The Wounds of Loung Ung - Essay Example

Loung Ung was able to keep her humanity and humor intact along with essential dignity, despite enduring unspeakable atrocity. She spent five years stuck in tortuous dread, trying to outrun destruction, war, starvation, and the ultimate commitment of an individual, death. She challenged inhuman evil acts as if they were kindergarten toys. According to me the turning point in the story can be found when the children’s mother turns them out of the home. She whispers to the children and Loung writes (2006) “If we stay together, we will die together, but if they cannot find us, they cannot kill us” (p.121).

She instructs them to separate, “walk until you come to a work camp, tell them you are orphans, and change your name” (p.122). Loung stubbornly refuses to go so “Ma says sternly. ‘Your Pa is gone now, and I just cannot take care of you kids. I don’t want you here! You are too much work for me! I want you to leave!” (p.122). As the wife of a high-ranking government official, her strategy was right and the children were saved but she lost sight of the human angle at that moment. That was a peculiar situation and in the situations, in which they have placed neither mother nor the children could be blamed. The wise saying goes that desperate situations need desperate remedies. In such a grim situation thinking power gets engulfed in confusion and no accurate decision is possible. It is wrong to conclude that the mother does not love her children.

The reality is she visualizes absolute danger for their lives if they continue to stay in the house together and as such she wants them to leave hoping that destiny would favor w them with good luck if they move out of the house and seek shelter elsewhere. Loung’s position is also to be pitied. Her resentment towards her mother is perfect as children look forward to protection from their parents and family members when it is a question of life or death. What is their plan of escape and where will they hide? Neither the mother nor the children are sure of it. My all sympathies are with that young girl it was a mind-boggling situation for her and the girls in that position would have thought about committing suicide!

The intervention (imagined)

I am a neighbor of Loung’s family and we have good relations. The calamity has fallen upon all of us. Under no circumstances I would not have asked her to go away from the house to an undisclosed destination. This is as good as her killing her. A mother must remain with the child and protect her at all times and at all costs. No doubt, this is a peculiar civil war in Cambodia, where villages are bombed and attacked first and the cities are comparatively safe. I would have personally escorted her to a girl- camp either for working in rice fields or for being trained as a girl soldier.

That Loung did not submit to her mother’s arguments indicates her grit to live up to the challenges and I would have encouraged her to pursue her path of defiance. While at the children's camp it is very obvious that Loung needs to keep on living when she says to herself "I have not survived this much to be defeated by them" (P.126). This indicates that my estimation of inner strength of Loung is correct. In war situations, even the ablest generals commit mistakes and as such I will not blame Loung’s mother for her decision but would have persuaded her to accompany the children to the girl's camp hiding her real identity.