My believe and expectation

Each person or each group or each ethnic has its own definition of home, village, land, city, country, etc. I, as a person, was born in a peaceful village but I, as a person, have to grow up in an uncompleted village. I have spent every single day of my life in this uncompleted village for more than 10 years. I have always thought that my life has missed something. I have been thinking about it for a very long time. Now I have just realized that what I my life has missed is my beautiful village.

About 10 years ago I lived in a peaceful and beautiful village. My parents woke up in the morning and went to work in our rice field every rainy season. They usually dried betel nuts and cashew nuts during summer season and sold them. We use the money that we sold those nuts to buy fish paste and salt to eat for a whole year. We had been living our life happily in this village year by year.

I was a child at that time. I studied in our village's primary school with my friends. I was very happy. But when I was studying in the forth grade, I found out that happiness would not be with us forever.

It was a day during winter final examination. School bell was rung and closed unexpectedly. Every student needed to go home. I did not know why. I saw my parents packed our stuff. I only knew that I had to run away from our home. Everything happened very fast. I could not carry many stuff. I did not know that to bring. I did not even know what I had in my bag. However, there was one thing that I knew in my heart. I had left my pets behind. They were cows, goats, cats, dogs and chicken. I have always wondered what would happened with them.

I was not only me who was suffered from that situation. All of our villagers also were suffered the same. We all had to leave our beautiful village. We had to walk through the death shadow valley for a long time. Raining season turned to summer season, finally we heard that there was a new village that we could stay. I did not know whose village was. The only one thing in my mind at that time was I wanted to sleep peacefully under roof because I had slept under trees for a long time.

We followed others to the new village with hearts that full of happiness. When I saw the new village, I felt it was completely different from my home village. The new village was located in a valley but it did not have any big trees but only some small bushes. However, I was sitting with satisfactory because I did not have to be worried or sorrow anymore.

We were provided a small piece of land. My mother planned to build our house. I had to help her because our father was separated from us while we were fleeing. Other villagers gradually arrived to and settled in the new village including other 30 villagers from our village.

Later on I saw many big trucks, which I had never seen in my life before, contained rice, cooking oil, beans, fish paste, clothes, blankets, plastic sheet for covering the roof and other stuffs into the new village. All children who arrived to the new village had to go to school. This big new village has administrative organization, social workers, schools, churches and clinic as it is a big town.

The people living in this new big village try to make themselves reproductive in different ways. Some of them stay at house, some study at the village's school and some work at village's offices. However, the boundary of this new village is limited. People living in this village are not allowed to go outside. I have never known the reason behind.

I have been living in this new village until I have my own family. One thing has changed in this village is people's hope and dream has been vanished within the boundary of this village. The highest expectation that they could dream of or hope equals to the area of this village. I call this new village “The Village of Missing” where the villagers' hope and dreams are missing.

I have been living in this new village for 14 years. There is something crosses my mine that how long I have been living here. I tell myself that I do not want to move further and I also cannot go back home. I miss my peaceful village where I was born. At that time, I had my own house and my own garden surrounded by beautiful nature.

The reasons that make me live in this the village of missing are my hope and my expectation; that one day I will be able to go back home, to my beautiful and peaceful village. My home that I have never forgot.

Saw Tar Sur Kar
Section 14
House no. 376/B