Thursday, July 24, 2008
"First They Killed My Father"
Our essential questions keep us thinking about relationships between our stories and ourselves. We are to consider to what extent are we witnesses of history and messengers to humanity; yet in “First They Killed My Father”, we struggle to find the humanity. The Khmer Rouge army takes over Cambodia in 1975 and begins five years of terror; we meet a five year old Loung Ung. Can we make connections between Loung Ung and who we are? Ung tells of the many horrors she and her family dealt with as they were forced from Phnom Penh. Being moved from the only home she knew, forced to walk for days to an unknown destination all the while concealing their identity in order to survive. As Loung shares her experiences of being separated from her family and forced to live in a camp with other children who practice strategies to kill the Youns, the Khmer Rouge enemy. Loung must pretend to agree with the propaganda of the Khmer Rouge, when she is actually aware that the Khmer are the true enemies. Loung must struggle to maintain composure as she learns that her father, mother and sisters have died in order to survive herself. Loung has fought unsanitary living conditions, starvation and fear daily for five years without losing hope for an end to this insanity. I find this story difficult to comprehend, how such a young child could survive this horrific treatment. I am interested to find out why in 1975, a child myself I was not aware of the atrocities that were happening to other children in Cambodia.
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11 comments:
Do our children know of the atrocities that are now happening to children in our world? As an adult, do I? My ignorance is my own fault, but I think we try to shield our children from the horror that exists in other's lives. How far do you go to create an awareness and empathy?
I graduated from high school in 1975 and college in'79. As I read this book I couldn't help but think "What was I doing at this time?" It's hard to believe I was living in the same world. What is happening now, as I drive to Wegman's, worrying about what to make for dinner?
Cathy M
This book was very disturbing. Like the rest of you I did not know what was happening in Cambodia because so much was going on with the ending of VIetnam and what was happening at home. I think the US became slightly isolated with concerns of SE Asia. It is hard to believe that a 5 year old could survive but I was glad I knew from the onset that she did. Today I think because of the internet we are more likely to know thow the happenings in the world yet there are still some isloated areas such as North Korea that do not let the world know what is going on .
I really loved this book. I decided, when I started reading it to put sticky notes on the pages I thought I might want to refer back to when I blogged...the book is filled with bright pink post-its!
First of all, I've been pondering Chris's comments in her starter post...and I too started thinking back to 1975. I was just starting high school and oblivious to the situation in Cambodia. Perhaps Cathy P. is right, we were so engrossed in Vietnam that we ignored the situation. Were journalists reporting about it?
Then I started thinking about what Cathy M. wrote...how far do we go to shelter our kids? Can we shelter them and still raise empathy and awareness in them? What is our global responsibility? This made me question my own response to these modern day atrocities and I think that after reading this book I will be more globally conscientious. Hopefully I will stop worrying so much about mondane things and try to keep my eye on the bigger picture. If the mark of a good book is to get the reader to step back and think...then this was an excellent book.
Back to my sticky notes! I marked many pages where the language was beautifully written or a sentiment was so profound I had to reread it. One of my favorites is on page 75- Loung is remembering how angry she was at her mother when she was reprimanded for breaking a plate or jumping on furniture. She reflects back to life before the war and realizes how silly she was to think that was the end of the world! It made me think of all the times I react like a problem in my life is the end of the world! Great wasy to get perspective.
I loved the way Loung writes about her father, and his words to her...and how they often keep her going when she thinks she can't go any further. On page 183 I was in tears as I read the passage that ends the chapter: "Pa Loved me and believed in me....I do possess the one thing I need to make something of myself one day: I have everything my Pa gave me."
Once again, I loved the epilogue...thank goodness for epilogues! It was very satisfying reading about Loung's life after she made it to the United States. I was sorry all of the family could not have escaped.
I'll stop...sorry for going on so long! I agree with Kim, this is one book that kids should read. John, as an English teacher I am anxious to hear what you have to say.
OOPs! I forgot...we have more than one English teacher! Elena, what do you think?! I haven't figured out what any of the special ed teachers are teaching next year so anyone teaching English my apologies.
And please forgive any typos...I think I catch them all before publishing the comment and then always manage to miss a few. I haven't figured out a way to go back and edit comments.
I wonder if our news media gets so caught up in what happens "at the front", that civilians and their stories are not told. Although, I would bet most of you remember the photograph of the little girl running, naked, after a bomb destroyed her village.
As usual, I need to find out more and plan to read the follow up to her memoir, Lucky Child.
Her website is:http://www.loungung.com/acorn.php?page=home
I noticed she does do school visits.
This book was so powerful in many ways. Specifically, the nature of the cruelty that existed, but the language and style Loung uses is most moving! As I read this book, I had to put it down quite often; it was just so painful in certain parts to go on. When Loung describes her mother's death and Geak being pulled from her arms, both of them "silenced", I just broke down. That emotional imagery was paralizing. I looked at my own children (who listened to many exerpts of this book while mommy was reading), and I just cried. No, sobbed is a better word. And that doesn't happen unless an author truly has command of her story and the literary devices to tell that story; Loung has it!!!
I agree with Kathy J., thank goodness for epilogues! I needed to know the rest of the story. I was in college when Loung's nightmare was coming to a close and like the rest of you find it difficult to admit that I was focused on Vietnam and the horrifying stories that were being told about our own soldiers that I knew nothing of Pol Pot and the Angkar. Like Loung, "I hate him, I want to kill him."
My question continues to go back to why? But also, why does this have to happen again and again? How do so many people follow such a leader? It is amazing to me the power of propaganda and how it infuses loyalty to such a barbaric philosophy! I am learning more as I read these selections over the summer about how much I value my freedom(and how it is take so for granted). I have never thought about the meaning of that word so deeply as I have over the last month!
Sorry, just know when Josh appears, it's really Elena!!!!
Sorry, but the social studies teacher in me has to come out. Elena asked how so many could follow such a leader as Pol Pot. I can answer that. He promised the people who had nothing something. And he made the peasants the ruling class. He followed Mao's communism. You do away with the intellectuals, you close schools, and you brain wash. On top of that you use terror, fear, intimidation, nationalism and propaganda. Today we have Burma and N Korea as closed socities and we do not know exactly the extent of the human rights violations that exist in these countries.
I have to echo that we are a fortunate country with our bill of rights. Cathy P
What propaganda am I swallowing? I assume people in power have the big picture and sometimes act in a wy that I don't quite understand because they have the big picture and I do not. Will I wake up someday and wonder what happened to the world I knew, the one I assumed would go on forever? I need to pay attention! We do have a voice in this country. Do we all use it - vote, question? Do we make sure we are informed? Are we giving our students eyes with which to see and awareness of their ability to act? How about beginning with the little horrors we sometimes witness in our schools? Are we involved? Working on solutions or, by not acting, part of the problem?
Cathy M
I think it's safe to say that our children and students are quite sheltered. It's easy to see that they are clueless about our own government, let alone about other countries in our world.
As I spoke to Chris at summer school, I felt that I had heard all of this before. And, I was right. Wiesel's story has several commonalities between what he went through and what Loung went through, too. The cruelties that she endured, and had to work through made her such a strong figure.
I struggled though while reading, and maybe it's because I couldn't turn off the critical side of my reading mind. How could she have remembered all of this, and I had a hard time swallowing all of her descriptions. I know traumatic events can, and will, leave impressions upon those who go through them.
It took me a great deal longer to get into this book, but as Loung moved through her labor camps, and military camps, I could envision myself having to deal with such tragic loses.
The disturbing images, and family loses help to keep the reader's attention.
I have talked about this book all summer. I teach the Pol Pot regime and yet have read very little about it from primary sources. I too was attending high school and college during this time and knew nothing about what was going on in Cambodia. I vaguely remember the name Kampochia from the news. I think this book is most shocking just because so little is known or published about these atrocities. I try to explain to my students and my own children what starvation really means. Not just "nothing good" in the refrigerator but absolutely nothing to eat. And to think these children were forced to raise food that was sold for guns while not allowed to eat any of it under threat of death. I wonder if I would have survived such an ordeal.
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