Cambodian activist Loung Ung on how she survived the Khmer Rouge

B I grew up with three sisters and three brothers. My father was Cambodian and my mum came from Chaozhou (in Guangdong province); we were raised to speak Cambodian and Teochew. I have many good memories of Cambodia before the war. My siblings listened to Elvis Presley on their eight-track tapes. We dressed up for Chinese New Year and got red envelopes full of money.

I was five when the Khmer Rouge took over the country. There were days when we were kept from school. Now, looking back, I realise that bombs were going off in movie theatres and there were rumours that soldiers were coming. Every time that happened, my parents kept us at home. My father would entertain us by telling stories. It was good that my parents did that, because when the war happened, we were together as a family.

(Khmer Rouge) soldiers came riding trucks into Phnom Penh on April 17, 1975. They were wearing big smiles and telling us the war was over. People cheered at first. Then the soldiers pulled out their bullhorn and screamed for people to pack and leave. They said the Americans were coming to bomb the city and, if we didn't leave, we would be killed. We packed what we could and left, along with two million others. We left behind family photos, birth certificates and house deeds.

We walked for over seven days, sleeping on roadsides. We went to my uncle's village, but my parents knew it wasn't safe for us to remain. My father was a military police officer; my mother was Chinese; my siblings and I were educated - those things put us in danger from the revolutionary zeal of creating a country where people's value was measured by whether or not they could farm the land and support the war. We had to keep moving. The soldiers took everyone's belongings and set them on fire. I saw my Chinese New Year dress go up in flames and remember thinking that my parents are not able to protect me.

A year into the war, the soldiers came to the village of Ro Leap for my father. We never heard from him again. Before, I had held on to the hope that all of it had to end. I thought we would go home and everything would go back to normal.

To keep us safe, my mother separated us. My sister and I ended up at different labour camps (Loung Ung later went to a camp for child soldiers). My mother, who stayed in Ro Leap, said we had to say she was dead. This was sacrilegious because, in my culture, you don't say somebody is dead if they are still alive. It is like a prophecy - if it happens, it could be your fault. A few months later, the soldiers came for my mother and four-year-old sister (Loung Ung learned this after running away from her camp and returning to Ro Leap to look for her mother). When she died, I felt terrible. Back at camp, I kept to myself. The safest route was to be dumb, deaf, mute, blind and invisible, and to just exist, but not live.