The Years of Zero: Coming of Age Under the Khmer Rouge by Ty Seng

Author:Ty, Seng [Ty, Seng]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Seng Ty
Published: 2014-03-30T16:00:00+00:00

Eleven – My Mother’s Spirit

I still managed to sneak out and find food. Sometimes after the meeting, I told my Me-Krum that I was going down the canal to bathe. While I washed I looked for crabs, snails, and fish—there was plenty of food, it was just that the Khmer Rouge didn’t allow us to have it. Before I went to sleep, I usually made a fire next to my mat—we were allowed to do this because it was cold—and boiled water in my teakettle on a stone tripod. The snails and crabs would go into the water. I would put some roots into the pot to cover up my snail-and-crab soup and make it seem as if I was boiling a traditional medicinal tea. The Me-Kong and Me-Krum would walk around to see if anybody was cooking food. If they caught us cooking anything, they would take it away and beat us, sometimes to death.

One night, my Me-Krum asked what I was boiling in my teakettle. “Met Seng, what’s in the kettle?”

“I’m boiling water, Comrade,” I told him.

“Open the lid. I want to see what’s in the kettle. ”

When I opened the lid, he saw the roots and said, “Boiling water, hey? Boiling water! Ha.”

“Oh, Comrade,” I said, “this is a traditional medicine. I drink it to keep me from swelling and diarrhea so I can work harder for Angkar!”

He glanced into my pot again. My snails and crabs were dead, buried underneath the branches of the phony herbs. Once again, I was spared. It was if my mother’s spirit had taken possession of the teapot to keep me alive. I ate my delicacies quietly under my blanket, where no one would know except Hong. He was quick to hear me chewing.

“What are you eating? Can I have some?” he begged.

“No. I don’t have any more food. I ate it all,” I told him through a mouthful of crabs. But he begged and begged until finally I gave him a crab. For many other boys, it was already too late. They should have taken a chance and gone out to look for food like I did. But maybe they didn’t have a teapot like mine.

Hong and I became good buddies over that crab. We decided to trust each other and always to cover for each other. After that, whenever I had food, I shared it with him. Hong was too afraid to look for food himself. I decided to share everything I caught with him so that he might live as long as me. It was nice to finally have a friend I could trust.

One morning at the end of the rainy season, the work bell rang. Hong was usually awake before me, but that morning I didn’t see him. After I went to wash my face, I went to his mat to see if he was still asleep, and there he was, rolled up like a ball, all frozen stiff.

“Hong, didn’t you hear the bell has rung?” I said.

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