after the gregorian new year and the lunar new year there is the khmer new year and with it comes my birthday and the anniversary of the reason i exist, here in this country in this psyche april 17, 1975 bombs and gunfire the fall no time to think about the new year no incense … Continue reading third new year
Tag: Khmer
for dinner
the sweetness of getting to decide every night what to eat, where, and with whom has merged with a nostalgia for coming home to a pot of rice, and plates of entrees (always at least one soup), and everyone reaching in with their own fork or spoon. i wonder whether what it is like to … Continue reading for dinner
a day that hurts
in a few weeks, it will have been thirty years since my birth and forty years since the day the Khmer Rouge took Phnom Penh i wonder whether my family thought about that day on the day that i was born if they are reminded each year that day comes around of what they went … Continue reading a day that hurts
landing
(continued from flight, 6, written during November 2013) Phnom Penh I stepped out of the plane, holding my grandmother's elbow tightly as we descended the stairs onto the tarmac. The warm, dusty air pressed close immediately. I wonder what they did when planes landed during the rainy season. I had searched for Lakhena during the … Continue reading landing
