he Cambodian Civil War and the Khmer Rouge killings under Pol Pot drove hundreds of thousands of Cambodians to flee the country, including roughly 10,000 Khmer who made their way as refugees to the Bronx (home to Wat Jotanaram and other institutions) during the 1980s and 90s, with a smaller community near Watt Samaki, a Cambodian Buddhist temple in Brooklyn. At a time when neighborhoods like Fordham, University Heights, and Bronx Park East saw frequent violence, the Cambodian community — disproportionately young and still recovering from the killings — struggled with poverty and invisibility and many left the Bronx's "Little Cambodia" for other parts of the country.