The Baby on the Boat

Family Secrets

iHeartPodcasts

Society & Culture

4.5 • 5.2K Ratings

🗓️ 1 September 2022

⏱️ 63 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Putsata was an infant when she and her family fled from war-torn Cambodia on an escape boat. When the captain saw that baby Putsata was ill, he suggested that her mother—Ma—throw her overboard. Ma couldn’t do this; she believed her baby would get better, and sure enough she did. Putsata grows up feeling indebted to Ma for saving her life. The weight of this debt gets heavier and heavier over time, causing Put to bury large and important parts of her true self.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, I'm Joel Stein. I want you to close your eyes and imagine a pocket watch.
0:05.7	It's moving from side to side. You're getting very sleepy.
0:11.6	Great. Now that I've hypnotized you against your will, you're going to start liking long-form journalism.
0:16.2	Like so much. You're going to listen to a podcast where the host interviews a writer about their long-form story every week.
0:23.6	I'm that host.
0:25.0	Listen to Story of the Week on the I Heart Radio app Apple Podcast or wherever you get your podcast.
0:30.3	The podcast, and that's what you really missed, brings you back to the choir room for a gloriously gleeky rewatch of all six masterfully musical seasons of Glee.
0:40.0	Join cast members Kevin MacKale and Jenna Uschkewitz for never-before-heard stories from the cast, crew, celebrities, and you, the fans.
0:47.4	From McKinley High to New York City, from the choir room to nationals, and from the Super Bowl to a World Tour.
0:53.4	Listen to and that's what you really missed on the I Heart Radio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
1:01.0	Family Secrets is a production of I Heart Radio.
1:08.0	My head made a myth out of me, spinning so many stories about my travels and adventures that some of her friends did not believe I was real.
1:17.0	Is this the one one of them said as I sat in Matt's kitchen, tucking into a bowl of noodles? I was only from a journalism job in Cambodia, always choosing to go home when I had time off rather than on holiday.
1:30.2	Matt's friend smiled and squeezed my arm as if to confirm I was not a ghost.
1:34.9	Is this your baby girl with the big job and all the money?
1:38.3	The one who almost died on the boat?
1:41.0	Matt smiled and nodded.
1:43.2	Her friend turned to me. Your mother talks about you all the time. She said, still holding my arm.
1:50.6	She says you are special.
1:57.1	That's Putsada Ring, journalist and author of the Searing Memoir, Ma and Me.
2:03.7	Putsadas is a story right from the start of overcoming staggering odds.
2:09.5	It's also a story about familial loyalty and cultural expectations and a strength it takes to become one's truest self.
	...

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