© St. Petersburg Times, published October 8, 2000 BETWEEN 1975 AND 1979, when Sophie Stagg was a young girl, 2-million to 3-million Cambodians died, victims of a genocide carried out by the Communist regime known as the Khmer Rouge. Millions were marched out of cities into the countryside. Anyone with an education or a professional skill was executed: teachers, doctors, lawyers, engineers. Even people who wore glasses were killed. Pol Pot, the fanatical leader of the Khmer Rouge, destroyed temples, abolished money and cut off communication with the rest of the world. His aim: to create an "agrarian utopia" mirroring the glory days of the 12th century Khmer empire. Cambodia reverted to what he called Year Zero. Everyone was put to work growing rice, digging reservoirs and building dams. Cambodia became one huge, sweltering concentration camp. Sophal, as she was known then, was 9 when she went to work in the killing fields. Separated from her parents and seven brothers and sisters, she toiled 16 hours a day under a relentless sun. Her only possession was the scrap of black plastic she wrapped around herself at night. As disease and hunger took their toll, her hair fell out and her stomach ballooned. She coughed up long, wiggling worms. Weeks dragged into months, months into years. On Christmas Day 1978 the Vietnamese invaded, and Cambodia's four-year ordeal ended. Against all odds, Sophal had survived. Reunited with her family, she trudged through the jungle and across the Thai border. They lived in a Red Cross refugee camp, then came to the United States to start a new life. The family settled in Oklahoma City, and Sophal enrolled in high school. While working at a Mexican restaurant she met Bill Stagg, who was charmed by the shy girl behind the cash register with her broken English. They married when she was 17 and he was 33. She Westernized her name, to Sophie. Today she is 34. She and Bill, a manager for a Tampa wholesale food company, live in a six-bedroom house in Palm Harbor. Their four sons have all-American names. Sophie, a full-time mom, cooks dinner every night and volunteers in her son's first-grade classroom. She is fond of Clinique cosmetics. She became a citizen of the United States. This is home now. "Heaven on earth," she calls it. But that's home, too, that sad and beautiful place where Sophie was born. Cambodia haunts her. She thinks about it at red lights on U.S. 19, in the checkout line at Kash n' Karry, in bed just before sleep. Every time a full moon rises over the pine trees in her back yard, she remembers those desperate nights when she was a child, scared and alone, and the moon was her only companion. She can't forget, nor does she want to. Several years ago, with Bill's help, Sophie wrote a book and had it published by a friend in Tampa. It has a black cover with a picture of a child screaming. The title is Hear Me Now. In the book, she details the horrors she endured: the leeches on her legs as she worked in rice paddies; the mice and crickets she ate to stave off hunger; the constant fear of beatings by Khmer Rouge guards; the sound of people begging for their lives as they were led away; the sight of other children dying the slow, agonizing death of starvation. After her book was published, Sophie gave speeches to church groups and school classes. Each time she told her story, she dabbed away tears -- cleansing tears. Somehow, it was therapeutic, letting people know what happened in Cambodia 20 years ago. But it wasn't enough, just talking about the past. She also wanted to do something about her country's ongoing suffering. Three years ago, she and Bill formed a non-profit corporation, the Southeast Asian Children's Mercy Fund. Their goals are to take food, medicine and other supplies to needy villagers and help bring orphans to this country for adoption. For Sophie, helping Cambodia is a mission of mercy. She has an extraordinarily sweet nature and an innate desire to help others. But she is also driven by years of festering anger toward the Khmer Rouge. She cannot forgive what they took away from her, the childhood that was cut short in the killing fields. If she can't undo what they did 20 years ago, at least she can try to bandage the wounds they inflicted -- in her country and in herself. In July the opportunity came, a 16-day trip to Cambodia. Her first time back since she walked out in 1979, barefoot, a half-starved adolescent wearing rags and an uncertain smile.
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"Fifty percent of me is happy to be coming back," she says, peering out the window. "But the other 50 percent ... to come back to this place where I had so much suffering ... I don't know."
Outside the airport, a rented minivan is waiting. Sophie gives the driver an address in a residential section of Phnom Penh. There, a little girl is waiting. All Sophie knows of her is a faxed photo and the skimpiest of biographies. Eighteen months old, given up for adoption by a mother who couldn't afford to take care of her, this child is going to be Sophie and Bill's new daughter.
Her birth name is Sothea. The Staggs plan to call her Samantha.
They have already filled out piles of paperwork, submitted to a home study and told their sons about the new baby sister who is coming to live with them. Samantha is much more than just a new member of the family. She personifies Sophie's dream to help her people. Here is one Cambodian she can rescue, literally, by taking her out of the country.
On the drive into town, Sophie is startled by the noise and grime, the cars, bicycles and rickshaws flowing in all directions like a crazed school of fish. Whole families ride together on small motorcycles.
When Sophie arrives at the foster home where Samantha lives, the child is asleep on an open-air porch. Her bed is a blanket on a simple wooden platform, all of it draped in a blue mosquito net.
Sophie tiptoes close. Samantha lies on her back, a pacifier in her mouth. She wears a diaper and a red pajama top. Her blue-black hair is drawn into a top knot. Tiny gold hoops hang from her ears.
Sitting gingerly on the edge of the bed, Sophie pokes a thumb through the netting and strokes Samantha's fingers. She eases the pacifier out of her mouth. The child wakes up, sees an unfamiliar face and starts crying.
"Awww," Sophie murmurs. "It's okay. It's okay."
Sophie and Bill are paying $500 a month to Soeung Man, 41, a licensed orphanage director. The money buys food and diapers for Samantha and four other orphans. The Staggs found Man last year via e-mail when they were looking for someone in Cambodia to help facilitate low-cost adoptions for parents in the Tampa Bay area.
 In her hotel room, Sophie Stagg watches as nanny Kim Lang holds Samantha, the child Sophie plans to adopt. The bonding process has not gone as smoothly as Sophie hoped, and a freeze on adoptions by the Cambodian government means she might not be able to take the girl home. |
Sophie rocks the child, bounces her, walks in circles around the small porch. The screaming continues. Over and over Samantha reaches for the nanny, her hands clawing desperately at the air.
Finally Sophie hands her back to the nanny. The crying stops instantly.
"Does she walk?" Sophie asks, in Khmer.
"Yeah, pretty good."
"Is she talking?"
"Some words, yes."
When she hears the girl's weight, 18 pounds, Sophie's brow furrows. At a year and a half, Samantha is not much bigger than Sophie's boys were at 5 months.
"She needs more solid food," Sophie says firmly, irritation in her high-pitched voice.
Sophie would like to hold Samantha again, but when she tries, the child sobs. Her forehead wrinkled with disappointment, she can only stand close as the nanny holds her.
In June, Cambodia froze all international adoptions until it can vote on legislation to eliminate bribery and graft from the process. Unless the law passes while Sophie is still here, she won't be able to take her daughter home, and an important part of her mission will fail.
Sophie brushes the girl's hair off her forehead and strokes her cheek. Samantha peers at her over the nanny's shoulder. Finally she reaches out, tentatively, and curls her fingers around Sophie's thumb.
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