Peter Chhun, left, and Sin Chhon and her daughter Davik Teng, 9, check out the menu at McDonalds in Long Beach in February 2008. Davik was aided to get life-saving heart surgery by the nonprofit founded by Chhun, Hearts Without Borders (Jeff Gritchen/Press-Telegram)
By Greg Mellen, Staff Writer
Posted: 11/27/2009
(Posted by CAAI News Media)
LONG BEACH - On Dec. 4, Peter Chhun will end a career and begin a life's purpose. He leaves a profession to pursue a passion.
An Emmy Award-winning producer and editor for NBC Network News, Chhun is also the founder of nonprofit Hearts Without Boundaries, which brings destitute children with heart problems from Cambodia to the U.S. for life-saving surgery.
Beginning Friday, the 60-year-old Cambodian refugee, who worked as an NBC cameraman during the country's civil war and escaped before the Khmer Rouge's final conquest, will be able to devote himself full time to his nonprofit's mission of "saving one heart at a time."
His long-term goal is to create a cardiac unit that can "save lots of hearts at a time."
Oh, and he's starting a new school in Cambodia.
It's anyone's guess what else will spring up in the peripatetic Peter's path.
Whatever it is, it will be in service to others. Because Chhun knows that but for a trick of fate his life would be vastly different.
"I'd like to help my country," Chhun says. "My life at one time I had nothing. My parents couldn't read or write. This is a time to return and do something about it. I formed my nonprofit knowing one day I would return. This has been my dream and my goal for so long."
If it seems like a lot to accomplish, consider:
In the past two years Chhun has already brought two children to the U.S., Davik Teng, 9, and Soksamnang Vy, 1, for life-altering surgery.
Worked with doctors from Variety Children's Lifeline, which sends missions to Cambodia annually to perform minor cardiac procedures.
Filmed and produced a documentary about AIDS and the sex trade in his home country called "Life Under the Red Light," which has been shown locally.
Delivered food, eyeglasses and medical supplies to far-flung villages.
And he did all that as a side gig to his full-time paying job at NBC.
"Seeing his dedication and hard work, I can't imagine what he'll be able to do (full time)," says Susan Grossfeld, who has worked with Chhun through Variety and helped broker the deal for Vy's surgery. "It gives me great hope for all the children of Cambodia whom we help. I think he's built an invaluable network."
Roots in war
Chhun could easily have been a victim. As an eager if unskilled and untrained young man he was handpicked by NBC correspondent Philip Brady to be a cameraman and companion to cover the growing civil war in Cambodia in the early and mid 1970s.
Chhun was out of the country on April 17, 1975, when the Khmer Rouge took control of Phnom Penh and the capital. Although Chhun escaped, his mother was one of the upward of 2 million who died during the horrific reign of the Khmer Rouge.
The ghosts of that time still haunt Chhun and have shaped his resolve.
"I am one of the lucky ones who got out of the Killing Fields to the greatest country on Earth," Chhun says. "Now it's time to return and help out those who didn't have the same chance."
Heading into retirement, Chhun is narrowing his focus to two seemingly disparate projects that dovetail to a single purpose.
Chhun wants to create a school in Phnom Penh to teach the English language and Cambodian culture to children from the country's growing middle and upper middle classes and use profits from that venture to fund "Hearts Without Boundaries."
Currently, there are 17 Cambodian children with heart defects whose families have come to Chhun seeking help.
In two years, Chhun brought Davik and Vy, known as "Lucky," to the U.S. for life-altering surgeries.
Both had ventricular septal defects, or holes in their hearts, that strained their lungs and hearts. The effect saps energy and shortens life expectancy. And while it is easily fixed in the U.S., it requires use of a heart-lung machine and expertise not readily available in Cambodia.
While those surgeries were successes and Davik and Lucky are now living healthy lives, they have also brought a flood of appeals that Chhun can't begin to honor.
Finding help difficult
In the past year in the wake of a slumping economy, Chhun has found it hard to find hospitals to donate services and donors to help defray travel and lodging costs for patients.
Even if Chhun could find funding for one child per year, it would barely put a dent in the need. Most of the kids will continue to suffer and some may die waiting. The defects of others will worsen until surgery is no longer an option. Such is the tragedy of Cambodia and the frailty of life in the third world.
Because "Hearts Without Boundaries" is a volunteer group with very limited funding, Chhun can only do so much.
He has had discussions about helping to facilitate a cardiac catheterization laboratory in his home country so that hundreds of children with life-threatening ailments could receive treatment.
However, that requires not only machinery, but specially trained staff, service and technical support, that are beyond anything Cambodia has today. So that project may be years away.
None of that fazes Chhun. His proposed English and Khmer culture school is already in the works.
'...a winner'
Alex Morales, a Cal State Long Beach educator who has made numerous educational and humanitarian aid trips to Cambodia, is working with Chhun on the school plan. He has no doubts his energetic partner will make the school a success.
"I feel very confident that under his leadership and with his enthusiasm it is going to be a winner," Morales says.
Groundwork for this has already begun and the hard-charging Chhun plans to open the school doors in May.
Grossfeld feels sure Chhun will be able to save more children "because his heart's so into it," she says.
"I don't have any question we'll see more kids like Davik and Lucky having their hearts repaired, either here or in Southeast Asia," Grossfeld says.
"I don't know how many more lives we can save, but we'll continue to do that," Chhun says.
greg.mellen@presstelegram.com, 562-499-1291
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