Often when people tell their story, they talk about their strengths and resiliency. It's really about their determination and their aspiration to survive and live.

Mary's [Hamill] working from an outsider perspective and I'm working from an insider-outside perspective. In this case, it will bring an added dimension to the visual aspects of the work. Also the processes and approaches that I'm thinking are about learning. I'm playing it by ear to experiment and see what happens.

Sometimes I fantasize about learning to write in Khmer. Because if I could write in Khmer, my perspective would be very different, because I'm both an outsider and insider and I see the writing in a different way. My description would be different from, say, a local writer.

When you make art, those things change shape into something else. It's transformation into a body of different visual elements.

I have a great advantage: I write from the perspective of my own voice. I'm not copying anyone's voice. It's my voice. I have the advantage of being a writer of English as a second language.

I tried to write poems in rhyme. I tried writing songs. Sometimes I jotted down a thought. I would keep a log of spontaneous thoughts.

Even though I'm not privileged in the money world, I'm privileged in other ways: I had greater access to education, I can travel, etc. It's the same with writing: the freedom to move in and out of different places, of different realms of existence, of different life forms.