Survival in the Killing Fields

by Haing Ngor

He called me over one day when he was sitting on a bamboo bench that soldiers sometimes used, near the common kitchen. He was so short that his legs didn’t reach the ground. He swung his feet back and forth like a child and rotated his cigarette in his fingertips.

  ‘Tell me something, uh, “Samnang,” ’ he said, pronouncing the name with deliberate irony. He had a way of lifting his eyebrows in surprise or puzzlement, and darting his eyes around without looking directly at me. ‘Uh, tell me the truth. You were a doctor back in Phnom Penh, but’ – he took a puff on his cigarette – you’re a nice guy and, uh, I like you very much.’

  He didn’t finish the thought. He didn’t need to. He was threatening to expose me if I didn’t give him a bribe.

  ‘Look, Pen Tip,’ I said, ‘I helped sick people in Phum Chhleav, same as you. You weren’t a doctor, I’m not a doctor. We were just concerned about public health.’

  ‘I hear you have had, ah, problems before with your own health,’ he said. His eyes rested on the stub of my little finger, then darted away. I found myself suddenly perspiring.

  ‘I really don’t have time to talk now, Pen Tip,’ I said. ‘I’ve got to get some more mud baskets for my crew. But you’re mistaken about me. So dam doeum kor, eh?’

  ‘People disappear,’ he replied.

  I walked away, calm on the outside, angry inside. It was bad enough to humble myself to the Khmer Rouge. I wasn’t about to humble myself to another ‘new’ person. And I didn’t like people who played up to the Khmer Rouge. Aunt Kim in Tonle Batí, Pen Tip here – people like that made me sick.

  Over the next few weeks Pen Tip managed to extract concessions from all the other group leaders, food or tobacco or other signs of respect, but I held out. It became a contest of wills. I didn’t tell Huoy about it. There was no sense upsetting her.

  Then one afternoon during tobacco break, when several groups were resting together on a hillock near the canal, Pen Tip made the struggle public. There were no soldiers or high-level supervisors around. We were smoking our tobacco cigarettes and relieving our depression by joking about what we had done under the old regime. One man said he used to be the king, but he had resigned to be a toilet inspector. The next man told him how lucky he was, that he had been only an assistant toilet inspector. We all laughed and tried to outdo each other with the most ridiculous stories.

  ‘You want to hear something funny?’ Pen Tip said. ‘I’ll tell you something funny. Samnang was a doctor.’ The tone of his voice made everyone fall silent.

  ‘No, Pen Tip,’ I said wearily, ‘that’s not true. And don’t call me that. Angka might kill me.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Pen Tip replied. ‘Everybody knows you’re a doctor.’

  ‘Comrade Pen Tip,’ I replied, ‘don’t say that. If you play around like that and Angka believes you, I’m in a lot of trouble. Don’t play games.’

  The break ended and we all went back to work. From that time on it was common knowledge that I had been accused of being a doctor, though nobody knew whether it was true or not.

  A week or so later I was resting on a mat and Huoy was lying in the hammock when two teenage soldiers came up. I had never seen them before. They were not the soldiers usually assigned to our cooperative. One of them held a rope in his hand. It was all I could do to persuade them to wait for me to change into fresh trousers. There was gold in the trousers I was wearing and, since it was obvious where I was going, it seemed better that Huoy keep it. They tied my elbows behind my back again. Then they kicked me as I stood on the edge on the hillock. I fell on my face in the rice stubble. Huoy was hysterical. They marched me away past the common kitchen in full view of hundreds of people. If Pen Tip was watching, I didn’t notice.

  21

  The King of Death

  A warning: this chapter tells of the very depths of suffering that people like me saw and experienced under the Khmer Rouge regime. It is an important part of the story, but it is not a pleasant part. So if you wish, or if you must, skip this chapter and go on to the next one.

  The soldiers directed me to turn left and right on the paths, and soon there was no doubt that we were heading toward the prison at Phum Chhleav. Then they told me to stop. We waited for about an hour, until six or seven more prisoners and their guards came up. We prisoners were tied together in a line and began walking again.

  When we reached the prison another group of tied-up ‘new’ people was waiting, like us the victims of a roundup that had been planned in advance. Our guards tied the two lines together but loosened the bonds around our elbows, enough for the circulation to return to our arms. We sat with our backs to the prison wall, which was part thatch and part corrugated metal, and tried not to look in the direction of the mango trees, where other prisoners were in various states of torture.

  ‘What did you do wrong?’ I whispered to a woman next to me.

  ‘Nothing. I don’t even know why they took me here,’ she said. ‘I’ve been working very, very hard for them in the front lines.’ She was pregnant, one of five obviously pregnant women in the line.

  None of the others knew why they had been arrested either. Quietly, in whispers, up and down the line, we agreed not to tell the Khmer Rouge anything.

  A young guard, fifteen or sixteen years old, asked us disdainfully if we were hungry or thirsty. When everyone said yes, he brought a large bowl full of water. He held it in his hands and the first person leaned over and put his mouth in it and drank like a horse. Then the guard put the bowl in the first person’s hands, which were tied behind his back. The first person turned, holding the bowl behind him so the second person could drink like a horse, and then the second person took the bowl in his hands and held it for the third person and so on down the line.

  ‘ “No one will take care of you,” ’ the guard said smugly, reciting one of the regime’s favourite expressions. ‘ “You have to take care of yourselves.” ’

  We spent the night inside the jail, a long, narrow structure with an aisle in the middle and a row of prisoners to each side. We lay on our backs with our heads to the wall and our feet locked into leg-irons attached to a long piece of wood running next to the centre aisle. Low wooden partitions gave us each a space to lie in, like a private pigsty, already dirtied with wastes. The air reeked of shit and piss and an odour like ammonia. It was hard to breathe. For me, it was impossible to sleep. There were about eighty ‘new’ people in the jail, and some of them were always moaning.

  Early the next morning the noise of a motorcycle came to our ears. The motorcycle approached, downshifted, stopped nearby. I thought: Somebody important has arrived. In the Phnom Tippeday region, messengers and low-ranking cadre usually rode bicycles or horses, middle and upper-middle cadre rode motorcycles, and those at the very top rode in jeeps. A motorcycle rider would be someone like . . . like an officer in the state security apparatus, I decided. Yes, that was about right. It had been prearranged, the fresh capture of political prisoners and our interrogation the following morning.

  Our group of eighteen prisoners was taken outside, past a parked Honda 90, into a neighbouring building, where my guess about the visitor was confirmed.

  In Cambodian folk religion one of the main mythological figures is known as the King of Death. He is a judge, the one who assigns souls to heaven or hell, and he knows all about everyone’s good and bad deeds. Nothing is hidden from him. The souls he sends to hell become pret, spirits of the damned, the victims of gory and everlasting tortures brought upon them by their own misdeeds. Looking around the room at our group of eighteen prisoners, all of us afraid, dressed in ragged, stinking clothes, I decided that we were already pret; our fates had already been decided. The Khmer Rouge who had ridden in on his Honda 90 and who sat smiling at us now – he was the King of Death.

  He was muscled and well fed, holding paper files and a black notebook under one arm. He wore a green Mao cap and an old green-and-white krama around his neck. His black clothes and rubber-tyre sandals were dusty from his motorcy
cle ride. He sat down in a chair at a small table and asked us to sit. We sat on the floor while he scanned the files. Several guards with holstered pistols stood at his side.

  The King of Death was calm and sweet. He was like Chev, but more sophisticated. For a guess, he might have finished high school, or lycée.

  ‘Please tell Angka the truth,’ he told us. ‘If you do, you will not be punished. Angka never kills people unnecessarily, or kills the innocent. Those who tell the truth will merely be re-educated.’

  One by one the prisoners went before him, sitting at his feet. He read from their files. He knew some of their names. Their crimes were: being a CIA agent, a Lon Nol officer, the wife of a Lon Nol officer, a ranking member of the Lon Nol government. All of the prisoners denied that the charges were true. At a signal from the judge, which I could not detect, even though I looked for it, the guards came around the side of the desk and kicked the prisoner. The guards did not kick everyone, but they kicked the pregnant woman next to me in the ribs and in the stomach for denying that she was the wife of a captain in the Lon Nol army. They dragged her back to where the rest of us sat, and then it was my turn.

  I sat in front of the judge with my hat in my lap and my krama neatly folded on my knee. From where I sat I could only see his trouser legs and his feet with their black rubber-tyre sandals.

  ‘Samnang, Angka knows who you are,’ the King of Death began gently. ‘You were a military doctor. You held the rank of captain. So please, tell Angka the truth. You will make it much easier on yourself.’

  Now I was certain that Pen Tip had informed on me. In Phnom Penh, few knew I was in the military, because I hardly ever wore a uniform. Since then I had not told anyone about it. Only a former hospital insider like Pen Tip would know that a government doctor my age would have held a captain’s rank. The only thing Pen Tip didn’t know was my real name. And Angka didn’t either.

  I didn’t say anything.

  ‘If you tell the truth,’ the King of Death said, ‘Angka will forget the past and give you a high-level position. Angka will let you operate on wounded soldiers, and teach medicine to students of the younger generation. The students will look up to you for giving them this knowledge. You will be a hero. But,’ he said, ‘if you don’t tell Angka the truth, you will be held responsible.’

  I cleared my throat.

  ‘Good comrade,’ I said, ‘I was not a captain, or a doctor. I was a taxi driver. My taxi number was 213755.’ (The numbers were from my motorcycle licence plate.) ‘I went to Takeo, Battambang, Kampot, anywhere the passengers wanted to go. I’m telling the truth. This is the second time I’ve been to jail, and still Angka doesn’t believe me. I work hard for Angka. I struggle to master the elements for Angka. I do everything for Angka, and I never make trouble. Why doesn’t Angka believe me?’

  ‘Because you are a liar,’ the judge answered in his calm, soothing voice. ‘Please tell Angka the truth. If you do, Angka will give you an excellent job. You are an educated person. You can lead people. You can help the country develop. You can help the country build its independence-sovereignty.’

  I said, ‘Comrade, if I were a doctor I would tell you so. I want to help Angka. If you don’t believe me, go to Phnom Penh and check the files at the medical school. If you find I am really a doctor, Angka can do what it wants.’

  BAM! The kick came to my ribs. I fell over on my side. Then the other guard kicked me with the hard edge of his rubber-tyre sandals. BAM! I arched my back in agony. The guards took turns with me, first one, then the other. Then the judge rapped on the table and the guards stopped. They dragged me by the legs back to the line.

  By the time I counted my bruises the judge was already interrogating the next prisoner. The guards had kicked me in the rib cage, in the shoulders, the thighs and the back of my neck. They were professionals. They knew what they were doing. A beating like that would have been hard even on a healthy man.

  When all eighteen had talked to the judge, the guards led us outside. We walked in single file, away from the mango orchard, through another grove of fruit trees and into an uncultivated rice field.

  There we saw wooden structures with uprights and cross-pieces, like soccer goalposts, except narrower and higher. There was a double line of them, each one the same. On the ground in the middle of each, where the goalie would stand, was a pile of rice hulls and wood. In front of each goal lay a wooden cross with a length of rope.

  At first I couldn’t figure it out. Then I looked farther down the rows, which stretched over several dykes and far down the field. At the far end of the rows, prisoners were being punished in a manner I had never heard of before. They were tied to the crosses, the weight of their bodies sagging against the ropes. The crosses were upright, hanging from the goalpost crossbars. Smoke and flames rose from the fires around the prisoners’ feet.

  The soldiers stood crosses behind each prisoner and began tying us up.

  I thought, I hope Huoy never knows about this. I didn’t tell her about the worst things of prison last time, about how they cut the poor woman open. I don’t want her to know. It would hurt her. She is so tender. She saved my life. I love her so much. If I am gone, who will take care of her? Please, gods, save Huoy and keep her away from this kind of punishment. But she has little chance. The soldiers will probably come for her anyway, because they are after the wives of soldiers and doctors. It is just a matter of time, unless the gods intervene.

  And please, gods, I prayed, when I have gone either to hell or to paradise, keep me away from Khmer Rouge. When I am reborn, don’t send me near them. I don’t want to be anywhere near Cambodia. If I did something wrong in my last life I will pay for it now, but please, gods, surely this is payment in full. In my next life let me be happy.

  I was still on the ground and the soldiers were tying my wrists to the cross. ‘Just shoot me!’ I shouted at them. ‘Just shoot! Get it over with!’ I fought them, but they were much stronger and they outnumbered me. They tied my upper arms to the cross and then my thighs and my feet. Then they threw the rope attached to the top of the cross over the goalpost and hoisted me up until my feet were above the pile of wood and rice hulls. I swayed there, back and forth, with a view of the double line of goalposts and the uncultivated rice field.

  After the guards tied all of the prisoners they went around to each pile of rice hulls and lit it with cigarette lighters.

  Rice hulls have a consistency like sawdust. Fires with rice hulls give off thick, stinging smoke and burn slowly, for days.

  When the cross stopped swaying I was facing the double row of goalposts at a forty-five-degree angle, twisted around to the left. Judging from the position of the sun I was facing due west; the rows ran southwest to northeast. Behind me was the grove of fruit trees we had walked through from the prison. To my far left, at the edge of my vision, was a rooftop of a separate building where teenage girls were imprisoned for ‘crimes’ against Angka, like premarital sex. In front was the rice field, weeds covering the flat patches and the raised paddy dykes, and the horrible, unavoidable sight of the other prisoners hanging like me.

  Of those who had been crucified longer, some had already died from starvation or thirst – generally women, their heads dropped against their chests, their bodies sagging heavily against the ropes, their feet burned and blistered. Their sarongs had dropped to the first tight circle of rope around their thighs. They didn’t have underwear. Unable to control their bodily functions, they had soiled themselves. Beneath them the fires smouldered.

  Oh Huoy, Huoy, I am glad you are not here to see this.

  My feet were about six feet off the ground and three feet above the pile of wood and rice hulls. The fire had not yet spread to the wood underneath, but the smoke rose into my nostrils and eyes.

  Our group of eighteen prisoners didn’t do any more talking. We were too thirsty to talk out loud. We were too busy praying.

  Hot sunlight struck me on the back of my neck. The weight of my body dragged down on th
e ropes around my arms and legs. My feet had no feeling at all. My fingers were numb but I could still wiggle them. Iridescent green flies whooshed around my head. I shook them off but they returned and settled on the wetness at the corner of my eyes. I shaped my lips and blew air upward but they just buzzed around and landed again on my face, and on my back where the skin was bleeding from the beating.

  The buzzing of the flies was the loudest sound in the landscape. To my right, a woman in her twenties moaned, begging her mother to save her. She was pregnant, with a full roundness in her belly. I did not think she could last long.

  Gradually the fire spread below the surface of the rice hulls to the wood. There were no flames, but there was a new smell. I looked down. The hair on my legs was shrivelled and burned. My feet must have been blistering and burning, but I could not feel them. My eyes formed tears from the smoke. The guards had built the fire for heat and smoke more than for flames. Their purpose was not to burn us to death but to prolong and intensify the pain of being tied to the crosses.

  Late that afternoon, when my eyes were shut against the direct rays of the sun, I felt myself swinging around on the cross. The wind had changed direction. I opened my eyes. The wind blew the smoke away from me, at an angle, but it also pushed the red line of fire farther through the rice hulls. The fire grew hotter, and the heat rose up my thighs. To my left came a quiet sputtering as the man on the next cross peed in his pants hoping to dampen the fire, but it was no use. The drops of urine fell from his feet to the fire, vaporized and rose up again, and the fire burned as strongly as before. The flies attached themselves to my arms and legs, waiting for the wind to die down.

  The sun inched toward the horizon and sank. It was then, at dusk, that the wind stopped and the mosquitoes came out.

  The mosquitoes came in close, their high-pitched whine near one ear, then the other. I didn’t even bother chasing them away.

  Oh Huoy, you saved my life when I was sick. You saved my life. May the gods and the winds bring you this message from me, that I am alive for now, that my spirit will always be watching over you.