Refugee to Butterfly: Brenda Oum the Business Person of the Year

刘鑫彬
刘鑫彬
Aug 9, 2017 · 5 min read
Filmed in Papillon Lafayette, CA on July 29th, 2017

Brenda works from 6:00 am to 18:00 everyday. Her daughters come to help her on weekends.

Early morning, Saturday, Papillon Coffee and Tea Cafe owner, Brenda Oum, is busy preparing her business for opening. Brenda is an immigrant from Cambodia. She sells gourmet coffee and tea drinks that she personally prepares. Soon, Papillon Cafe, located in Lafayette, California, is filled with the delicate smell of Coffee. She soon talks calmly with us about her life, and about making coffee.

Owning Papillon is exactly the kind of thing that Brenda has dreamed since she was quite young. . At her community college in Virginia Beach,Virginia, she studied business. “When I went to the community college I took business management because when I grew up I wanted to own a business.” Brenda added that she finally started a business after moving to California in 1993 with her husband, Thom.

Brenda’s cafe is quite popular in Lafayette, Brenda and her family are very proud of it.

Papillon is not her first business. She started by running a donut shop in California for 8 years. “At that time, we [Brenda and her husband] did lots of works, delivered donuts to companies in San Francisco, Berkeley, and Oakland every single night. Thom got in lots of accidents, both of us were exhausted” Brenda said.

Papillon is one of the most popular cafes in Lafayette now. Many people come and enjoy the day time here.

So, Brenda and Thom looked for a new business to run. As Brenda states, “Suddenly, I found Papillon, then I was very happy. I really wanted to buy this business, I wanted my kids to go school near here.” She further explained, “I really love this business. Lafayette is nice, safe, and has educated people so I learn many things from my customers,” she said.

Papillon is one of the most popular cafes in Lafayette now and has been for many years.

However, she is concerned about the business’s performance in recent years. “I like to have part time students from college who need a job” Brenda said. “I always had students work for me doing part time. But now I cannot afford it because the rent keeps going up and the business is not as great like before.”

Brenda can not afford price of hiring she runs her cafe by herself and with her family.

Brenda said she would sell papillon and move to another area after her two daughters finish their college degrees and if the business continues to slow down. “I want to move somewhere, cheaper than here [California].” However, she wouldn’t want to move back to Cambodia. “Life was really hard during the wars, without my father. My father left us when I was 5 years old. They [the Government] killed so many people and since that time our lives were so difficult until we came to the USA.”

Khmer Rouge caused tragedy in Cambodia, a large number of people became refugees in these years.

When the Khmer Rouge came to power, , under the Marxist leader Pol Pot, they tried to suppress the Cambodian people. Up to 2 million people died from execution, starvation, disease and overwork. Brenda and her mother survived the killing fields. After witnessing people dying in front of them, including Brenda’s sister, they made their way to a refugee camp in Thailand that was overseen by the United Nations. Brenda told me about the horrible life there: they didn’t have identification papers so they could have been caught and sent to jail. To avoid being arrested, her family stayed inside the camp all day long. They lived in the refugee camps for 4 years.

Another immigrant from Cambodia, Christina, who suffered a lot under the Khmer Rouge, illustrated that miserable time to us. According to Christina, “There was no life under the Khmer Rouge. Following my first failed escape attempt I was tortured nearly to death. On my successful escape attempt my best friend was killed right in front of me. Had I stayed in Cambodia and fallen into the hands of the Khmer Rouge, I would probably not have survived.”

Brenda met her husband, Thom, in a refugee camp. Thom’s father also had brought his family to the refugee camp. When Brenda moved to Virginia, she found out her father had secretly married another woman years before, having assumed that his family was dead. Her father had died three days before her arrival in the U.S. Brenda stated, “My father was really clean and had integrity, he was a gentleman, but he was forced to sign a paper in hospital when he got sicker and sicker. We have nothing.”The paper that he signed left all of his belongings to the U.S. wife that he had secretly married. After this series of events, Brenda and Thom eventually started their immigrant life in California.

When we asked Brenda about her life in Cambodia, she said that although she suffered terribly in the killing fields and refugee camps, she still holds onto her Cambodian culture: “My daughters, who grew up in America, could speak fluent English and Cambodian. I taught them Cambodian culture and we visit Cambodia every year. We also have property there.” However, she prefers to stay in California because she likes the weather, the people and the legal system.

Although she faces difficulties in the US, Brenda has worked hard, has never given up and loves her customers like family.

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