Anger For Survival: Personal Narrative

Anger for survival Theme Essay Anger can be a motivator to somebody in a stressful situation, like in a job or in the military. Research has shown that anger can actually be used to motivate somebody to break through a problem or barrier, and angry people tend to be more optimistic. “I never work better than when I am inspired by anger; When I’m angry, I can write, pray and preach well, for then my whole temperament is quickened, my understanding sharpened, and all mundane vexations and temptations depart” (Martin Luther). In the mid to late 1970s, Cambodia fell under the rule of the Khmer Rouge, a communist group who tried to bring Cambodia back to a farming country. They banned religion, modern technology and education. Anybody

Loung and her family are victims in the Cambodian genocide. Since her father is a government official, they must keep their past lives a secret. But the Angkar finds out about Pa’s past job, and he is executed. After the Angkar kill her father, she is only motivated by her lust for vengeance, as she desires to bring pain and suffering to them. She talks to her father even after he is dead, promising to avenge him, and the others who she knows and loves that were killed. “But, one day, they will all suffer as we are suffering now” she says in her mind. She wants revenge, she hopes that making them suffer will bring joy to her and her father. “Pa, I am going to kill them all” (Ung 119). Loung is motivated by her desire for justice, she lives for this idea where she will have joy again by killing them. She feels like killing them will bring a fulfillment to her life and her father in the afterlife. She feels that her vengeance will be a substitute for her father’s presence, and it somewhat is, as her father’s love kept her alive before he was executed. She thinks only of her vengeance, and this is what kept her so determined to live. Her rage is slowly influencing her in negative, uncontrollable

As Vietnamese troops invade Cambodia, the child soldiers train to fight the invaders. As they are training to attack troops with knives, Loung focuses her anger on the dummy. “I attack at Met Bong’s cue, charging at the dummy, I yell ‘Die! Die!’ Though I focus on its head, I am only tall enough to thrust my knife into its stomach” (Ung 159). Her anger is now being used more as a driving force rather than just a cause for spontaneous outbursts. “It is dangerous to travel without permission, but I don’t care” (Ung 159). She goes on to see her mother, motivated and determined by her anger. But her mother and her baby sister, Geak, have been executed by the Angkar. Loung passes out for three days after learning about her mother’s fate, but she is woken by the superior of her camp and she is punished. The next day, she trains using her anger on the dummies, she imagines stabbing the leader of the Angkar, Pol Pot, over and over again. Loung’s anger only empowers her, and her want for