Fall Like Rain (eBook)

KUNTHEA’S DIARY PART ONE

April 10, 1987

Five years old

Where did this diary come from? My cousin gave it to me for Khmai New Year. She says I talk her ear off, so she got me this diary. For now I talk and she writes, but when I am bigger I will do the writing myself. My cousin is named Srey Srah. Her mama is Aunt Mony, and her papa is Uncle Heang. She is twelve, so she is good at writing. Before I tell you about today, my diary is pink and it has English letters on the cover. Srey Srah says the letters say “Happiness Memory”. Oh, and my name is Kunthea and I am five years old!

Up on the road, they were dancing tonight. It is almost Khmai New Year. Mr. Vuen has a radio, so after the selling time tonight, they set it on the wooden selling table, and they danced in a circle around the table to the New Year music. Mr. Sok was dancing too hard and he fell on the table and broke it, but the radio was ok. Mr. Vuen cursed at Mr. Sok. Papa said that Mr. Sok drank up too much wine. Everybody went home after that.

It is so very hot! I do not want to sleep close to Sela and Sopheak because we make each other even more hot. So last night I moved out of the mosquito net and that was not as hot, but those mosquitos bit me all night long! I opened my tired eyes when the morning sun started to dance on my bamboo and leaf wall. The dried leaves on Mama’s side of the hut cut the light up into little pieces that danced on my side. The dancing light woke me up. It has been a long time since I heard rain drops fall on my hut. When they do, it will be cool again I think.

I love the sound of our rain. Sometimes it starts with big drop­lets that tap tap at our soft hut. But soon it grows into a soft rumble that grows into a roaring flow that spills over the grass roof and to the ground where it makes little rivers in the dirt. Sometimes me and Sopheak, we lay on our tummies and peek through the bamboo floor slats and we watch the rivers grow. They dig into the red dirt and push and shove their way down the hill where they join up with the mighty Mekong. Sometimes there are rocks in the way. At first those rocks make the little rivers bend and then the power of the water bursts onto both sides, and suddenly those rocks become islands.

April 18, 1987

Five years old

Papa told me the story of a New Year angel. Her name is Mohurea Tevy. She likes to wear sparkly blue and green sapphires and she eats deer meat. She rides on a giant peacock and she carries a golden disc of power. All the New Year angels have the family name Tevy, because they had one father and he was the king of the gods. But a very smart rich boy was smarter than him and won a contest they had. It was a riddle contest, and the boy was so smart, he figured out the riddle. Since he won, the rich boy cut off the head of the god king! But the god king was so powerful that, if they threw his head in the ocean, it would all dry up! The god king had seven little girls and they are the New Year angels. Every year a different angel carries the head of the father around for that whole year because they cannot throw it in the ocean.

It sounds like an awful job. But Papa says the angels are happy … if we give them what they like. This one likes deer meat. I wonder where we will get deer meat. If I do not find deer meat, I’m afraid she might throw the golden power disc at me. I bet it would break my head instead of the other way around. Not like our plates. We only have six plates now because Sopheak dropped some. Now me and Sela, we eat off the same plate. I have never seen the ocean. Papa says it is like the Mekong but so big that you cannot see the other side! Anyway, Da says if the ocean dried up, the Mekong would too and we would have no fish to eat. So I am glad all the Tevy angels take turns carrying the head of the king around the world, even though that sounds terrible, and I am glad I do not have to.

August 4, 1987

Five years old

Our house stands up tall on four strong legs of wood. That is a good thing, because the Mekong is sneaky. It creeps up under our house fast. The houses on the road do not have legs. The road is high. But one time the Mekong creeped all the way up there also! They should sit on legs too, but they do not. Sotheary’s house is up there. She has three broth­ers and she used to have a sister too, but the day the Mekong snuck up there, it took her sister away. The Mekong is powerful and dark in the rainy season. The monks came and chanted for three days, and the whole village thought that Sotheary’s papa must have been awful bad in his life before, or Preah Put would not have let the Mekong take his little girl. After they stopped chanting, we could hear Sotheary’s mama wailing and moaning all night long … even all the way from my house on legs down by the river.

Today, Mama grabbed the oiled tarp and spread it over our pile of nets and pillows, because the roof has more leaks than it did before. The tarp smells like the gasoline that the boy at the corner shop pours out of the giant Coke bottles and into Papa’s moto. That shop is called the Lucky Lucky shop and they sell tasty little crackers fried in fish sauce, and moto gas from giant Coke bottles, but sometimes they are Marinda or Fanta bottles. I like that smell. When they pour it into Papa’s moto, the smell puffs up in the air to my face. Then Papa pays the boy and swings me up onto my spot on the seat in front of him, and off we go!

September 10, 1987

Five years old

Da (Grandpa) and Yay (Grandma) live in the hut next door. It has legs, too. Today I was at their house when the sky grew dark. Then we all of a sudden heard the boats knocking each other, so I looked out to see the dark swirling river. In the rainy season, sometimes the Mekong looks angry, and in the dry season it looks almost dead. But there are some days when it just looks beautiful, strong and ringing with the happy music of the fishing boats and the swishing of their nets. On days like that, the blue sky and the sunlight join together and dance on the water! On days like that, I forget that the Mekong took Sotheary’s sister away.

Then Da said, “The sky wants to rain, little one.” Right then, while he was still saying that, the powerful wind slammed the shutters against the hut. I jumped back into Da’s strong arms, which was a good thing because when the shutters slammed it was suddenly all dark and I could not even see! Then the rain hit Da’s tin roof like tiny pebbles being poured all over it. Not like my roof. My roof is made of leaves and it is soft. So the rain sounds more like a swoosh than a crash. But soon even the loudness sounded smooth and steady. I tried to keep talking with Da, but he could not hear me over the loud rain on the roof. He smiled and shook his head no pointing at his ears. So, I fell asleep for a long time, and when the loud rain was over, the Mekong had climbed up the hill right to our houses! So, Da took an old fishing net and twisted it into a rope. He tied it to a piece of wood, set me on it and pushed me across the water to my own house! Mama cursed Da for that, but he did not hear it, which is a good thing since Da is Mama’s papa, and she knows we have to respect our mamas and papas. She said I do not know how to swim yet, and that is the truth. I don’t.

I love Da. Sometimes he makes me sad, and even scared. He has really bad dreams that make him yell out in his sleep. I can hear that from my own mat, under my own mosquito net, in my own house. Mama says his bad dreams are from the Pol Pot time. I do not know what the Pol Pot time is, because Mama gets upset when I ask about it. Her eyes get red and her face turns puffy, so I just feel strange, and I do not like to feel like that. But I really want to know. And my cousin, Srey Srah, who is writing this now for me, says her mama and papa also will not talk about the Pol Pot time. And she is also sad for Da. We both love him.

October 21, 1987

Five years old

There is dark power in the spirits. I know. Mr. Vuen has the spirits all the time. He is a weak man, so the powerful spirits just walk right into his body whenever they want to. Sopheak and I can hear the voices screaming. The voices change, but they all come from his own mouth! I saw that. We don’t want to look … but then we do want to. We agreed we should not get too close, or the spirits may try to just walk right into us too. Sopheak and me, we think that little children are not as strong as grown-ups, so that could happen. We are not strong enough to hold the rope on Uncle Heang’s boat when the Mekong is fighting with it. And we are not strong enough to carry Mama’s food basket from the market the whole way. We have to stop and rest, but Mama can walk the whole way.

One time I did look at Mr. Vuen when the spirits had him. I peeked through the window bars and there he was, with his sons hold­ing him down on the wooden bed stand. One on each leg and one on each arm, the sons were sweating and making faces. His shirt was all torn and his pants too. His eyes were rolling back in his head. When I saw that, I turned to run away, but my hands got caught in the window bars and I cried out. Then he looked right at me with his spirit eyes! Now that spirit knows what I look like, so I make Mama braid my hair...