*Ø* Blogmanac February 25, 1996 | Death of Oscar winner Dr Haing S Ngor
Rejected by Australia because as a refugee he was not only stateless but paperless, Haing went on to better things, but was struck down in his prime
1996 Oscar winner Dr Haing S Ngor (b. March 22, 1950) (The Killing Fields, 1984) was murdered in Los Angeles, USA.
Two days later, three 19-year-old boys, members of a local gang, were arrested and charged with the murder, which apparently was a robbery gone wrong. Haing was shot after refusing to hand over a locket, holding a photo of his late wife. His wife had died in his arms, of hunger and beatings, while they were both in Cambodia (Kampuchea) under the Communist dictatorship headed by Pol Pot.
During his captivity under the Marxists, Haing was frequently subjected to imprisonment and torture. At one time, after having been caught foraging for food for his family, Haing was crucified over a fire and had one of his fingers chopped off.
As a medical student in Phnom Penh during the Indo-China War days, the young Haing had met Australia’s best known war cameraman, Neil Davis (One Crowded Hour). The two became drinking buddies, and Davis told him stories of his home Down Under. Haing wondered if he would ever get to Australia.
Later, as things turned for the worse in Cambodia, he escaped the country and tried to get to Australia, although Davis had by now been killed in a combat zone. Rejected for refugee status by Australian immigration officials in Thailand because he had no identification (such papers would have been a death sentence under the Khmer Rouge, as was the wearing of spectacles, signifying bourgeois origins), Haing moved to the US as a refugee in 1980.
A medical doctor with no acting experience, Haing came to international prominence in 1984 through his Academy Award-winning performance as Cambodian photographer Dith Pran who, like Haing, was a survivor of the ‘killing fields’, Cambodia’s ‘holocaust’. Haing was the first non-professional since Harold Russell in The Best Years of Our Lives, (1946) to win an Oscar. As Haing’s memoirs Survival in the Killing Fields showed, the doctor’s own experiences had been even more horrific than those of the photographer he portrayed in the film. He was, however, a very quiet man as I can attest. I had the pleasure and honour of hosting him in Sydney for a few days, when he told me, quietly and without rancour, about his experiences under the Communists, his friendship with Davis, and his attempt at immigration to my country.
In America Haing established a modestly distinguished acting career, while continuing to work with human rights organisations in Cambodia and elsewhere with a view to improving the conditions in resettlement camps, as well as attempting to bring the perpetrators of the Cambodian massacre to justice, something the world’s ruling elites seem to have decided will never be.
This is just a snippet of today's stories. Read all about today in folklore, historical oddities, inspiration and alternatives at the Wilson's Almanac Book of Days, every day. Click today's date when you're there.
Rejected by Australia because as a refugee he was not only stateless but paperless, Haing went on to better things, but was struck down in his prime
1996 Oscar winner Dr Haing S Ngor (b. March 22, 1950) (The Killing Fields, 1984) was murdered in Los Angeles, USA.
Two days later, three 19-year-old boys, members of a local gang, were arrested and charged with the murder, which apparently was a robbery gone wrong. Haing was shot after refusing to hand over a locket, holding a photo of his late wife. His wife had died in his arms, of hunger and beatings, while they were both in Cambodia (Kampuchea) under the Communist dictatorship headed by Pol Pot.
During his captivity under the Marxists, Haing was frequently subjected to imprisonment and torture. At one time, after having been caught foraging for food for his family, Haing was crucified over a fire and had one of his fingers chopped off.
As a medical student in Phnom Penh during the Indo-China War days, the young Haing had met Australia’s best known war cameraman, Neil Davis (One Crowded Hour). The two became drinking buddies, and Davis told him stories of his home Down Under. Haing wondered if he would ever get to Australia.
Later, as things turned for the worse in Cambodia, he escaped the country and tried to get to Australia, although Davis had by now been killed in a combat zone. Rejected for refugee status by Australian immigration officials in Thailand because he had no identification (such papers would have been a death sentence under the Khmer Rouge, as was the wearing of spectacles, signifying bourgeois origins), Haing moved to the US as a refugee in 1980.
A medical doctor with no acting experience, Haing came to international prominence in 1984 through his Academy Award-winning performance as Cambodian photographer Dith Pran who, like Haing, was a survivor of the ‘killing fields’, Cambodia’s ‘holocaust’. Haing was the first non-professional since Harold Russell in The Best Years of Our Lives, (1946) to win an Oscar. As Haing’s memoirs Survival in the Killing Fields showed, the doctor’s own experiences had been even more horrific than those of the photographer he portrayed in the film. He was, however, a very quiet man as I can attest. I had the pleasure and honour of hosting him in Sydney for a few days, when he told me, quietly and without rancour, about his experiences under the Communists, his friendship with Davis, and his attempt at immigration to my country.
In America Haing established a modestly distinguished acting career, while continuing to work with human rights organisations in Cambodia and elsewhere with a view to improving the conditions in resettlement camps, as well as attempting to bring the perpetrators of the Cambodian massacre to justice, something the world’s ruling elites seem to have decided will never be.
This is just a snippet of today's stories. Read all about today in folklore, historical oddities, inspiration and alternatives at the Wilson's Almanac Book of Days, every day. Click today's date when you're there.
Pip Wilson posted item above at 3:48 PM | Permalink
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