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<\/p>\nPhoto by Erika Berg<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n As a daughter of genocide survivors, I have been fortunate to hear stories first hand. I have discovered a world replete with unimagined inhumanity, as well as a world of human resilience and compassion. And yet, as I began to understand the heavy burden that exists on the shoulders of our community, I questioned why there was no one who knew about it, no one who seemed to care. Why we were only given a mere four sentences in history textbooks, or not even taught at all. Why it wasn\u2019t talked about. Why there was so much silence. How were there not more individuals my age who were angry about the atrocities our people went through? As I learned more, I came to realize the reasons for those silences and that there was more at stake in having this knowledge; it wasn\u2019t just recognizing the trauma from those who survived, but the trauma of my own generation–children of survivors–who have to grasp\/reconcile with the unimaginable suffering of our people and how that affects our own lives. There are a lot of unanswered questions, and to even start finding the very elusive answers we must look at history. So that then we can understand why only 14% of our youth make it into higher education, why our community suffers from disproportionate levels of poverty and unaddressed mental health in the form of PTSD, why the youth of today feel disconnected and culturally deficient. That\u2019s why we\u2019re gathered here\u2014to know and remember, because there is power in knowledge, in knowing yourself, knowing history; there is power in memory, in visibility, in collective healing. And more importantly, we\u2019re celebrating our resilience. We\u2019re here, making space for us Khmer Americans to express our fortitude and show what we are made of. We are making space to ensure that we and the rest of the world never forget what happened to us.<\/p>\n To learn more about Khmer culture and support KhSA and the community, you are invited to attend UW\u00a0KhSA<\/span>\u2019s 23rd annual Khmer New Year Show, held on Saturday April 27th, 2019 from 5pm-11pm in the UW Husky Union Building Ballroom (HUB 211).<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Tonight is a night for the Khmer community. I\u2019m eternally grateful for the many of you who have come to stand in solidarity with the Khmer community, to learn and understand history that has been silenced. We\u2019re here to remember April 17th, 1975–the day when the destruction of millions of lives was the price for<\/p>\n