| Borany's Life BEFORE the Khmer Rouge Occupation |
Aspects of the Environment |
Borany's Life DURING the Khmer Rouge Occupation |
| Aunt cooked for restaurant, French influence, no shortages, family farm | Food | Rice, fish, fruit - often in short supply - famine/ malnutrition, cooked on fires |
| Fashionable, French influence | Clothing | Everyone had to dye clothes black |
| Large wooden houses, with garden; privately owned | Housing | Built own houses from flax, sheets of plastic; no private ownership |
| Extended family - grandparents close, well educated, relatives in France | Family | Children sent to camps, families split, most died, communal eating |
| Predominantly Buddhist, belief in omens (comet) and spirits | Religion/ beliefs | Buddhism discouraged, the Khmer Rouge insisted on devotion to Angka |
| Several servants, looked after children | Servants | Potential danger to family - knew too much about background, left |
| Lived in Phnom Penh, modern, large, cosmopolitan city | Location | Lived in the countryside, villages, beside the Mekong |
| Father a businessman, interpreter, restaurant; Mother worked at home; high status professionals | Work/ Employment | Hard physical labour, planting rice, looking after cows, no money/pay; status given to peasants (old people) |
| Private tuition, learnt in French, examinations, important | Education | No schooling for children at all; Khmer only language allowed |
| Lon Noi government supported by USA, form of democracy | Government | Communist dictatorship, death a common punishment, loss of freedom |
| Electricity, motor vehicles | Energy/ power/ lighting | No petrol for cars, candles, human and animal power |
| Radio, news from overseas available | Communications | Radio taken by Khmer Rouge, little information about events, rumour |
| Hospitals, French established modern health service | Medical system | None - Father died from infection, no medicines |
