Anchor Moy wrote:Got a taxi one time from Kep or Kampot to Sihanoukville - the driver told us about the KR times in that area. It was terrible to hear but I will always be grateful to him for sharing his memories - sad stories about his family which really made history come alive for us.
Many Cambodians don't want to talk about that time, (and I respect that) but I got the feeling that this guy wanted to tell us his experiences. As we went through the countryside, he said " Here, just behind these fields my wife's family were living. They all died except my wife and her sister."

Terrible times.

prahkeitouj wrote:

Anchor Moy wrote:Got a taxi one time from Kep or Kampot to Sihanoukville - the driver told us about the KR times in that area. It was terrible to hear but I will always be grateful to him for sharing his memories - sad stories about his family which really made history come alive for us.
Many Cambodians don't want to talk about that time, (and I respect that) but I got the feeling that this guy wanted to tell us his experiences. As we went through the countryside, he said " Here, just behind these fields my wife's family were living. They all died except my wife and her sister."

Terrible times.

Yes, many people suffer from it, but they should tell others because we don't want the history is repeated. Even I was not born in Pol Pot regime, but I experienced living the village that Khmer Rouge lived near by and I ran many times when they fought with goverment soldiers.If anyone knows Kampot in 1993, they will know Khmer Rouge still existed there.

John Bingham wrote:

prahkeitouj wrote:If anyone knows Kampot in 1993, they will know Khmer Rouge still existed there.

Sure, they used to attack the train regularly and kidnapped and killed 3 tourists from the train in 1994.

MekongMouse wrote:

prahkeitouj wrote:

Anchor Moy wrote:Got a taxi one time from Kep or Kampot to Sihanoukville - the driver told us about the KR times in that area. It was terrible to hear but I will always be grateful to him for sharing his memories - sad stories about his family which really made history come alive for us.
Many Cambodians don't want to talk about that time, (and I respect that) but I got the feeling that this guy wanted to tell us his experiences. As we went through the countryside, he said " Here, just behind these fields my wife's family were living. They all died except my wife and her sister."

Terrible times.

Yes, many people suffer from it, but they should tell others because we don't want the history is repeated. Even I was not born in Pol Pot regime, but I experienced living the village that Khmer Rouge lived near by and I ran many times when they fought with goverment soldiers.If anyone knows Kampot in 1993, they will know Khmer Rouge still existed there.

I'd like to know more about this. Very interesting insights. Thank you.

prahkeitouj wrote: I was born in the city but my sisters and I stayed with my aunt in Kampot province during our vacation in the house that made from clay with cowdung and hay.
I Knew a bit that Khmer Rouge still existed there but I didn't know that we had to escape when they fought. My aunt was vice-principle of a public hospital in the district. My ancle ( my aunt's god son) also was civil servant. Khmer Rouge lived in Warl Mountain ( claimbing plant mountain ) near our village. My aunt told me to have two bages of my clothes, one was the new clothes and my valuable things and another one was for daily life. I wondered why , but untill the fight she told me to take the new one. We were often sleepless because we escape to stay with villagers' house. We often slept at villagers' houses. Such a city girl, I saw many kinds of house in the province, some big, some too small and most of houses had cows, coconut trees and banana trees. Sometimes we moved only 100m from our house. Sometimes stayed 4 or 5 hours in abadoned house which surrounded by trees, many mosquitos, no bed, but we used hammocks. I couldn't sleep because I didn't know why we had to escape and stayed like this? I tried to ask my aunt ,but she seemed not want to tell me why? The old people were talking in the middle night (aunt, ancle, villagers and a few soldiers). I tried to listen to them, but not really understand. I wondered why the villagers didn't escape like us? I became enjoy with my adventurous life. I realised that because my aunt and ancle worked for government. So Khmer Rouge wouldn't kill villagers, but only civil servants! My aunt and ancle dug very big hole, maybe for more than 10 people, had 4or 5 stairs,was covered by big logs, And built the roof. My sisters and I liked to play in it. It was for hidding when they fought and shoot, the bullets would fly... ect

New teachers for KR classes
Fri, 10 April 2015
Rebecca Moss
The US Institute of Peace on Wednesday announced the completion of a program – conducted by the Documentation Center of Cambodia (DC-Cam) – to train an additional 600 educators to teach Khmer Rouge history in the Kingdom’s secondary schools.

In a statement issued yesterday, Katherine Wood, a grant adviser for USIP, said she hoped the $120,000 project would help to “heal the profound divisions in Cambodia that have persisted between survivors and perpetrators for the last four decades”.

Despite the influx of new teachers, DC-Cam director Youk Chhang said yesterday that additional financial support is needed to help the coursework to move beyond the “platform” level and bring a dialogue on – and ultimately the practice of – human rights and democracy to Asean nations.

“We are not learning history to be obsessed by it, or enslaved by it,” he said, “but to be free.”

DC-Cam pushed for the introduction of a genocide curriculum in Cambodian classrooms for seven years before the government acquiesced in 2009, making A History of Democratic Kampuchea a compulsory text for grades seven through 12. And while an estimated 1 million students have been exposed to the course, a limited number of qualified teachers and inadequate materials have hindered the project’s success, Chhang said.

“Right now, genocide education is a foundation, it’s a platform. It’s not really genocide education yet,” explained Chhang. “This process is very fragile.”

In 2012, a DC-Cam quality control study discovered that while teachers and students found the material easy to understand and unbiased, many of the 3,000 teachers trained were under-qualified to generate discussion (fewer than 40 per cent had university degrees). Additionally, there was “little evidence of actual learning” occurring. Several teachers said they feared teaching the material in the classroom.

Chhang recalled a history teacher who refused to teach the material and resigned. One of her arms was shrunken at her side, the result of having an IV of coconut juice injected into it as a child under the regime.

“She said ‘look at my arm’,” Chhang said, pointing to his own. “For her, it is very emotional.”