First They Killed My Father

Meng and Loung arrive in Phnom Penh, their hometown. The once-lovely capital city is filled with litter, potholes, and a foul stench in the streets. One of the first things Loung asks her brother to do is to take her to their old home, but Meng refuses. He explains that he saw it on an earlier visit, but it does not look the same. Instead, they make their way to a water port. Upon their arrival, Meng sells his bike and the pair get into a small boat. They ride in the small fisherman’s boat all the way to Vietnam with Meng and Loung hiding under a plastic tarp covered with fish. Once they leave the boat, they get into a bus and ride to Saigon.

The first thing Loung notices in Saigon is how comfortable everyone is. The women wear beautiful clothes and laugh with other people. The shops are full of clothing, jewelry, singing, and more. While in Saigon, they prepare for their trip by boat to Thailand. Eventually, the right time arrives and the pair get into a small 30-foot boat that is bottom heavy with refugees traveling to Thailand. On the third day, pirates overtake the boat and steal a small Buddha from Loung. Fortunately, the pirates are just thieves; after they loot the boat, they direct it on to Thailand and the Lam Sing Refugee Camp.

The final chapter of the book takes place in February 1980, when Meng and Loung have to fill out paperwork to stay in the refugee camp in Thailand. With some other refugees, they purchase a hut and stock it full of necessities like pots and pans. Every refugee needs a sponsoring family before they can leave Thailand for America. The refugees are all given food and supplies on a daily basis, but they supplement their diets with food from the Thai market near camp. Loung comments on how “camp consists of standing in line after another for our food and water rations” (229).

The two siblings are baptized as Christians in the ocean. Loung describes the event and her excitement, but Meng quickly explains that they need to be made into Christians so they can be sponsored faster; they were still Buddhists. After five years of living in squalor, Meng and Loung are willing to do whatever it takes to make their lives happy. Just a few short months after arriving in the camp, they learn they have been accepted to go to America, specifically to Vermont. The night before they leave, Loung dreams about her father. In their short conversation, she tells him she misses him, and he says he will find her. The next morning, the author writes, “Heartened by my dream of Pa, I walk onto the aircraft” (233).

Many years after immigrating to America, Loung returns to Cambodia to see her family. Loung shares her experiences of adapting to life in the United States and her efforts to forget about what happened to her in Cambodia. But in 1984, the media’s focus on the starving children in Ethiopia makes that difficult for her. She tries to become a typical American teenager, joining the cheerleading squad, curling her hair, and eating pizza, but deep in her heart, her family still haunted her. Even though she wanted to bring her family to Vermont, life simply got in the way. Her family remained in Cambodia, living in Bat Deng with their aunts and uncles. In 1988, her brother, Kim, made it to a refugee camp, so Meng did what he could to bring him to Vermont.

As an adult, Loung works for the Campaign for a Landmine-Free World (CLFW). She travels the world sharing information about landmines and about her experience in Cambodia. Loung writes, “The more I tell people, the less the nightmares haunt me. The more people listen to me, the less I hate” (237). Eventually, her fear fades enough for her to return to Cambodia, which is where the story ends as she gets off the plane and sees her sister, Chou. Despite the happy reunion, the Khmer Rouge still interferes, as Loung realizes her black clothes resemble what the killers wore many years ago.