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Book of Dreams: A singer, survivor, determined scholar
By Hudson Sangree - hsangree@sacbee.com
Published 12:00 am PST Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Story appeared in METRO section, Page B1
Sunnix Touch, left, helps her father, Touch Sieng, study English in their Elk Grove home. Sunnix Touch was a popular singer in Cambodia when assassins shot her in Phnom Penh, leaving her paralyzed. Autumn Cruz / acruz@sacbee.com
Sunnix Touch was one of Cambodia's most popular singers when assassins on motorcycles shot her outside a Phnom Penh flower shop four years ago.
Her mother died trying to shield her from the assassins' bullets.
Now 27, Touch lives with her father and siblings in a modest duplex in south Sacramento.
She is paralyzed from the neck down and gets around in a high-tech wheelchair.
Touch is able to speak with effort, but no longer has the breath to sing.
She cannot scratch her nose or read a book without help.
And she cannot pet her small brown dog, Pily, who has stayed by her side through her long ordeal.
"For now I dream that someday I will walk again and start to sing again," Touch said.
Who ordered the young singer killed remains something of a mystery, though Touch believes it was powerful people who objected to her songs promoting democracy and urging Cambodians to take back their traditional lands from neighboring Vietnam.
Touch and her family came to the United States as political refugees in 2005.
Though she recorded about 3,000 songs, the money she earned from her performing career was spent during more than a year in a Bangkok hospital, her family said.
In addition to being a singer, Touch was a scholar in her homeland.
The holder of a graduate degree, she taught Cambodian literature at a university in the national capital.
Now she wants to keep learning English and to study American history.
She said she'd just like to be able to read a book or use a computer without someone always sitting beside her.
"That's what I really want – independence – so someone doesn't have to turn the pages," she said.
Touch is being tutored by volunteer Joan McFarland, and another tutor, Elsie Feliz, helps her father learn English.
Touch assists with her father's lessons.
"Her mind is so good and quick," Feliz said. "A computer would help her explore the world."
Touch and her family have asked Book of Dreams readers to help purchase a computer with software that would allow her to control it with voice commands.
About the writer:
- Call The Bee's Hudson Sangree, (916) 321-1191. For more information about the Book of Dreams series, please call (916) 556-5667.
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