So, after seven weeks of the Khmer Rouge exploration, our team came up with a short play that displays the picture of Khmer Rouge regime.
Narrator: The music of sorrow plays in the middle of the performance, where we can see a 14-year-old girl with black fabric covering her eyes and fabric tied around her hands, with people forcing her to walk. Behind her, there are two soldiers, wearing black clothes, screaming at her.
Soldier 1: “Keep walking!”
Action: The girl falls down.
Narrator: The girl, feeling so anxious inside, but talking politely, says:
“I’m sorry. I promise I won’t do it again. Please let me go.”
Action: Both soldiers kick her.
Soldier 2: “Get up! Don’t be so weak!”
Narrator: The girl tries to get up. She doesn’t know where the soldiers are taking her, but she knows that she’s gonna die. When they arrive at the killing field, she kneels down, closes her eyes with starvation and thinks about her beloved brother. She starts crying when she hears the sound of death ringing in her ears.
[inside shadow puppet]
The soldier raises his weapon; he knocks her in the back of her neck. She falls into the hole.
_________________________________________________________________________
Narrator: An old man gasps, waking up from his nightmare. He wakes up with sadness and hears a sound coming from the kitchen.
Rathanak: “Grandpa! Breakfast is ready!”
Grandpa: “Errr! I’ll come now.”
Action: The grandpa walks toward the dining table. He can see rice lying on the table. He sits down and starts eating.
Grandpa: “Today you are not going to school?”
Rathanak: “There’s no school today because it’s Sunday.”
Grandpa: “Okay, good, then you can help me wash the cow today.”
Narrator: They keep eating, until Rathanak gets up. There is rice left on the boy’s plate, so his grandpa says:
Grandpa: “Rathanak, remember what I always tell you?”
Rathanak: “No, Grandpa. What is it?”
Grandpa
“Look at your plate! You need to eat all the rice. Do you know how hard people tried to grow and harvest it? You are very lucky to get to eat as much rice as you want, because during the Khmer Rouge regime, I didn’t get to eat like you.”
Rathanak: “Khmer Rouge? What’s that?”
Grandpa
“The Khmer Rouge was a group of communists who took control of Cambodia on April 17, 1975, when I was your age; my sister was eventually killed. In fact, millions of people got killed because of starvation and torturing by the end of this regime.”
Rathanak: “How did she die?”
Grandpa: “It all started when…….”
[shadow puppet – a girl and a boy walking tiredly]
[human actors come from behind the shadow puppet curtain and continue walking tiredly]
Narrator: Rany and Vin finally are able to stop after working in the fields for hours and hours under the hot sun. They lay down on the dirt, sick with starvation. (Dalin was done)
Vin: “Bong, I’m so hungry, is there any food left?”
Action: Rany shakes her head sadly.
Vin: “I’m so hungry.”
Rany: “Just hold on for breakfast in the morning.”
Vin (crying): “No, I can’t.”
Action: Rany starts to think and walks away from her brother.
[brother actor lays down as sister walks away; then brother exits the stage]
[sister walks around the room as if looking for something]
Narrator: Rany slowly walks through the dark, trying to see if anyone is there. In front of her, she sees some small, shriveled and green bananas. As she is about to pick the bananas…
Soldier 1: “Hey! What are you doing, comrade? How dare you use your hands to steal the food from Angkar!
Soldier 2: “We need to teach you some lessons.”
Action: Both of the soldiers take her away, behind the shadow puppet curtain
[open shadow puppet] – show soldier killing the sister
[close shadow puppet]
[rooster sound – shows that it is morning ]
PAUSE
[sound of the bell]
Pol Pot
“Hello!, my friends. This is a new experience, and it’s an important one for the whole world because we Cambodians don’t perform like others. We leap, and swiftly build. We don’t need a long time for transformation. So from now on, I want you all to increase your rice yield to three metric tons per hectare. If you do this, everyone will be happy.”
So, “Now, would any friends like to say anything?
Everyone is quiet.
Action: Victim 1 raises his hand.
Victim 1: “I saw this comrade (pointing to victim 2) dig up some potatoes at the farm last night.”
Action: Victim 2 raises his hand.
Victim 2: “No, I didn’t. This comrade is lying! She was the one who stole the potatoes.”
Victim 3 (pointing toward Victim 2): “No, I also saw that comrade steal food.”
Soldier 2 (pointing toward Victim 2): “Yes. This all makes sense. We always knew she had a problem.”
Action: Pol Pot looks at his soldiers, and nods his head.
Pol Pot
“Comrade, you didn’t show respect to Angkar. Now you must learn.”
Action: Pol Pot looks at his soldiers again.
Pol Pot: “Please take this comrade away.”
When the soldiers come to pull Victim 2 away, she yells:
Victim 2: “No no, please, no. I didn’t do it. They are just trying to accuse me!”
[open shadow puppet]
The soldiers are standing, the victim is on her knees. The soldiers hit Victim 2 with a shovel. [scary music sound]
Governor
“It’s time to declare the anniversary of the founding of CPK. Our party began in 1951.”
Pol Pot
“Comrade, I do not agree with this idea. I’m sure that is not the date; CPK began in 1960 when I and Ieng Sary came to the assembly in Phnom Penh.”
Governor
“But I believe the founding of CPK actually began back in 51, around the time when the Vietnamese came to Cambodia to support the overthrow of Lon Nol.”
Pol Pot
“Any friends who disagree with me, you’ll stay. I want to have some private conversation with you. Those of you who see the truth of the 1960 date may go.”
Friends who agree with Pol Pot leave the room, looking back over their shoulders like they are scared for their friends.
[close the curtain, scary music, shadow puppet opens; soldiers killing people one by one]
Narrator: Pol Pot started to get suspicious of everyone around him, including people who used to be from middle-class backgrounds, soldiers who had fought for Lon Nol, those who had joined the Communist movement when Vietnam was still very involved, and anyone who had exposure to foreign countries. To be suspected of disloyalty, a person only had to be mentioned in the confessions of three other people. Pol Pot got suspicious of all these people because he was afraid that they would rebel against him, so he killed many people who he thought didn’t stand on his side.
PAUSE
Narrator: January 1979
Soldier 1 talking to Soldier 2:
“We need to get out off this country because I’ve heard the Vietnamese are attacking Cambodia and they got the victory.”
Action: They hear one gunshot. Soldiers 1 and 2 run off stage. Two more gunshots are fired. Three Vietnamese soldiers in uniform march onto the stage.
Narrator: After more than 100,000 soldiers from Vietnam crossed the border and took over large sections of Cambodia, many Khmer Rouge leaders took cars, trains or walked to get out of the country. There was very little information about Pol Pot after the overthrow. Cambodians, who had spent four years working day in and day out were shocked at the sudden departure of their zone leaders, but slowly started to move back towards their hometowns to pick up the pieces of their lives. People tried to find their families and started to rebuild Cambodia as best they could.
Grandpa
“This genocide left sorrow inside all the victims who had been tortured by the Khmer Rouge soldiers or had lost their family, friends, property, dignity or identity.”
Rathanak: “This is so scary and emotional.”
Grandpa: “Yes it is.”
Rathanak
“Grandpa, is there any place where they killed the people during the Khmer Rouge that I could go to visit?”
Grandpa
“Yes, there is. One is Cheung Ek, known as the Killing Fields, and another one is S-21, which was a school that got turned into a prison. But it’s in Phnom Penh, and we can’t afford to go there now. Maybe when you grow older and have enough money, you can go there.”
Rathanak: “I will, Grandpa.”
music