‘Jungle girl’ sent to Ratanakkiri hospital

Mom Kunthear

Phnom Penh Post

SO-CALLED “jungle girl” Rochom P’nhieng was transported to the Ratanakkiri provincial hospital on Monday to recover after being trapped at the bottom of a 10-metre-deep dugout toilet, local residents said.

Sal Lou, who has cared for Rochom P’nhieng for the past three years and says he is her father, said Monday that her health appeared to be improving after she received food, a shower and medical treatment.

“The health officials have allowed my daughter to stay in one room and are giving her medicine. My wife and I have stayed to look after her because we are afraid she will pull out her IV [drip],” Sal Lou said.

Rochom P’nhieng was discovered in the Ratanakkiri forest in January 2007. She has since lived with Sal Lou and his family, who say she is their daughter who went missing in 1989 while herding buffalo.

Now believed to be 29 years old, Rochom P’Nhieng had been living peacefully with the family for three and a half years before abruptly tearing off her clothes and escaping into the forest last month. After she had been missing for 10 days, neighbours discovered her stranded last Friday at the bottom of a local latrine.

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