Arlington Provides Refuge for Cambodian Culture

Arlington Provides Refuge for Cambodian Culture:
http://www.sungazette.net/articles/2008/10/01/arlington/news/nw915.txt

For Cambodian-Americans in the Washington, D.C., area, keeping traditional culture alive is a fight against long odds. The battle's fought, however, week after week at the Arlington Mill Community Center, where Cambodian-born parents bring their American-born children for lessons in their ancient heritage.The children come midday Sunday, shuffling into the center in richly colored, sequin-studded Av Noay, a traditional Cambodian dress. They're here to take classical Cambodian dance and music lessons and to understand their roots.Jonathan Dos, a fifth-grader at Carlin Springs Elementary, patiently holds two mallets above the dark hardwood bars of a curved wooden instrument known as a roneat ek. It's like a xylophone but has a rich eastern tone that fills the room as Jonathan plays. It's a simple tune, like a Cambodian version of “Chopsticks.”The instructor, Ngek Chum, watches his pupils while bowing a violin-like instrument called a tro.There's not a musical sheet in the room. “I use my ear,” Chum said.Most of the adults here arrived in the United States between the late 1970s and early 1980s - during or after the dark, genocidal era of Pol Pot's regime. In an effort to create a classless society, the Khmer Rouge directly or indirectly killed nearly 1.7 million Cambodians, one-fifth of Cambodia's population, between 1975 and 1979.Upon arriving in the United States, the refugees established “Khmer” communities throughout the country. Some 4,000 Cambodians live in the Washington, D.C., area.In a larger room across the hall from Chum's music lesson is Devi Yim, the Dance Master. Yim stands on tiptoe at the head of the class, her outstretched arms moving gracefully in large circles to music played from a stereo.Facing Yim for this demonstration of the Coconut Dance are 30 girls, some no more than five years old.Like the others, Yim has seen hardship.“They gave us three days to leave,” Yim said, referring to the Khmer Rouge order to evacuate Phnom Penh in 1975. Yim and thousands fled to the countryside on foot and at gunpoint.Yim, 5 years old at the time, was separated from her family and forced to tend rice fields in the countryside. Her brother was killed.
In the early 1980s, after the fall of the Khmer Rouge, Yim completed her education and graduated from the Royal University of Phnom Penh. She first performed dance in the United States in 1990 on the invitation of the U.S government.“My country was still at war,” she said. “I decided to stay here.”Now she teaches the children what she learned in her homeland. “I want to keep my culture alive. That's why I do it every weekend.”Sara Say agrees. A former second lieutenant in the Cambodian Special Forces, Say has been performing in America since arriving in the early 1980s.Afraid their culture would be lost in the relocation, Say and 30 other refugees brought their dance heritage with them.Say, now a writer, drummer, and singer, lives and performs at local venues.“We must show them that we are from somewhere else in the world,” Say said referring to the children. “They have to learn what is their background.”It's a refrain heard again and again among the parents: It's important that the children know their heritage.Kathy Rafferty sits in a plastic chair in the community center while her adopted daughter, Grace, practices dance moves. Grace was born in Cambodia and brought to the United States by Rafferty at six months of age.Rafferty's not Cambodian, but she understands the importance of culture and identity.The dance lessons teach culture and help with identity, Rafferty noted. Her daughter “wailed at first,” she said, “but when the kids get older they really start to appreciate the lessons.”Another mother, Nalen Smith, watches Meghan, her 5-year-old daughter, perform. “My kids don't know the culture yet,” said Smith, who spent five years at the Khao-I-Dang refugee camp on the Thai border and lost her sister to a border-guard's bullet.“I bring Meghan to dance because I want to keep the culture alive,” she said. “It's not easy.”The littlest ones, like Meghan, are too young to understand. But they eventually learn. “After a while they realize that they have their own origins,” said Say.Victoria Yap, a Chinese-Cambodian-American, passes out four-foot peacock feathers to twenty children in the break room. They're about to practice the “Peacock Dance.”“They become the peacock,” Yap said, explaining the meaning of the ancient dance.Dance and music lessons, however, require lots of free time. And in America, free time comes at a premium.“We try to maintain our identity. But, we're busy,” said Poly Sam, 42, a Cambodian immigrant and survivor of the Khmer Rouge. Sam now is a broadcaster at Radio Free Asia in Washington.Circumstances don't always allow for culture to come first, he said.But though Sam embraces his heritage, he is also grateful for the opportunities America has offered him and his three children.“Being American is a good thing,” he said. “My kids will be successful.”