The Khmer Rouge's army was slowly built up in the jungles of Eastern Cambodia during the late 1960s and was supported by the Viet Cong, and the Pathet Lao, with strong supports from China. The Khmer Rouge emerged victorious in the Cambodian civil war. In 1975, they captured the Cambodian capital, overthrew the corrupt military dictatorships of the Khmer Republic and imposed Socialism. Following their victory, the Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot, installed a government called the Democratic Kampuchea and immediately set about forcibly depopulating the country's cities, murdering hundreds of thousands of their perceived political opponents and carrying out the Cambodian Genocide in which 1.5 to 3 million people (around 25% of Cambodia's population) died.
The Khmer Rouge regime was highly autocratic, xenophobic, paranoid, and repressive. The genocide was under the guise of the Khmer Rouge enforcing its social engineering policies. Their attempts at agricultural reform led to widespread famine, while its insistence on absolute self sufficiency even in the supply of medicine, led to the death of thousands from treatable diseases such as malaria. Part of the purification included numerous genocide of Cambodian minorities. Arbitrary executions and tortures were carried out against perceived subversive elements. The event lasted 4 years, 1975 to 1979.
In 1978, I was 6 years old living in a small hut in one of Pol Pot’s camp, with my Mom and baby sister. In Cambodia, our concentration camp was located smack in the middle of the jungle. Because of mosquitoes, we all have to sleep bunched up together inside a mosquito net to avoid bites. One particular night, I woke up needing to pee badly. I wanted to wait until morning,but couldn’t hold it. It was dangerous for a boy my age to leave the hut at that time. I turned to my mother and saw that she was sleeping soundly. Even at that age I realized, Mom worked 16 hours a day in the rice fields and always hungry because the camp boss only feeds her once a day. I didn’t want to wake her, she needed her rest. So, I made a decision to go pee on my own.
Spirits and Ghosts are often talked about among people in the camp. Many people died brutally, both from hunger, diseases or being shot by the soldiers. As I was trying to leave the hut, I did my best to lift the mosquito net up to exit. However, no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t lift it. I tried all around the nets, even make sure I was not on top of it, but no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t lift it. It felt like something or someone was holding it down. I panicked, so I shook Mom to wake her. Once she woke up, I told her “I need to pee.” I told her I tried to go alone but couldn’t lift the mosquito net. She was furious I tried to go alone because it was dangerous. I proceeded to lift the mosquito net to exit and I didn’t have any problem at all after a Mom woke to escort me.
Was it a ghost or angel protecting me from a dangerous situation?
