once upon a time in cambodia i went to the barber.
i saw some glossy pictures. handsome. beguiling.
i want to look that man, i told the barber.
do you have any money.
yes. i showed him some paper.
you have to wait.
how long.
years.
ok.
Please open your creative notebook. Using a simple writing tool like a pen or #2 lead pencil I want you to consider the following questions. Please answer them using your basic English.
Why am I here? _____
Am I a machine, a tool? _______
What exactly is a machine? ________
What is my motivation to learn English? Money.
Your supervisor has instructed me to motivate you. She expects me to motivate you to complete the assigned tasks, pass the exams and arrive on time. Her management style instructed me to use fear as a form of discipline with you. We are all well aware how the power and threat of fear motivates humans.
If I fail to motivate you and pass you I will be executed. Survival is my fear based motivation.
Fear of starvation. Fear of poverty. Fear of failure. Fear of humiliation or shame. Fear of not meeting social expectations.
the woman at the metro
with a burned leg - you remember her clearly
how she sat after dragging her bad leg
into the car, into the compartment
this image of her
alone
cold
scared
in pain
how did it happen? why is she alone?
on a late night in a flimsy sweater
her skin below the knee
running to her ankle
all burned away
exposing blood red lines
her abstract expression
her sacred scared distracted face
watching night fly past windows
where blue televisions and children kept an eye
on each other
how the woman kept going
on the metro past a stop
where the expensive private hospital on a Roman
hill gleamed its extensive intensive pensive care
ward and her treatment was delayed,
forgotten, useless
here
because she is poor
so she stayed in her seat
anxious now feeling her pain
wondering where she would go
where she would end up on this night
as a stranger studied her anxious, passive
expression feeling burns, violent burns
inside sensations fire and heat
nerve impulses darting through, along sensory
channels where signals are blocked by
neurotransmitters shutting down
her chance
My sister put me to work with a niece washing clothes. In reality I am a happy slave. I have my sister, niece, food and a safe place to sleep. I make some money. An Australian girl gave me a scooter. I dress nice.
My sister started selling massage service. If I meet a good man, which is rare, like Thorny, I let him touch me because I trust he’ll take care of me.
I need help.
My job has no emotional connection. I have the power to say NO. I have a 5th degree black belt. I’ve killed more men with silence than you can imagine. I tell aggressive idiots they can get laid somewhere else. Go find a beer girl. Flash your cash honey.
I do all the washing, ironing, and massages. My sister pockets the money. I make small tips. She sits around admiring herself in mirrors, playing with her 2-year old daughter. Talking rubbish on her cell.
I am a voiceless voice of quiet resignation.
Shhh. I have a new secret short term lover while Thorny is home in OZ. I am easy going with a willingness to share honest emotional connections.
No commitment is a temporary abstraction.
I am a beautiful deaf mute woman.
I speak sign love, sing, dance and laugh in Cambodia. Spoiled whining children and small adults run around screaming. I can’t hear them. It’s a blessing. I read lips screaming I want food. I want love. I want education. I want medicine.
I had a dream. A grandfather in Laos is an idiot. He runs his truck. It’s his solace. I love the smell of pollution on Sunday morning. His daughter burns plastic trash. Parents and children inhale fumes.
Ancestor worship. In Vietnam it’s incense.
In Laos it’s exhaust and burning plastic. Here it’s cow shit. Youngsters respect their elders. Shut your mouth. Do not say anything to venerable grandfather. Birds sing with hammers. I feel vibrations.
Their traditional silence kills them softly. Truth is a powerful weapon. Most people are afraid of truth. Hearing, speaking, realizing truth entails risk. Daring is not fatal. Truth is a deaf mute seer in Cambodia.
Everything here is a secret. Shhh fingers on my lips. I am secretly married to a false dream of going to Australia with Thorny. He is 50, married with family there. He works for an NGO in Cambodia. He builds fake bamboo homes. He plays my father figure and rescuer.
I come from a poor rural Cambodian village. I was the last of 11 children. I am 28. I came here with my sister, 32. She got pregnant by a married New Zealand man. She had a daughter. She pretends to be married. It’s all show here. He sends her a monthly handout, pays the electricity.
My sister set up a hair salon business in a temple tourist town. It fell through. Salons are a dime a dozen. Thousands of undereducated poor passive girls don’t read or dream. They cut. Do their nails. They digit phones.
Staring at mirrors is their fate. Some moonlight as beer girls and hostesses. Where is Mr. ATM? No money, no honey.
Vietnamese plant rice. Cambodians watch it grow. Laotians listen to it grow.
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