Lightning struck, the sky roared, and the night cried a…

“Always somewhere there was light, and, though transient, it flashed all the more brilliantly because of the surrounding dark.”

— Vaddey Ratner

“Life is like that." papa turned once again to the Mekong. "Everything is connected, and sometimes we, like little fishes, are awept up in…

— Vaddey Ratner

“The United States bombed Indochina with three times the tonnage of bombs used in all of World War II; Cambodia alone was hit with…

— Vaddey Ratner

“Turn your tongue seven times before speaking. This way you'll have time to think if you ought to say the things you want to…

— Vaddey Ratner

“If you pay close enough attention, Raami, you'll realize that a single leaf can contain myriad lives imitating our own, and you'll know that…

— Vaddey Ratner

“He often lookes like this - like he wanted to escape but knew he couldn't.”

— Vaddey Ratner

“Knowing comes from learning, finding from seeking.”

— Vaddey Ratner

“When you love a flower", he said, as if wishing to explain his altered experience, "and suddenly she is gone, everything vanishes with her.…

— Vaddey Ratner

“She loved her daughter so much that she'd give the child whatever the girl desired. One night while they were playing in the garden,…

— Vaddey Ratner

“Perhaps it's natural for a father, for every parent, to see in his child all that's unspoiled and good.”

— Vaddey Ratner

“He supposes in this way he's learned to pray not as one might to the gods but as one does by simply pausing every…

— Vaddey Ratner

“Your grief will fade…It's hard to believe this now, my friend…but it will wither and, like a flower, leave behind always a seed of…

— Vaddey Ratner

“If the river brought us here," I ventured tentatively, "then when it reverses course, it'll carry us back.”

— Vaddey Ratner

“Absence is worse than death.”

— Vaddey Ratner

“the problem with being seven is that you're aware of so much and yet you understand so little”

— Vaddey Ratner