Category: 2016-2017

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Woman Needs Rich Man

“You should marry a rich guy.” This is what older generation across Cambodia say to girls. Fall in love with a wealthy guy so that your life is complete. People prioritize money over actual love because with money, you can do anything and you will be happy. This is what many Cambodians believe in.

On the 8th of December, 2017, I attended an event related to my current Exploration, which is “Gender Equity.” It was actually a play called “I am a daughter,”  and it will be shown to government schools both in Phnom Penh and provinces. Due to limited fund, they only have two government high school students as actor and actress. There is a boy that played as a grand mother, a guy that the main character was being forced to married to, and Soya (main character’s best friend – a girl.) On the other hand, the girl is the main character and also Soya’s husband.

At the beginning of the play, the grandmother is urging the main character to quit studying to marry this wealthy man. However, she refuses because education is more important to her than marriage. So, her grand mother tries to come up with many benefits of marrying this man. Moreover, she tells her to look at Soya (best friend) as a role model because Soya married at an early age and now has a baby and a delightful life.

With the pressure from her family, she talks with the guy that she supposes to marry to to let him know about her intention before the marriage. The guy understands and let her finishes high school and college. While she is receiving high education, her best friend regrets her decision of marrying because her husband abused her. At the end, she marries the rich guy and has a kid.

Personally, I think this play really reflects the idea of wanting rich man and why we should stop believing it. This play can end at when the main character finishes her study and have a job without marrying; however, this is a good example of how to create change by preserving culture. In Cambodian culture, woman needs to marry someone. Nevertheless, she should marry a man because of love instead of money.

Soya and her husband

 

 

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Another Challenging Committee

On the 17th and 18th of March, I attended my second MUN conference at Saigon, Vietnam. I was so excited to participate in this event and it was my first time to travel abroad. I decided to be the representative of Sweden in the General Assembly, which was very challenging due to strict rules and protocols that I was very unfamiliar with.  However, before I got to experience the life on a new land, I had to prepare and research about my four topics such as: combatting food insecurity in urban areas, measuring to implement the Addis Ababa Action Agenda, sustainable tourism and sustainable development in South-East Asia, and the question of preventing offshore tax evasion. Personally, I found the topics about Addis Ababa Action Agenda and offshore tax evasion as the toughest topics to understand because I had zero background information about them. As I entered my committee, I was very intimidated by other delegate English and age because most them are 17 or 18 years old. However, as soon as I started to convey my one-minute opening speech, I gained back my strength to continue and fight back my intense feelings. After approximately 40 delegates gave their opening speeches, the chairs (the one who monitor the whole committee) told us to broke up into teams to craft a resolution(s) for every topic. My team resolution was concentrated on the topic of combatting food insecurity in urban areas. For the whole conference, I asked several questions to other delegates during the debating session and I went up to speak once to convince other delegates to vote in favor of my team resolution. Even though that I did not speak a lot, I felt like it went very successful because what I can accomplish during my first time in a general assembly was enough to show me that I can do it next time and I got to learn a lot about those problems, especially the offshore tax evasion.  
 
 
 

Below is the video about our journey in Vietnam.

 
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The Danger of Toy Marketing Strategy on Children’ Perspectives

          Toys play an important role in children’s life from having fun to being creative. However, toys have a very strong impact on them, especially when the toy makers promote their products by using gender stereotypes.

          According to The New York Times, toys are being marketed based on gender between “boys” and “girls.” Walking into toy stores, there are rows of pink toys that relate to beauty and domesticity on one side for girls, whereas on the other side which is full of blue and black toys associated with building and violent stuff for boys. The New York Times reports that parents are buying gender-typed toys not because of their preference, but because their children had requested to. This indicates that kids are learning and adapting to how society designs. They have a mindset that certain colors represent one specific gender. Therefore, they believe that they should play with the colored toys that are right for their gender. Moreover, if this keeps happening, the future will be full of gender stereotypes, where girls and boys are totally separated from each other.

          The research in Teaching Kids News shows that “playing with building toys, blocks and puzzles helps children develop “spatial” skills.” That is why many parents buy the construction sets for their children, especially for their daughters since they have less experience with it. The number of construction sets that are now bought for girls is only 20 percent compared to the boys. An article in Teaching Kids News says that parents do not only buy construction sets for their daughters but also toy weapons. There is a study that showed that games that the kids play that relate to weapons, in fact can help them. It encourages them to be more powerful and less anxious when they are faced with problems. For this reason, it is important that toy makers are not using gender stereotypes, so that both genders can access to these toys.

          As it mentions above, this may seem a positive thing from having more girls interested in building to playing with toy weapons to be more confident when there are threats. However, Teaching Kids News affirms that all of those things are still come in with pink and purple color. Many people are complaining that the companies are still using gender stereotypes. Despite this criticism, the toy makers resist and state, “if the building sets are “girly,” girls are more likely to play with them.” In addition, the design is based on the response that they got after asking the girls on what they want. This demonstrates that toy makers’ marketing strategy is affecting their identity. They now know what color of toys that they should play with.

          When toy makers market their products on specific gender, it is very harmful to the children’s perspective. Therefore, people should take the action now to stop this from happening, all help from toy makers, parents, and the children.

Works Cited

“Different Toys For Girls And Boys?” Teaching Kids News. Web. 13 Dec. 2016.
Sweet, Elizabeth. “Guys and Dolls No More?” The New York Times. The New York Times, 22 Dec. 2012. Web. 13 Dec. 2016.
“Toy Weapons For Girls: Too Violent, Or Too Pretty?” Teaching Kids News. Web. 13 Dec. 2016.

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S-21

Have you ever heard about Khmer Rouge or even S-21? Khmer Rouge was the genocide that happened here, Cambodia. Currently, I am learning about this terrible genocide as part of my Exploration. So, there is a place in Phnom Penh called S-21, which are old buildings that were during that time. At first, the buildings were high schools, unfortunately, they became prisons. However, not only becoming prisons but also where to torture people to tell the truth. So, my group went there and we listened to audio when we were in each spot. I was a bit scared because I saw ACTUAL skulls and REAL rooms with blood stain. Additionally, there were many rooms that displayed pictures of prisoners, commanders, Pol Pot (leader), and ways that they killed others. For instance, I saw a photo of how they used water to kill by making them stay in the water until they die and also abuse women by using poisonous animals. In a relationship with that, they also used electricity and taking people’ nails off. I know this is very cruel and quite hard for you to imagine. But, when I was there, I can see those actions in my head. Sometimes, I got bumpy goose when the guy in the audio told me all the horror things that had happened. Did your country experience with genocide? If so, I encourage you to go to the place where they stored all the information, so that you can learn more about them. Moreover, if you are interested in visiting or already in Cambodia, I urge you to go to S-21 and study more about our history, especially if you are Cambodian!! 

 

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Famish Polar Bears

As the Arctic is warming faster and faster, it is also impacting the living organisms in that area, specifically polar bears. The author states, “Sea ice retreats in the Beaufort Sea off north Alaska into waters that can be too deep for foraging.” According to this quote, because of climate change, the ice is melting into the sea that makes it difficult for polar bears to find food. The only way for them to find food is on land rather than in water. The text states, “The natives have relied on these for more than 100 years to store whale meat, called muktuk. Now the freezers are open to hungry bear raids.” As you can see that they come up on land to villager’s houses to take food from them. However, this can be dangerous and people that live in that Arctic village are worried about the bear and their own safety. The author states, “But these meetings could grow more dangerous. The animals could stay longer and get hungrier.” This demonstrates that because of climate change, the polar bears are getting hungrier due the melting of sea ice.
 

Click here to see the original text: https://newsela.com/articles/polar-bears-alaskan-natives/id/23208/

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Short Response Paragraph – Before Chicago

Currently, Native Americans have jobs to do to earn money to support their livelihoods. Even though that is the case, long ago they were struggled with the weather, getting food, and keeping warm. The author states, “Then in winter, they would leave the village and build homes in the woods. Each family would build its own home, and would take animal skins with them to help construct their homes.” According to this quote, because of the weather, they had to relocate their homes to other places. At there, they rebuild their homes by using branches to make tents and covered the walls with animal skins to keep them warm. One important reason why they had to leave their homes was because at there, they could find food easily. The author mentions, “They would be able to track rabbits in the winter, and there would also be deer.” As you can see that they could hunt animals easily at there. However, they would not have as much food to eat as in summer because there would be no plants growing in winter, except wild onions. But, even they needed a lot of food for their families to eat to have the energy to work, to find more food. This clearly shows that Native Americans faced a lot of challenges in that time.

Click here to see the original text: Before Chicago

 

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ASEAN Astronomy Camp 2017

On January, there will be students from southeast Asia that will join the astronomy camp in Thailand. But to go there, all students need to write an essay or make a video that explains on how astronomy effects their daily life. So, I wrote an essay about shooting stars.

Click on Wishes or Rocks? to read about my essay.

Wishes or Rocks?

Makara-application

Astronomy Camp Website: http://www.narit.or.th/en/index.php/aac2017

As a result, the list of candidates that they chose already out. My name was not on there and I was a bit disappointed at first when I checked their website. Even though that I did not get slected, I am very proud of myself that took this challenge and also I learned a lot during my research.
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Current Event -South African Girls Protest for Their Rights

There is prestigious high school in South Africa named Pretoria. This school cost about $2000 for every girl to go to learn. Even though, those girls can get high education, there are still problems about racism. Girls are not allowed to wear Afros because they think that it is untidy and not appropriate with school uniforms. So, many girls come together to protest and even their parents and people in the community. According to the school: “All hair styles should be conservative, neat and in keeping with the school uniform.” This clearly show that just because of the hairstyles, girls have to skip school and come to protest for their rights.

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/08/31/africa/south-africa-school-racism/

 

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Drone

There were four boys who created Drone Exploration and they are now expert at flying it. After this Exploration end, they and their learning facilitator trained four more girls, including me. I started to fly drone a few months ago and now I can fly it!

 

Since, there are eight students that know how to fly it. Not just flying, but also taking good videos and pictures. So, we now have a own business called Cambodia Aerial Photography (CAP). If people want to take pictures and/or videos from the sky view of their school, building, etc, they can hire us. What make our business standout is that we are young Cambodian pilots and we create quality videos, pictures for our clients.

Currently, we are teaching four more boys. In the future, we will definitely train more students!