Loung Ung

For Cambodian writer Loung Ung, covering the story of the genocide that killed approximately two million civilians was about her family.

“I’m not just telling a story. I’m trying to communicate my belief, my hope, for what our lives could be on earth.”

If that was my story, and I’ve been separated from my family for four years, and they’ve suffered a war, and I didn’t know if they lived or died – if I get to tell that story, who would I want to hold on to at the end? Who would I want the world to see?”

As an advocate of women displaced by violence, Ung believes writing is about telling the story through your frame. “I started writing because when I was reading stories of Cambodia, they were written mostly by politicians, journalists, and other people visiting the country.” While this was many years ago, the trends still haven’t changed enough to invite a more diverse array of stories onto the global stage. After watching “The Killing Fields”, a 1984 movie based on the life of Khmer Rouge survivor Dith Pran, Loung was inspired to tell her own story. And to tell the story in her own authentic voice as a survivors, sister, and daughter.

Ung has written three bestselling novels, Lucky Child, Lulu in the Sky, and First They Killed My Father, which she adapted for the screen in 2017 with director Angelina Jolie. “When you write a book,” she says, “you have to write everything. And so, you’re almost telepathically communicating with your readers: you’re going to tell them about, you know, the sound and the sight and the smells and the tones and the temperature. You write everything in the story.” But in writing the screenplay, Ung had to extract many pieces out to account for everyone else working on

WRITER: AUDREY LOWELL TAMALPAIS HIGH SCHOOL, FRESHMAN: EDITOR: MAXINE FLASHER DUZGUNES

REPORTERS: NICHOLAS CHIN, JUPITER ESMAIL, HARITA KALVAI, MARGUERITE WALDMAN-KAUFMAN, KIERA EISENBUD MILL VALLEY MIDDLE SCHOOL, MARIN SCHOOL OF ENVIRONMENTAL LEADERSHIP, SACRED HEART PREPARATORY, SAN RAFAEL HIGH AND TAMALPAIS HIGH SCHOOLS the production: the director, the costume designer, the makeup artists, the sound designers, the hairstylist. Suddenly, it’s a collaboration, “and to have them imprint their voice and their vision into the film, I found that just exhilarating and exciting.”

Ung wants stories that aren’t slogans, stories that tell of brothers and sisters not just surviving war but thriving in peace years after the war has been declared over. “We are constantly being bombarded with stories of horrors, and heartbreaks and tragedies and wars and victimizations and you know, atrocity. But we’re not getting enough stories of humanity, of heart, of hope, of courage, no good news stories.” She describes the banner that media organizations use nowadays to cover their stories as this: “if it bleeds, it leads. You’re getting your news in snippets, you’re not getting indepth investigative reporting, you’re getting news that are sound bites, that, you know, are designed to get clicks on social media, or designed to draw your attention, but not really designed to tell you a story of family.” The media’s coverage of violence in countries like Cambodia, Rwanda, Afghanistan, and Ukraine has deterred allyship, it has discouraged heart from where it is needed most. So now more than ever, it’s important to show people these stories to get them interested and involved, not to turn away.

Growing up, Ung used to think that re- ucate people about wars, “but to draw on people’s understanding of what it takes to survive wars, and it takes courage and humanity and dignity and love and family. It takes all these things to survive.”

“I think what’s missing in education for not just women, but all kids, is financial intelligence,” Ung admits. Going to school to learn reading, writing, and math is different than learning how much of what we earn goes to taxes and how much remains to support ourselves. A college degree is one thing, but a job is another. “What has helped me live my life and freedom was that I knew how to manage my finance…And so if people ever mistreated me at my job, I could always quit and leave.” Ung believes there are so many more things right with us than there are wrong with us, and we need to embrace that.

“I am very disheartened by what’s portrayed to women in general as being broken, as being not whole, as being imperfect,” Ung says. She points out how television and social media advertisements directed at women always use dismembered parts and never the whole women: whether it’s hair that’s not straight enough, skin not smooth enough, eyebrows not thin enough. Instead, women need to be models for each other: “we’re here, we’re surviving, we’re strong, we’re giving birth, we’re nurturing each other, we’re protecting each other, we’re speaking out for each other, we’re standing up together. How could there be so many things wrong with us if we are here?” Ung proposes changing not only women’s education in school, but women’s education in life.

It requires commitment to take actions around in peace in your community. “Life is about choice,” Ung says, “Peace is not an automatic, peace is not something you grant to somebody. Peace is not something you wish upon a star. Peace is not something you ask for from your government, or from your school administrators or from your friends. Peace is something you actually commit to working on.” It’s about choosing to work to stop cycles of violence and toxicity and choosing to sacrifice many parts for the whole that’s the best of ourselves.

Ung doesn’t walk through her home country with guilt anymore, she honors the space and experience of the people who decide to share their stories with her. Because when she was in a refugee camp as a child, she recounts the day that a worker came up to her, “one of the invisible kids, dirty and hungry and desperate. And I remember her bending down to my eye level and talk to me. I have no idea to this day, no idea what she said. But I remember what it felt like to be seen, to be heard, to think that somebody actually saw me.” So, despite feeling rage and sadness upon returning there, Ung also carries feelings of gratitude, admiration, and respect for silience was an intrinsic quality, a special trait that she could possess. It was not until she started suffering symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder throughout her adolescence, she realized that all this information had been implanted inside her consciousness. “Resilience isn’t a thing you’re born with, it’s a learned behavior that consists of verbal communication or written communication or however we choose to communicate with each other. It’s forming relationships and friendships with people who will be there for you when you’re going through a hard time. Resilience is also learning how to support yourself.” We can use these learned behaviors to pick ourselves up when times are tough.

It’s about seeing each other in three-dimensional versions of ourselves.

Coming out of the war, Ung believed there were more bad people than good people in the world. She was very scared and suspicious, as if overtaken by the traumas and battles she had to fight alone. But in considering some advice she might give to her younger self, she admitted that sometimes we just can’t change the mistakes we’ve already made: “all we can do is go on, go move forward and do better.” It’s about extending yourself towards the good human beings among the 8 billion plus people on earth. “My adult life has really been a journey to just see beauty and be grateful and put out kindness.” Ung’s work is not merely to ed- generations of people who have been through so much and grown so much and worked so hard to be here.

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