WEBVTT

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♪ Cambodian music ♪

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[DONUT PEOPLE]

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[Samoeurn Phan]

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[Affectionately known as
Pou Sam (Uncle Sam)]

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[Sam has opened over 20 donut shops
for Cambodian families across Houston.]

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(Uncle Sam) Well, when I came here in 1994

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to eat one donut you didn't realize
how much work goes into one donut

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until you actually go into
doing the donuts.

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You know, it takes quite a bit
just to make one donut.

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I start off by finding a location.

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If I find a location,

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I get a family that needs a donut shop 
to go to look at the location,

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and if they like it,
we negotiate the price,

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and if the price is right,
I build it for them and turn them the key.

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You know, most of them
already know how to make donuts.

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They work for a family member,

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you know, they've already worked
for like two, three or five years

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to save up the money
to start up the business.

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[Chandara Meas
Owner of Snowflake Donuts, Galveston]

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[Cambodian Immigrant]

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(Chandara Meas) That's what I'm saying,
when I came to the States,

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I don't have no relatives in here,
I don't speak that much English,

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I gotta start to learn English

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and start to work to support myself...

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and I don't have chance
to go back to college,

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so I end up at a donut shop.

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Most Cambodians who take us,

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they own a donut shop, 
they run a donut business...

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yeah, you know, it's hard to do it,

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not many people want to do that job
as I'm doing right now.

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[Countless Cambodians were tortured]

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[and more than a million were killed]

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[under the brutal Khmer Rouge regime.]

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[More than a million Cambodians fled
and became refugees.]

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From 1975 to 1979,

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there's Khmer Rouge ran by Pol Pot.

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At that time I was 10 years old...

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I still remember the torture,

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lot of people died 
by starving and sickness...

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most of [the time] 
they were killing people.

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That was a hard time

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and that was the worst thing 
that happened in the world.

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Most Cambodians escaped from the war 
in 1981after the Khmer Rouge regime,

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and when they started to come here,
people don't speak that much English,

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so that's why they started
working at donut shops

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because most of them what they do 
are family business --

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This is my wife's nephew.

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He just came to the USA last year.

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He came in a special case
that they call "Lottery Visa".

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He's a lucky one 
that won a lottery green card.

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The business we just opened--
it is kind of slow, it's brand new.

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Hopefully, we can stay for a long time
until we get some profit...

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to take care of my family, my kids...

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go to school, go to college...

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I have a beautiful kid.

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It's like, if you work for a company,

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you have a different schedule
than the donut people.

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So the donut people,
we wake up at 2:00 or 3:00 am,

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and we'll be done by 12:00 or 1:00 pm,
and take a couple-of-hours-nap,

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and, you know, get together
and then, go to sleep, and wake up,

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and go to make some more donuts!

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(man singing Karaoke in Cambodian)

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[Tao Ngo Vietnamese Restaurant
North Houston]

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[Cambodian Karaoke Party]

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(end of singing)

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Yeah, we like to get together
because, you know,

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we work seven days a week.

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Some of us wake up at 1:00 am,

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some of us wake up at 2:00 am,

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some of us at 3:00 am,

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and we work seven days a week,

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you know, this is the only fun we have.

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(Cambodian music)

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I would say 95% of the donut shops
in Texas, not just in Houston,

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in Texas is Cambodian people owned.

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One one-big -family, that's all.

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(Cambodian music)

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[Second Generation Donut Shop Owner]

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[Roth's parents, sisters, aunts,]

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[and uncles all own donut shops.]

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My parents bought the store in 1994.

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They would always bring us on weekends
because we have school on weekdays.

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I really dread waking up on the weekend
just to come make donut, you know.

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They told me one day
I'm going to own my business

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and I kind of say
I didn't want to do this.

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This is not my first choice
of what I really wanted to do.

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For me, going to school
what I really wanted to do,

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I wanted to experience that life.

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One day I woke up and I realized
I didn't want to work for somebody else.

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I called my mom and I told her
I wanted to come back home

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and try this again,

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and she was very excited,
very happy for me

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that I can kind of woke up
and I wanted to do this.

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I get up at 4:00 am,

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and my sisters get up
at around 2 - 2:30 am,

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they're closer to the plant
so they wake up earlier,

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to go to the plant and--

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I'm fortunately to have
a little bit of both,

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so I can stay in bed a little longer
and they can--

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So when I first got to Houston
I didn't know--

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I thought my family was the only one
that was doing donuts

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but I come to find out that

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a lot of Cambodian people
have done this way before we have...

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You know, it's like a community
of helping out each other, you know,

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like, people were telling each other
what can make you successful

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and I don't think anybody
was envious of each other,

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just wanted to see our culture succeed,

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and the donut business 
is where it started

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for a lot of these Cambodian cultures.

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It's definitely a dream

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that a lot of people want
when they are in Cambodia,

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to have their own place.

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