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Maly
Lena is Sang Ly’s mother. Although Lena is originally from Prey Veng, she moves to Stung Meanchey to be close to Sang Ly, Ki, and Nisay, sharing a hut with a distant cousin a short walk away. Lena is depicted as strong and virtuous by the fact that she too wants to take a stand against the gangs and is proud of Sang Ly for helping to protect Maly, and she helps devise the plan to get Maly to safety. Lena plays a relatively limited role within the story overall, and is most often described taking care of Nisay while Sang Ly studies with Sopeap.
Lena / Mother Quotes in The Rent Collector
The The Rent Collector quotes below are all either spoken by Lena / Mother or refer to Lena / Mother. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter Seven Quotes
Her biggest fault—perplexing to this day—is that Mother loves to pick trash.
“It’s an adventure,” she says. “You never know what surprises you’ll find.”
I remind her that surprises usually mean human body parts.
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Chapter Twenty-Two Quotes
“Remember, the province, though beautiful, has its own pockets of ugliness. While the dump is ugly, it also has its pockets of beauty. I think finding beauty in either place simply depends on where you decide to stand.
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Chapter Twenty-Four Quotes
“I should go to work,” [Ki] says, “but I have no boots, no picker, nothing.” Of course, he is right, we have nothing. And yet, if Nisay is truly better, we have everything.
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Lena / Mother Character Timeline in The Rent Collector
The timeline below shows where the character Lena / Mother appears in The Rent Collector. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter Seven
...when Cambodian parents grow old they move in with their children. For Sang Ly’s mother, Lena, that unfortunately meant moving into the garbage dump. However, Lena is good-humored about it, and...
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Chapter Eleven
...their limit from worrying about Maly. She decides to enlist the help of her mother Lena, who is proud of her for doing what’s right and promises to think up a...
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...is instead quite pleased with himself. He has convinced two other men, as well as Lena, to take a stand. Sang Ly still fears Ki will get himself killed, but he...
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Chapter Twelve
Sang Ly finds Lena causing mischief at the dump and watching two neighbors bicker with amusement. Sang Ly and...
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...her days before, and promises her that someday she’ll learn how to read it. As Lena takes Maly away to safety, Sang Ly knows that this is the best option, but...
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Chapter Fourteen
...change the instruction’s meaning from agricultural advice to child-rearing wisdom, and she shares it with Lena, who also marvels at it. When Sang Ly shows Sopeap her discovery, Sopeap tells her...
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Chapter Twenty
Lena suddenly arrives, screaming, with Nisay in her arms, and says that while she was watching...
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Chapter Twenty-Two
...them. Sang Ly fills Auntie and Uncle Keo in on news of Stung Meanchey and Lena, but when she is about to tell them about Sopeap, she cannot bring herself to...
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...just to keep her away from Keo’s mother-in-law. Auntie remarks that she still talks to Lena by phone sometimes, and says that though she is proud of Sang Ly’s reading, she...
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Chapter Twenty-Four
...do about it in the middle of the night, so they decide to sleep in Lena’s house instead. When Sang Ly wakes the next morning, she finds that Nisay is already...
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...Ly, noting where the key to her locked door is hidden. While Ki works and Lena looks after Nisay, Sang Ly thumbs through the notebook full of handwritten essays by Sopeap...
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