"Suffering has no frontier," says Dr. Bounsang Khamkeo, a former Laotian civil servant imprisoned for seven years in the aftermath of the Vietnam War. "Suffering is human nature...the story of many people - in Laos, in southeast Asia, in the world. We can’t end suffering, but we have to do what we can to make life better for others." Khamkeo worked in the Foreign Affairs Ministry of the last non-communist government in Laos and was witness to the disintegration of that world. With the subsequent rise of the Pathet Lao, Khamkeo tried to believe that the "classless" system of communism would be the answer to the devastation of his beloved land. When that government, too, grew corrupt, he considered defecting, but instead tried to effect change from within. Distrusting his status as an "intellectual" (he holds a PhD in political science) the Pathet Lao threw him in a jungle prison where he and fellow prisoners ate rats to survive. Surviving that ordeal, he moved to the United States in 1989 and wrote his memoir, I, Little Slave, which speaks to the tragedy of Laos, an ancient land caught between competing forces, ideologies, and values. Khamkeo will speak to the WIPPS-sponsored Student Leadership Program and then to the public in the Terrace Room of UWMC, 518 S. 7th Avenue, Wausau. The event is free and open to the public and is sponsored by the UWMC Lecture and Fine Arts Series, the UWMC Multicultural Center, and WIPPS. A reception will follow. For more information, or to order the book, go to
www.amazon.com/I-Little-Slave-Bounsang-/dp/1597660078

To read some recent interviews with Dr. Khamkeo, click on thees links: www.cityofvancouver.us/seniormessenger.asp?issueID=32718&articleID=32723Khamkeo
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