Green River Community College -
English as a Second Language Program
Student Stories - Spring 2000

Life Story By Tim

I was born in Cambodia in 1942. My parents worked on a farm. We grew a lot of rice, fruits and vegetables. My family owned a lot of land. We worked our whole life and my family was very happy together because we had our own house and land. I have six brothers and three sisters. I miss my family when we lived in this house. At 12:00 we ate rice in the fields. At 5:00 we returned home. We took a shower and sat around the table and ate dinner at 7:00. My Grandmother would call all the Grandchildren to sit around her and listen to her stories.

My parents had 10 children. Four brothers, one sister and myself all got married. Four did not get married because they died young. We all lived close together. I had three children and my brothers and sisters had eleven children all together.

After that my country changed the law and it was very difficult. In 1973 the Khmer Rouge came in at night and burned our house down and many others. Everything was gone. They took my father, mother and small sister to the mountains. My husband and I ran to live near the boarder of Thailand. We lived there about one year. When we came back, we lived with my brother again on our family’s farm. The Khmer Rouge shot many people so my family ran away again to a small city. In 1975, early in the morning the Khmer Rouge told all of the people to go out of the city and go to the mountains.

We all went to the mountains. One year later my family was starving, over worked, sick and dying and we were not together. My husband, one brother, one sister, her daughter and one sister-in-law and her daughter were all killed. Two of my children died from starvation. One of my brothers and three nephews are all missing and I don’t know what happened to them.

In 1979 the Khmer Rouge had lost their power. My mother, my daughter, my niece and myself where the only ones left alive. We moved to a small city and it was hard, so we escaped to Thailand. I lived in a camp for six years carrying bamboo to make houses. They didn’t give us money for work but gave us chickens, noodles and things. I hurt my back and got food from the United Nations. I then went to school in Thailand to learn to write and read Cambodian. I re-married, had a son and after one year I passed a test and could come to America. I had to then go to a camp for six months and learn about America.

In 1986 my mother, my son, my niece and myself all came to the United States. My daughter stayed in Thailand and came to the United States in 1987 with her husband and one daughter. My daughter had two more children here in the United States and my niece got married and had two children.

My daughter went to high school for three years went on to College for two years and now she works. My grandson is in the seventh grade, my granddaughter is in the second grade, and my son is in the tenth grade.

I am going to school at Green River Community College to learn to read and write English and to learn about the computer. It is hard to learn, but I like school because my country did not have school.

I go to Church and we talk. We learn about the Bible and have made a lot of friends.

It has been very hard to be a single parent and to take care of my mother. I am sad sometimes because I miss my brothers and sisters and family. I have to take medicine all the time, I worry about my family and I do not know if I will be able to work. I don’t drive a car now. I work very hard at home cooking different types of food for my son and my mother. I have trouble sleeping at night because I think about my family, and sometimes I cry at night when I think about Cambodia and my life there.

I am thankful for my Church and for my school. I am thankful for my teachers and the government who pays for my teachers. I am happy to be in a free country were I can learn.

See my project on the Cambodian New Year