Story by Nina Strochlic
The blurred images obscure their heavily scarred skin as the Cambodian victims of acid attacks share their painful stories. “I am a broken person,” one says, brushing a tear from her cheek. “When people see us they are afraid of us,” another woman states. These horrendous assaults have become disturbingly prevalent in the last decade. Within five years in Cambodia alone, there have been over 75 attacks reported, with at least 100 total victims.
On Thursday, March 4, the University of Oregon’s Women of Color Project sponsored a screening of the film “Finding Face” in the EMU Ballroom. Investigating the prevalence of acid attacks in Cambodia, the movie premiered a year ago at the International Film Festival and Forum on Human Rights in Geneva, Switzerland.
It examines the issue through Tat Marina, a Cambodian karaoke star who was coerced into an abusive relationship with the country’s Undersecretary of State. Marina was 16 years old when his angry wife dosed her face and upper body with acid in a busy Phnom Penh marketplace. Dozens of onlookers witnessed as Marina was beaten unconscious, and searing acid was poured onto her, burning through her skin. Despite the perpetrators’ identity being common knowledge, neither the secretary nor his wife has been questioned. Threatened from both sides against coming out with her story, Marina and her family were in grave danger. In 2000 she was granted juvenile asylum in the United States to live with her brother, and hasn’t returned to Cambodia since. Doctors at the Shriners Children’s Hospital did all they could to salvage her face, but twenty-five operations later, Marina is a shadow of what she used to be. Today, she lives with her young son. “I still miss my family, my country, everybody,” she says. “Sometimes I want to give up because of the way I look.”
Justice for acid attack victims has been virtually nonexistent. According to the film, only fifteen perpetrators have been prosecuted, and the judicial system heavily favors their side. Some contribute this to the disparity between the rights of women and men in Cambodia, where most victims of acid attacks are women.
The filmmakers follow Marina’s brother as he makes his first risky trip to Cambodia in eight years. The film’s footage is the first glimpse her family has seen of Marina since she fled. They gather around the small screen, but when her damaged face appears, her mother begins to sob. “She is not as beautiful as before,” she repeats again and again.
When her brother returns to the U.S. he brings Marina video messages from her family. She sits on the floor of her kitchen, as her sister’s face fills the laptop screen. “I just want to tell you: Don’t give up hope,” she says. “Justice is still out there.” Long black hair frames Marina’s face, and as she watches tears roll down the scarred cheeks that tell a story much larger than her own.