Cambodian refugee Thida Loeung and her husband, George Chigas, visited a Philippines Refugee Processing Center.September 13, 2007
RUSSELL CONTRERAS
Boston Globe (Mass., USA)
ACTON - A pioneer wasn't something George Chigas sought to become. He just wanted to be a travel writer, in the same vein as his Lowell hometown literary hero, Jack Kerouac.
Pioneer wasn't what Thida Loeung had in mind, either. She and her family were more concerned about survival after escaping the brutal Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia.
But pioneers the two were when they met in Lowell 22 years ago and married, becoming one of the first American-Cambodian couples in America following the great Cambodian refugee influx of the early 1980s. And immediately the couple was transformed into local icons of two worlds encountering and trying to make sense of each other.
"We had a lot of support from the Cambodian community," Loeung said, remembering those early, trail-blazing years.
The couple's first meeting occurred not long after Chigas returned to Lowell following a three-year stint in San Francisco. Entering his hometown for the first time since he went away, Chigas remembers feeling as if he were "walking into a movie set": There were Cambodians roaming the streets of the old mill town.
Mesmerized, Chigas, then 27, began volunteering at a resettlement agency and teaching English to a Cambodian monk, who in return taught Chigas the Khmer language.
"It was a fateful decision," Chigas said. "My future wife was working there."
Loeung, then 20, had only been in the United States a few years and had come across few Americans familiar with Cambodians. But here was a Greek-American who not only knew about her culture but was someone who was quickly learning her language.
"He was a nice man," she said. "I was impressed that he had learned so much on his own."
In October 1985, they began dating. By December, they were married.
A photo of their wedding, with both in traditional Cambodian attire, has been copied a number of times and made the rounds all over Lowell ever since.
Those early days, though, were far from blissful for the couple as Chigas learned the extent of his new bride's pain. She'd cry in the middle of the night. She was distrustful of people. Sometimes she was just scared.
"In those first few months of getting to know my wife, I was also getting to know her story, " said Chigas, 49, a visiting political science professor at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell and a former associate director of the Cambodian Genocide Program at Yale University.
He learned about her father, Houry Loeung, who starved to death under the Khmer Rouge.
Some of the stories Loeung shared. Others she kept to herself.
"It's very hard to forget," said Loeung, 42, a kindergarten teacher in Lowell.
Chigas said the world should never forget the Cambodians' pain under Pol Pot and has dedicated his life to learning and teaching about Cambodian culture and sharing stories of refugees. The scholar of Southeast Asian literature has published poems by Cambodian-Americans who use writing as a way of healing. He also published his own collection of short pieces about his wife, titled "Chanthy's Garden." (Chanthy was her name when she arrived in the United States.)
Today, the couple live comfortably in Acton with their two sons - Yianni, 9, and Arthur, 5. They have a tennis court in the back, and their nights in the suburb northwest of Boston are quiet.
Both say they want their boys to understand Cambodian culture and the dark history that led to her - and her people - coming to America.
"The question is," said Loeung, "will they understand the pain I went through?"
Pioneer wasn't what Thida Loeung had in mind, either. She and her family were more concerned about survival after escaping the brutal Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia.
But pioneers the two were when they met in Lowell 22 years ago and married, becoming one of the first American-Cambodian couples in America following the great Cambodian refugee influx of the early 1980s. And immediately the couple was transformed into local icons of two worlds encountering and trying to make sense of each other.
"We had a lot of support from the Cambodian community," Loeung said, remembering those early, trail-blazing years.
The couple's first meeting occurred not long after Chigas returned to Lowell following a three-year stint in San Francisco. Entering his hometown for the first time since he went away, Chigas remembers feeling as if he were "walking into a movie set": There were Cambodians roaming the streets of the old mill town.
Mesmerized, Chigas, then 27, began volunteering at a resettlement agency and teaching English to a Cambodian monk, who in return taught Chigas the Khmer language.
"It was a fateful decision," Chigas said. "My future wife was working there."
Loeung, then 20, had only been in the United States a few years and had come across few Americans familiar with Cambodians. But here was a Greek-American who not only knew about her culture but was someone who was quickly learning her language.
"He was a nice man," she said. "I was impressed that he had learned so much on his own."
In October 1985, they began dating. By December, they were married.
A photo of their wedding, with both in traditional Cambodian attire, has been copied a number of times and made the rounds all over Lowell ever since.
Those early days, though, were far from blissful for the couple as Chigas learned the extent of his new bride's pain. She'd cry in the middle of the night. She was distrustful of people. Sometimes she was just scared.
"In those first few months of getting to know my wife, I was also getting to know her story, " said Chigas, 49, a visiting political science professor at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell and a former associate director of the Cambodian Genocide Program at Yale University.
He learned about her father, Houry Loeung, who starved to death under the Khmer Rouge.
Some of the stories Loeung shared. Others she kept to herself.
"It's very hard to forget," said Loeung, 42, a kindergarten teacher in Lowell.
Chigas said the world should never forget the Cambodians' pain under Pol Pot and has dedicated his life to learning and teaching about Cambodian culture and sharing stories of refugees. The scholar of Southeast Asian literature has published poems by Cambodian-Americans who use writing as a way of healing. He also published his own collection of short pieces about his wife, titled "Chanthy's Garden." (Chanthy was her name when she arrived in the United States.)
Today, the couple live comfortably in Acton with their two sons - Yianni, 9, and Arthur, 5. They have a tennis court in the back, and their nights in the suburb northwest of Boston are quiet.
Both say they want their boys to understand Cambodian culture and the dark history that led to her - and her people - coming to America.
"The question is," said Loeung, "will they understand the pain I went through?"
