Thida is an unusual Cambodian woman. She is outspoken, bold and completely extraverted. Thida laughs recalling how her parents used to scold her for being too loud and free with her thoughts as a child. Thida often talks about how she loves America and how at home she feels here. In the Butt-Mam household located in San Jose, California, Thida's daughter is at Apsara dance class and her son is practicing basketball at the local junior high. Over patê and baguette sandwiches, Thida takes down a photograph of the Cambodian parliament assembled in Phnom Penh. It is dated 1963, just five years before Pol Pot took over the country and sealed it from the rest of the world. Her father, a tall slender man smiles amid the sea of uniformed men. Also in the photograph are Prince Norodom Sihanouk and Khieu Somphon, who went on to become one of the architects of the Pol Pot regime. Thida comes from a well-to-do family and as she describes her life before the Pol Pot regime one would think it was a normal middle class childhood. She enjoyed playing with her sisters and the family dog outside their two story home, meeting her friends in the marketplace on a Saturday morning for rice noodles and listening to her father's stories kneeling near his feet. Although Thida's childhood was peaceful initially, it was soon filled with the spillage of the Vietnam War. Soon after the photograph of the Parliament was taken, U.S. bombs rained down on Cambodia and continued to do so for the next five years. Thida describes the daily stress of the bombings, the growing shortage of food, closure of schools and the marching footsteps of the Khmer Rouge take-over. Through Thida, we learn the personal horrors of the Pol Pot regime and the tragic loss of her father. Today, Thida is a vocal Cambodian-American survivor. Her story has been published in the book To Destroy You Is No Loss and she has been a keynote speaker at dozens of conferences dealing with genocide and the advocacy for a war crimes tribunal in Cambodia. She also appeared on Oprah, sharing her inspiring perseverance in the face of death and her experiences as a refugee in the U.S.

THIDA'S UNFOLDING STORY
In January 2005, Thida and her sisters, Rasmei and Mearadey will return to Cambodia in search of her father's remains and the details of his death. They will return to the camp where their entire family endured slave labor during the Khmer Rouge Regime in Khum Speu and seek out their former perpetrators. Thida plans to explore the Documentation Center of Cambodia and interview Youk Chhang regarding any information on her father, Butt Choen. In addition, Thida will visit the Court construction site and travel to the Elephant Mountains with Arn Chorn Pond, a former Khmer Rouge member now dedicated to the preservation and education of traditional Cambodian musical instruments. Thida and Arn will meet with the Hill Tribe people there and listen to their stories of survival.

Aki Ra, Landmine Clearer and Educator, Former Child Soldier with the Khmer Rouge

Perhaps the best possible example of reconciliation within one character is Aki Ra. A young and gentle man, surrounded by happy children and rescued animals, Aki Ra's tenderness and morality is baffling. In 1977, when Aki was just five years old, a Khmer Rouge (KR) leader named ?Poh' swept into Ra's village, murdered his parents and took Aki Ra into the jungle where he was taught to lay landmines. Shortly after being captured by Poh, Ra was captured by the Vietnamese and trained to fight against the KR. Years later, he was once again captured, but this time by the Cambodian army. By the age of twenty-five, Ra had spent twenty years as a soldier. Half-starved and having witnessed many of his friends die, Ra never experienced a "normal" childhood. In recent years, Ra single-handedly cleared mines outside of Angkor Wat thus creating a safe-haven for his home, dozens of other families and the Landmine Museum. Ra's museum is filled with hundreds of anti-personnel mines, grenades and rocket launchers that he has cleared himself.

Today Ra divides his time between the museum and mine clearing. He goes out for days at a time to clear mines discovered by farmers in more rural areas. On occasion, Ra will get the call that mines were discovered and detonated by curious children. Often these explosions will kill those children nearest the mine and maim others. Ra takes in some of the maimed children to offer them a chance at school and a healthy life.

Within the past five years Ra has reconnected with Poh, the former Khmer Rouge leader who captured him as a boy. Poh, who is still armed and living in the jungles of Anglong Veng, welcomes Ra into his camp where Ra teaches Poh's soldiers how to dismantle and destroy the thousands of mines that remain in the Anglong Veng/Thai border area.

RA'S UNFOLDING STORY
Ra's Landmine Museum has been temporarily closed due to Siem Reap government corruption. In addition, Ra's clearing methods are seen as dangerous and controversial by other established landmine clearing NGO's such as CMAG and The Halo Trust. Meanwhile, Ra has created the Cambodian Rehabilitation and Landmine Awareness project with Canadian Richard Fitoussi. A production trip to Siem Reap will allow us to check in with Ra to see how his Cambodian Rehabilitation and Landmine Awareness construction is coming along and how his dedication to "quick-and-dirty" clearing methods continue to rid Cambodia of the remaining 2 million landmines ten times faster than that of CMAG or Halo Trust.

One's first impression of Youk is that of a well-scrubbed, organized professional. After spending a little time with Youk, one becomes entranced by his poetic style of speaking and his kind eyes. It's hard to believe that Youk was once a very angry young man. Although he survived the Pol Pot regime, both Youk's sister and father were murdered. Furious at the world for taking away his family members and his childhood, Youk thought retribution was the only way. It was only after long hours of study in one of the many monasteries that Youk came to realize a different path. After studying in the U.S. at the University of Texas and at the Yale Genocide Studies Program, Youk became the Director of DCCAM, an organization dedicated to the aggregation and preservation of Khmer Rouge Regime evidence. Security is so tight that it takes three individuals, two with keys to two separate locks and one with the combination, to open one of the many safes that store ?confessions' from Toul Sleng Prison, testimony and other evidence from the regime.

Youk publishes a monthly magazine entitled Searching for the Truth, which features perpetrator testimony and survivor stories. Youk and his team have also launched a textbook project that explores the possibility that perpetrators are victims too. Their goal is to get survivor stories and their own published books distributed across Cambodia. DCCAM is supported by the Cambodian government and a dozen other countries including the U.S. Defense Department.

YOUK'S UNFOLDING STORY
What happens when a DCCAM team goes into a village where perpetrators and victims are living side-by-side to interview the perpetrator? How does the village deal with this individual when the team drives away? With production assistance our crew will accompany Youk and his team when they launch their video testimony project in the poorer provinces of Cambodia.

Director, Beth Pielert is a director, cinematographer and editor specializing in social justice documentary film. Most recently she was the 1st Assistant Director and primary camera operator for The Corporation, which garnered dozens of International awards including the Sundance Audience Award for 2004. Beth is also an Apple Certified Final Cut Pro instructor. When Beth is not collaborating with Big Picture, Women's Educational Media, Link TV and The Bay Area Video Coalition (BAVC), she is gearing up to shoot in Cambodia on her feature, Out of the Poison Tree; a film about transitional and transformative justice for Cambodians.