s enough.’ I happened to have cousins abroad. I said, ‘I don’t know if my cousin will want to apply.’ He said, ‘Try it, if you don’t get your papers, go to Khao-I-Dang, in Thailand, you’ll see if it works.’ In fact, he wanted to rip me off. I didn’t even have any money and he wanted to rip me off. I went to do my laundry. My destiny was lucky. I met a fortune teller. She was washing herself. She said, ‘Later on, you’ll have to come and see me.’ I said, ‘Why?’ ‘Come, I’ll tell you your destiny, I’ll save you.’ I said, ‘Okay.’ In Thailand, when I arrived at Camp 007, I met a faithful Catholic, who heard that I was also Catholic. She wanted to take me to Thailand but it wasn’t possible. To go to Khao-I-Dang, it wasn’t possible. She told me she would send me money. So she asked a priest to take some money intended to help refugees, and he gave me 200 baht. I said I borrowed the money from him. She said to me, ‘It doesn’t matter, we’re giving it to you, it’s the Catholic faithful who have pooled their money to give to the poor.’ She gave 200 baht for me. I kept the 200 baht on me, then I met this fortune teller. She told me to come and see her, so I went. She said to me, ‘You know, I’m going to save you.’ I said, ‘Why?’ She said, ‘Your destiny is not here. Your destiny is abroad.’ I said, ‘Where in foreign countries? I don’t know any.’ I don’t know where the aeroplanes are, I’ve never been abroad. She said, ‘Follow me and you’ll be fine.’ I said, ‘Which road should I take?’ She said, ‘You have to shave your head to pay homage to your parents at this place. Then you can cross the border.’ She gave me these recommendations. So I let her shave my head and I gave her 10 baht. And she read my cards, it was very accurate! She said, ’You know, you can’t follow this doctor, this doctor is going to… the smuggler… wants to take your person, take your destiny.’ I said, ‘But I don’t even have any money.’ She said, ‘Even if you don’t have any money, he’ll take you. He’ll kill you.’ I heard that, I said, ‘What can I do?’ She said, ‘Now go home. Take this money, you have a hundred baht left, take it to leave. Follow me, I’ll show you the way, follow me. Then you’ll meet a young man, in his twenties, he’ll come and get you.’ She told me that, I hadn’t met him yet. I thought to myself, I’m going to listen to him. I followed him. I walked, and then it was exactly like that! I was eating, a young man in his twenties said to me ‘Big sister!’, in Cambodian, he said to me, ‘Big sister, do you want to follow me?’ I said, ‘Where to?’ ‘To Khao-I-Dang.’ I said, ‘I don’t have any money.’ He wanted 2,000 baht. 2,500 baht. Thai currency. I said, ‘I don’t have any money on me, you’re telling me to come with you, I don’t have any money to give you.’ He said, ‘It doesn’t matter. Abroad, you have relatives who have sent money.’ He said to me, ‘Follow me.’ I said yes. I was brave, I said yes. After dinner, I followed him, in the middle of the night, we walked, my legs were bleeding. There was sharp barbed wire… The lights were spinning, when the lights were facing the other way, we had to hurry to get away. I was in so much pain, I was bleeding, I couldn’t climb any more. The ground was too high, we were at the bottom, as soon as there was light, we would bend down, and when the light was there, we would hurry to get through. I opened my legs, it hurt, he dragged me, he dragged me so that I could move forward. When we got there, he prayed to the Buddha. The Buddha was very lively. He saw that my legs were bleeding, he told his wife to quickly put some ointment on them, the next day, they took me to look for people, to look for Chinese people. There was the Chinese community that organised activities. Like the Teochew Association, which helped people. I went to register. After a few people, I met the one who had brought me to Thailand, he was also there, he said to me, ‘You have nowhere to sleep, tonight sleep at this lady’s, don’t stay with that young man, that man has leprosy. If you stay with him and he hurts you, you’ll be in trouble. I said, ‘But no, he’s very nice.’ He said, ‘No, no, follow me and let’s go.’ So I went with him to this aunt’s place. After sleeping there, the next morning I went to look for things so that we could make a request for me. And I was lucky. Someone from the Red Cross arrived. She said, ‘Those who haven’t registered yet, come and register,’ so I registered myself. So I was living alone. The people who lived next door were a couple, no children, they lived next door to me, Chinese. They said… I can’t remember their names, it’s been too long. They lived over there, they said, ‘Big sister, now that we’ve distributed the bamboo stalks, if you know how to do something, do it. I borrowed a saw from someone, I made a bed, a piece of furniture, a door, there were people who came to catch you at night, the Thai military were nasty, they committed rapes. I was scared. I made everything. I had a padlock, I asked someone in Thailand to buy me a padlock. Once it was done, there was a lady who came from Vietnam and came to live with me. She knew Vietnamese and a little French. Now she’s in the United States. I don’t know her name anymore, I can’t remember. We lived together. Until she went abroad, and so did I. The Red Cross took me. I flew to France. When I arrived in France, I had no clothes, I would have frozen to death. They gave me a coat. [Laughter]
[i] What year did you arrive in France?
[r] In 1982. I arrived in France on 27 March.
[i] How long did you stay in Thailand?
[r] I only stayed in Thailand for a few months. About three months. It was quick for me because I was alone. I had been waiting for a long time. A month before, they kept telling me I was angry and I said I was going to register to go to China. On the day I registered, that very day, my legs were aching, I was called to leave, but it didn’t work. They didn’t want me to leave, my legs were aching, they didn’t want me to leave. People said I was lying, but the fact was I couldn’t walk. I said, ‘Carry me and I’ll go.’ They didn’t want me to go to China, they allowed me to go to France. That’s it. I flew to France and arrived at the refugee camp in Herblay. I lived in Herblay for less than a week or two, then my husband came to get me.
[i] Who?
[r] My husband. He came to get me. He… He was looking for a wife, he wasn’t married yet, he was looking for a wife. He came to meet me. It was his little sister who introduced us. His sister sent me some shrimp paste. Five kilos that she had sent from Chonburi. She wanted me to be her sister-in-law. For me to be her sister-in-law. I hadn’t met him yet, I couldn’t accept yet. I said, ‘I’m waiting to see him in France before getting married.’ She was afraid that I wouldn’t keep in touch, so she used the shrimp paste to stay in touch. She wrote a letter to her older brother. She was going to Australia. My sister-in-law went to Australia. She wrote a letter to her older brother, to go to the refugee camp to look for me. He came to look for me but he couldn’t find me, because as soon as I arrived, they would take me for a walk to the Arc de Triomphe. That was my friend Lak, when she arrived, she would take me for walks, on the river boats, to visit all of Paris… I was lucky. When I arrived, I visited Paris and the Eiffel Tower in a week. I visited all of Paris. I had a friend who said to me, ‘You know, you’re very lucky. You found me. I’m going to show you around and take you to the Foire du Trône, etc.’ For a week, two weeks, I walked all day long. My husband came from the countryside to pick me up, but he couldn’t find me. I was always out and about. I didn’t stay at the hostel, I ate out and didn’t eat at the hostel. She said to me, ‘You’re very lucky, when you arrived here, you were very bold, you never stopped following people, you weren’t afraid.’ I said, ‘Me… I escaped death, now I want to walk!’ That’s what I thought. I just kept walking, until one day, my husband couldn’t find me, he came… It was a Friday afternoon. He had just finished work and quickly took the train to come and get me in Herblay. He found me, and the next day they assigned me to the Cadet refugee centre.
[i] Where was that?
[r] Cadet, in the 9th arrondissement. Cadet. I lived there for four months. I learnt a little French there, I learnt to read the metro map. They helped me with the administrative procedures. When I arrived, I declared my real age, 33. They said to me, ‘Don’t do that! If you’re 33, you won’t find work. Now you have to declare that you’re younger.’ I said, ‘How many years younger?’ They said, ‘You’re 33, say you’re 27. That way you’ll find work.’ When I left the refugee centre, I had nowhere to live. Everyone else had people they knew who could put them up, but I was the only one who didn’t know where to go. I had nowhere to live. So I phoned that young man who wanted to court me, and I said to him, ‘[her husband’s name], now what do I do, I’ve got no place to live, they told me to leave, what do I do? They don’t care whether I have any acquaintances or not, they tell me to look for people.’ He said that in that case he had an uncle who lived in Tower 84, on the 14th floor. ‘Go and live with him for a week, then we’ll look for somewhere to live. I said, “That’s good too.” I asked him if I could live there for a week. After a day or two there, I signed up to work as a temp. To work at Renault, or I can’t remember which factory. I didn’t know it, they took me there, I went. I was bold, I followed the others. When I got there, they told me to sign up, then they hired me. I worked there for two weeks, they saw that I worked well, they hired me on a permanent contract. I worked there… until about… Then my husband came to live with me. He was afraid that I would be kidnapped… At the time, I was living in Aubervilliers, I was living in a room, 600 Francs. I lived alone. Opposite me there was a French couple. They were kind-hearted, they could see that I lived alone, they said to me, ‘Aren’t you afraid?’ And at the weekends, I had friends who had a dressmaking workshop, they said, ‘Come and learn how to use the sewing machine, at the weekends, sew a little. On Saturdays, you don’t go anywhere, you stay at home, and you’re all alone, so you sew clothes.’ I went and bought a sewing machine for 4,000 francs. 4,000 francs. I learned to sew. At first, out of every ten, I only managed one. I couldn’t do it. I kept pricking my fingers. A week later, I could do it. In a day or two, I’d make 300 or 400. One day, I sewed 20 or 30 items of clothing. Before, it was only a franc per item. At the weekend, I did sewing. I started to earn money. My husband was scared, he came quickly from Paris to move, to live in this place, it was very cramped. What’s more, he brought two nephews to live with us. There were four of us living there. In a very small room, we were so cramped. I said, ‘It’s not possible. We have to find another place to live.’
[i] And where were you living at the time? In 1984… In 1983, I was living in Tower 84. I was living in Tower 84 when I got married. Then I had children, I had three of them when I was living in Tower 84, until one of my children was six years old. When I had children, I applied for social housing, which I got in Chateau des Rentiers. Until today. My children are all grown up, they are all married, my husband has passed away. Now I live alone. [Laughter] That’s my life until today, that’s all. That’s my story. [Laughter]
[i] When you arrived in Paris, you learnt to sew. Have you always been a seamstress?
[r] I wasn’t a seamstress, I worked for French people. To begin with, I worked… in a factory, then I had three children, then I stopped, I was unemployed. After being unemployed, I worked part-time as an ironing woman… I ironed clothes. I ironed tablecloths. For the French, for 3 months. At the end of the 3-month contract, I was renewed, and after 6 months, I stopped. Then I was unemployed. While I was unemployed, I went to do… what did I do…? I looked after my children at home, and I looked after other children at the same time. Then my husband was also unemployed, we were both unemployed, we weren’t working. We were receiving state benefits. It was in 19… In 19… I can’t remember which year, I found work at Charles de Gaulle airport, I worked there until I retired.
[i] What did you do?
[f] I cleaned. I worked there for 8 years. I was always alternating between work and unemployment. I worked until all my children got married. Now I’m retired. [Laughter] That’s my story, that’s all.
[i] You have three children, right?
[f] Yes, two girls and a boy.
[i] How old are they?
[r] My eldest daughter is 33. The second is 32. The third… is 30. 31. Now she is 31. Now, the eldest… this year she will be 34. The second, the boy will be 33. The third is 31. They all have children. I have four grandchildren. My eldest daughter has a boy and a girl. My son has a boy. The youngest has a girl. That’s all. Now I live alone.
[i] Where do they live?
[r] One in Lognes, one in Vitry, one in Dijon. I don’t know their addresses, there’s no point in asking me.
[i] What do they do for work?
[r] One works in IT. Computers. The second one has just been unemployed. The boy is unemployed. The girl works in a bank. I don’t know exactly what they do, don’t ask me. I really don’t know anything.
[i] Do you tell them your story?
[r] When I tell them, they don’t have time to listen.
[i] They don’t know your story?
[r] No, they haven’t asked me.
[i] They don’t know what you’ve just told me?
[r] They know nothing.
[i] They haven’t asked either?
[r] Why would they have asked? They were busy with their studies, their friends, etc. They didn’t care about their mother’s stories. I’ve already talked about it, I’ve already told them, but they couldn’t listen. ‘We don’t know what you’re talking about.’ They didn’t live through that period. I told them what I went through, but they said… They said, ‘Don’t talk about it.’ It’s too sad, they don’t want to listen. They said they didn’t want to listen to sad stories. They said, ‘Mum, it’s too sad, don’t talk about it, it makes us cry.’ They said that and didn’t want to listen. So I didn’t tell them any more. If you publish a book, I’ll show it to them. They’ll know more or less. [Laughter] That’s how it is. My story is over, there’s nothing left, now I live alone.
[i] And before, in Cambodia, you thought one day you might come…
[r] No, I didn’t think about it! You know, in Cambodia, there was no point in thinking, I went out, I took money to buy food, buy this and that, I didn’t think about anything at all. I had business to do. I opened a drawer, took what I wanted, bought what I wanted, my father didn’t stop me. It was easy to buy things. And I was daring. I rode my motorbike, I rode my bike, I didn’t care about anything. Every day, I rode my bike for a ride, and my motorbike. I didn’t care about other people. My father said, ‘You don’t think, you go wherever you want.’ I didn’t need to ask, I went wherever I wanted. I didn’t care about anyone. I didn’t need anyone’s permission. I’ve had my daring since I was little. I was very daring. To do business, my father often asked me to go shopping. To replenish stocks, collect the money, On Saturdays, I was the one who collected the money. My brothers and sisters didn’t know how to do that. My father knew I was daring, I was afraid of nothing. On Saturdays, I was the one who collected the money that my father didn’t collect. I would stay until I had collected it. I was a child, my father couldn’t do that. We would say, ‘There were no customers today, don’t come to collect the money.’ My father was afraid, he told me to go. So I went, until I got the money, then I went back to give it to my father. Since I was little, since I was 8 or 9, I’ve known how to sew buttons, I can do everything. Because my mother was hard-working. She made clothes at home, she sewed clothes, I added the buttons. From a young age, I learnt what other people did. I didn’t care if there were servants etc., I worked. When I wanted to work, I worked. When I didn’t want to, I went for walks. I was like a boy. I played boys’ games. I was like a boy. Everyone said I could be a boy, not a girl. I played with elastic bands, poppity-pop. I played with elastic bands. I played every night until morning. I was good at going for walks. I was good at watching films. I was good at everything. If there was something fun to do, I went for it.
[i] When you lived…
[r] In Paris?
[i] … during the Khmer Rouge, you…
[r] What?
[i] Did you think you could… … that one day it would end?
[r] No, I didn’t think about it. I was just waiting to die. That was all I thought about. I thought to myself, if that’s how it is, I was just waiting to die. I wasn’t thinking about anything else. I thought to myself that one day, if they shot me, I was going to die, I wasn’t thinking about anything else. I swear to you. There was nothing to eat, I had no strength, they gave you a bowl of water, there was nothing to eat. As soon as I lay down, I fell asleep. I looked at the sky, the stars, the clouds. When it rained, I put a cloth over me for shelter, I thought of nothing else. I thought that one day I would die like the others. I didn’t think about anything. I didn’t think I would come to France. I didn’t think I would flee. I didn’t think I would experience what I am experiencing today. If it hadn’t been for the Vietnamese soldiers, I would be dead. On the last day, there were 50 of us in a ditch. We had dug a hole 100 metres deep and 100 metres wide, and we had all dug it. Then they told us to celebrate. At that moment, the Vietnamese soldiers arrived. There were 50 of us in the middle. The Vietnamese were on that side. The Vietnamese were there, the Cambodians on the other side. All 50 of us, all girls, were there. In the middle. The Vietnamese said, ‘Come this way!’ The others said, ‘Come that way!’ I heard that, I didn’t know where to go, I was in the middle. The others asked me, ‘Which way should we go?’ I said, ‘I don’t know, now, which way should we go?’ In my heart, I thought it was better to follow the Vietnamese. Because on this side, we had already endured suffering and misfortune. ‘Come on, follow me this way.’ 30-40 people followed me this way. There were about ten who didn’t want to listen, they were shot over there. As soon as they arrived, they were shot. We were lucky on our side. They quickly took us over there, they told us to get down on the ground. They fired on one side, then on the other, they were shooting at each other. We were in the middle, on the ground. When they finished, they lost and left. The Vietnamese soldiers helped us get back up, if we wanted rice, they gave it to us, they gave us anything we wanted. I couldn’t take it, a packet of rice grains was 20-30 kilos, I couldn’t take it, I didn’t have the strength to take it. I took a few jars to eat on the road. I just ran away. I’ve been running away until today. I wasn’t thinking about anything. All I cared about was walking. I went where I needed to go, and I was bold. When I had to work, I went to work. I didn’t think I’d get this far today. I didn’t think about it. Today, whatever the subject, I don’t think about it. I know that one day I will be dead. I almost died twice and I didn’t die. I had been forced to fetch water for the elderly, I almost fell into the water, I almost died. Once, a snake was at my feet, I almost died. In the cornfields, I almost died, there was a snake at my feet. That’s my fate, five times, I survived. That’s how it is. That’s what I experienced, that’s how it is. You ask me if I was thinking of anything, I wasn’t thinking of anything. I was just thinking that I was going to die one day. I was just waiting to die. I didn’t think I was alive. That’s how it is. I wasn’t thinking of anything. Even when I fled, I wasn’t thinking of anything. I didn’t think I would make it to France. I swear to you. All that time, I was always alone on the run, I couldn’t have thought about coming to France. I didn’t think about it.
[i] What about your brothers and sisters?
[r] They died, I only have two little sisters left. Now they are in Cambodia.
[i] Where are they?
[r] In Cambodia, with my mother. My mother is over 90 this year.
[i] Is she still there?
[r] I asked her to come and visit, but she doesn’t want to live here. She went back.
[i] Do you see them again?
[r] Yes, yes. I didn’t bring their photos.
[i] But you see them again?
[r] Yes, I have photos. My little sister has just left. She came. She came for three months and left, she doesn’t want to live here. I told her to come and live here, but she doesn’t want to. Too bad. It’s better that I live alone, it doesn’t cause me any worry. My personality is not very compatible with that of my sister. My second sister is fine. My second sister is in Phnom Penh. She has many children and grandchildren, and they have all bought a big house. They have taken photos, they are richer than me. I do my accounts every day, they all have their houses, their families, their businesses, it works very well. They always tell me to go, but I can’t go. On my papers, I am a refugee. I can’t go. I don’t have the right to go. I went to get a travel document, it says ‘except Cambodia’ on it. How can I go there? I have to wait until I have French nationality before I can go there. That’s how it is now. I can’t go anywhere.
[i] Have you ever applied for French nationality?
[r] Yes. I applied, then my husband fell ill, then I left it until today, I haven’t applied again. I didn’t want to apply for French nationality, my French isn’t very good. [Laughs] I know a few expressions, I don’t really know how to speak it. Now… I live from day to day, I don’t think too much. I have food, I eat, I can have fun, I go out and have fun, I don’t think about anything. Under Pol Pot, I thought I was going to die, I didn’t think I’d be alive. I wanted to commit suicide once. I didn’t die. [Laughter] I was sick, it was very hard, they wouldn’t give me food, I wanted to commit suicide. I took drugs to die, I didn’t die. [Laughs] I didn’t manage to die, I had no choice. Fate didn’t want it. I thought I was going to die. There was no one near me. My mother didn’t want to live with me either. I don’t care about that anymore. When I fled, I didn’t think I would get married here. I got married in 1983.
[i] And your husband is also from Cambodia?
[r] Yes, he is from Cambodia. He came earlier, arriving in France in 1978. He only lived under the Khmer Rouge for a year. He fled, leaving via Thailand. For him too, it was… hard for a year, no more. In 1977… 1976-1977, in 1977, he fled to Thailand. In 1978, he arrived in France. I arrived in 1982. People didn’t know, they thought he had brought me over, but in fact he didn’t bring me over. I left on my own, thanks to the Red Cross. Then the Red Cross asked me for the money, I gave it to them. I paid back 1,200 francs. The plane ticket. I paid it back.
[i] When you arrived in Paris, you… how did you find Paris?
[r] Oh, when I arrived in Paris, I didn’t think about anything. When I was taken on a tour, I went along without thinking about anything. I got to know the places and what they were called. I was taken on a river tour to see Paris. My friend’s name is Lak, she’s in Canada now. She took me on the river boats, to the Eiffel Tower, the Arc de Triomphe, the Sacré-Coeur, she took me everywhere. She took me out to eat, she took me sightseeing. I knew nothing. I followed the crowd. When I arrived in Paris, after a day, I put my suitcase down in the foyer, bought a kilo of apples and sat down to eat them.
[i] And do you like living here?
[r] Why wouldn’t I like it? I’m used to living here. If you told me to go and live in Cambodia, I wouldn’t be able to, it’s too hot!
[r] Even if I had the right to go there, I wouldn’t go. It’s true.
[i] What do you like here?
[r] What do I like? I like everything. If I want to walk, I walk, if I want to go for a stroll, I go for a stroll. I’m not thinking about anything now. My children and grandchildren are well, that’s the main thing. There’s no point in thinking about anything else. Me now, I can… I can spend my days laughing, that’s something. Whether I have more or less, that’s how I live my retirement, you shouldn’t think too much. I live in social housing, it’s good and cheap, I have no problems. Now I don’t think about anything anymore. I think about my family who are well, my grandchildren are well-behaved, that’s all. I don’t think about anything anymore. People ask me how old age is, and I say it’s like this, you shouldn’t think too much. If there’s food, I eat, if there’s something to have fun with, I have fun. I’ve been in France for about thirty years. I don’t know Hong Kong, I haven’t been anywhere. I haven’t been on a plane. Since I was brought here, I have never been on a plane abroad.
[i] You haven’t been abroad?
[r] Never. I have never been abroad.
[i] So you have stayed in France?
[r] In France, yes.
[i] Have you visited France?
[r] Yes, Nice, Cannes, my daughter took me there. I went on a package holiday. Nice, Cannes… Germany. Italy… Spain, I haven’t been there yet. Switzerland, I haven’t been there. There are a few places… Metz, Jarny, etc… I’ve been there. I’ve also been to Lille and Dijon. My daughter lives there, so I’ve been there too. But I haven’t yet flown abroad. I’ve never flown, they won’t believe me! They’ll say I’m… In fact, I haven’t been.
[i] And do you want to go?
[r] I’d like to but I don’t have any money. How can I go? My pension only allows me to eat, where can I go? I only go for walks in Paris. I take part in activities for senior citizens.
[i] Where do you like to go for walks in Paris?
[a] I go everywhere, there’s no point asking! [Laughter]
[i] What’s your favourite place?
[a] What’s my favourite? In Paris, I walk everywhere, here, there, I go everywhere. I don’t care. As long as I can walk. You ask me which place I prefer, I like them all. [Laughter]
[i] Isn’t there a place you like the most?
[r] No, I don’t think about it. I don’t think there’s a place I prefer. As long as I can walk, I walk. I don’t care whether I like it or not. If I can go there, I go there. I don’t care. That’s how it is. There’s nothing else.
[i] Did you find that the French were welcoming when you arrived…?
The French, when I arrived, were good people, they gave me money, they gave me accommodation, etc…. They took me to do my administrative formalities, they were all French. The ones who gave me the residence permit were French. They also took me to the Cité (the Prefecture). They gave me food and accommodation. At the hostel, they gave me some. And when I left the hostel, they gave me about 1,000 francs. I didn’t have to think about anything. Before, I didn’t have a penny. Now they give me that much, I’m already lucky. What else is there to think about? I don’t think about anything anymore, it’s true. They help us enormously, the French government helps us a lot. I congratulate them. When you are sick, you don’t need money. Everything is free. Having a child doesn’t require money either. You know, I had a caesarean section for all three of my children, I didn’t spend a cent. Can you believe it? You don’t have to spend a cent. When you don’t have any money, they help you a lot. They even help you with housing. I congratulate them. What I’m saying is true, it’s true. My heart is attached to them. To take the plane, I didn’t spend anything, they took me to France. You know. They fed me, they put me up, they let me take a few classes. Is that how it is in Cambodia? You always have to pay. I came this far, so my destiny is a good one. I congratulate them. There’s nothing to say. When I arrived, they made me feel really welcome. There was everything to eat in the foyer. You could eat your fill. I ate so much that I couldn’t eat any more. It was too much! If you only knew! Where else can you find such a good deal in another country? If you only knew! I congratulate France. Coming here was really a good choice! [Laughter] It’s true! I’m telling the truth. Now I wander here and there, I go to friends’ houses, I go for walks, I tell jokes, it’s the best thing. I don’t want to worry about anything now. My brain doesn’t think.
[i] Did you meet all your friends here?
[r] No, there are some I already knew in Cambodia. People I played with when I was little. Four or five people I grew up with. When I saw them again, I gave them a big hug. I cried a lot. [Laughs] One of them said to me, ‘I never imagined you’d come so far, all this way.’ I said, ‘That’s right. I can’t believe it either.’ He said, ‘Your destiny is really long. Did you see my parents?’ I said, ‘Yes, I saw them, we left together.’ But now they’re not there any more. Now they’re all dead. There are only four of us left in my family. My mother, my two little sisters, and me. The four of us. But I left on my own. My sisters didn’t know. I left and looked for them, they didn’t look for me. Because my mother can’t read. I had put an advert in the paper, but she didn’t know about it. On the road, I would arrive at a certain place, when I earned a little, I would send her money, I was always putting adverts, but she couldn’t read. So I asked people who were going to Phnom Penh to send her letters or photos. Then later, I met an aunt in Phnom Penh who was in the wholesale trade. It was when my cousin brought back some goods that I saw her, and I asked her if she knew such and such a person. It was my cousin who gave her to my mother. My mother said that she was the daughter of an aunt. That’s how I found her. Otherwise I wouldn’t have found it. Where was I going, dead or alive, she didn’t know. I fled alone, from Pol Pot until today, it’s been many years. I asked her to come twice. I took her to Etretat, I took her to Saint-Michel, where else did I take her? I can’t remember any other place. I took her out to eat, to have fun, she was very happy, I told her to live here, she said, ‘No, it’s too cold.’ She didn’t want to live here. She wanted to go back to Cambodia. So she went back. Now I always send her money. When I have friends who go there, I give them 200 euros to give to her. I send her money at least four times a year. I don’t go abroad. I send her money. And it’s not enough. She’s often ill. I always send her money. Sometimes it’s more than 2,000. When she came, I spent several thousand. I gave her all the money I had saved. I set up a tontine to get 6,000 euros. To get her to come. To get her to come. When she came, I fed her and gave her a few thousand, and I bought her things. She didn’t manage to bring everything back. And she keeps saying that the money isn’t enough. Today, she still says she doesn’t have enough. I’m always sending some. I sent some two months ago. I have a friend who has just gone, I gave her 200 for her to give it to her. I send four times a year. I send 200 each time. I am very thrifty myself. [Laughs] She has no idea, she thinks that we live so well here, that we have a lot of money. But we’re so poor that we don’t say anything… She keeps asking me ‘Don’t you want to come?’ She thinks I can leave whenever I want, but it’s complicated with the papers, it’s not that simple! It’s hard to say… I don’t know how to say it… If she wants money, I’ll send it to her. I take care of her. I send her what she wants. I save. If I want to eat, I eat. If I want to have fun, I have fun. I save so I can send her some to spend. When my friend goes there, I’ll give her 200 for her to give to him. I save a few hundred for her to spend. That’s it. It’s not a big deal. She knows I take care of her. If I don’t, she calls me and tells me she’s run out of money, that she has to get a vaccination… Let her take it [the money]! If I don’t, she calls me and tells me she’s run out of money, that she needs a vaccination… Let her have it [the money]! As soon as someone goes, I send her some money. I send her some money. I save, but it’s so she’s OK. She’s 90 now. It’s not a big deal! I give her what she wants. Now I’m at peace, I don’t want to think too much. I take walks, I eat, that’s enough for me. I don’t think about anything else. That’s it.
[i] What do you do on a daily basis?
[r] On a daily basis? When I wake up, I do a bit of cleaning, I light incense for Buddha. The most important thing is Buddha. I light incense for Buddha. And I do a few things here and there, I have breakfast, and with my friends, I talk about this and that in the café, and it’s lunchtime. Sometimes I eat out, sometimes at home. I’m on my own, if I want to go for a walk, I go for a walk, I don’t think about anything else. That’s my story. That’s all. There’s no point in thinking too much. If my children invite me to eat, I’ll eat at their place. My children call me and say, ‘Mum, come and visit us.’ So I go. That’s it. I haven’t even been abroad yet. It’s true. I haven’t travelled yet. They say to me, ‘Mum, it’s been a long time since you went abroad.’ I say, ‘I don’t have any money.’ They say, ‘Go ahead, we’ll buy you a ticket.’ I say, ‘Yes, in the future. Today, I don’t have my papers [to travel]. When I have sorted out my papers, Mum will agree to you buying tickets.’ They say, “It doesn’t matter, Mum, go ahead. We’ll buy you a ticket so you can go on your trip.” That’s what they say, but I don’t dare. Their money is not easy to earn.
[i] Did your children go there?
[r] No need to talk about it!
[i] Did they go to Cambodia?
[r] They didn’t go. Because they don’t know the language. They say they will go when they can speak the language.
[i] Do they speak Teochew? With you?
[r] With me, they speak Teochew. Over there, people speak Cambodian. That’s it. Coming here, I learnt to speak a little Vietnamese. [Laughter]
[i] Did you take French lessons?
[a] Yes! But after less than a month, I found work and had to stop. I took lessons, then stopped. I don’t know now, I’ve forgotten. I’m waiting until I’m 65 years old on my papers and I’ll sign up for French lessons. To learn a little.
[i] Would you like to learn today?
[r] What?
[i] Would you like to learn again today?
[r] Next June, yes. Rather from September. Because not learning is not an option. Today, I take care of my papers myself. I manage alone with the expressions I know. My children don’t help me, they’re busy. When I ask them, ‘Mum, I don’t have time, some other day!’ ‘Some other day, but I need my papers! Help me fill them in, and I’ll bring them myself.’ I always take care of it alone. Benefits, illness… I take care of it alone. Nobody helps me. I bring the papers for the town hall by myself. When I applied for social housing, I took care of it myself. I would apply four or five times a month, four or five times, until I got one. I applied for 13 years before I got a place. I lived in Tower 84 for 13 years before moving into my current accommodation. I kept asking, I kept insisting until they got fed up with me. ‘Madam, you keep coming, but we have no room for you.’ They said I was stubborn. [Laughs] The Frenchman, every time, told me I was stubborn. I insisted. I insisted until it worked. Finally, there was an elderly lady at the town hall who was kind. She was about to retire, and she said to me, ‘Madam, that’s not the right way to do it.’ I said, ‘Why?’ ‘You know, you don’t have a payslip, so they’re not going to give you a flat.’ I said, ‘In that case, what should I do?’ She said, ‘If you have a payslip, we’ll give you accommodation.’ I went to work for Tang Frères, I looked after his children, his grandchildren, for 3 years. I had a payslip, and I was immediately allocated accommodation. I worked for Tang Frères for three years. I had pay slips and a contract, then I received unemployment benefits and found a job at Charles de Gaulle airport for eight years. Then I had problems with my legs, I couldn’t walk anymore. The doctor said, ‘If you carry on, you’ll end up in a wheelchair.’ I went for some x-rays. The airport is very big. If you walk too much, your legs hurt. My two bones there, they… I had x-rays, he said, ‘It’s not possible anymore, you’re going to have to be in a wheelchair.’ Being in a wheelchair is even worse! Who would take care of me? He said, ‘Stop working.’ It was at that very moment that I changed bosses. He gave me compensation to leave. He gave me compensation and I received unemployment benefits until I retired. I retired at the age of 63. They said that my points were too high. They retired me. I receive around 800 euros, with the ‘supplementary’ I have around 900. Until today. I have only been retired for 10 months. My husband passed away in December. Last year in December. It had only been 10 months, and he passed away. I had been retired for 2 months and he passed away. I was lucky, I didn’t have to do anything. Going to the cemetery, asking this and that, it’s tiring. That’s where I am today. I live my life. Sometimes I go to a friend’s house, sometimes I go to the temple, because I’m a Buddhist. That’s my story, that’s all. Now that’s how I spend my days. I don’t think about anything else. You ask me which places I like, I like them all, it’s true. I congratulate France. The people are generous. They helped us a lot, the refugees. It’s true. The French didn’t receive as much. But the refugees were helped a lot. And at 65, you get this and that. I’ll be 65 in a year. That’s not my real age on my papers. I’m four years younger on my papers. I was born in 1950, but on the papers it’s 1954. There’s a difference of four years, four months. No, four years, not four months. That’s my story. That’s what I went through. It was sad. [Laughter] I’m getting on with my life. I don’t worry about anything now. Even if you ask me to think about it, I wouldn’t think. If my children invite me to eat, I go. If they ask me to look after their children, I do. I go for walks, I go for strolls… I don’t think, as soon as I lie down, I fall asleep. I don’t think about anything. I watch films. Sometimes in the evening, I watch films until 1 or 2 o’clock, I talk on the phone with friends for 1 or 2 hours, it happens, until the early hours of the morning. I have friends who talk a lot, I listen to them. [Laughs] Until the early hours. I sleep, I do bits and pieces here and there, I take care of the house a little. Sometimes I knit scarves to pass the time, for my friends. They think I knit well, they’ve asked me to make them some. I’ve knitted a dozen for people. One friend wants one, another one too. It’s done in two or three days. When I have time, I knit. I do a little of this, a little of that, it passes the days. I don’t want to think anymore. Next year, your father will be 70, I will also be 70. [Laughter] It goes by fast. Year after year. My daughter is 34. Next year she’ll be 35. Time flies. When I arrived here, time flew too. I got married and had children. Three children. One a year. Time flies. Now they’re all grown up. They’re all working. I don’t have to worry anymore. Now I don’t think about anything. If I want to go for a walk, I do. What’s the point of thinking? If friends go to visit a place, I go too. Next year, I will participate with the others in the activities of the town hall. [Laughs] I don’t think about anything. I go anywhere. I am very easy-going. Wherever the place, I go there. With what I went through, if I had to die, I would already be dead. I don’t think about anything anymore.
[i] The interview is over. Do you have anything to add?
[r] No. That’s my story. If you want to ask me any more questions, next time! [Laughter]
[i] Thank you very much!
[r] You’re welcome. Goodbye.