Throughout the course of the year from 2016-2017, I participated in many explorations and as well as many events in Phnom Penh. In the exploration and events like Carbon in Cambodia, Ted talk and Tos-Tov project, we had a discussion from interviewed and researched. From those executions, it helps to form us a creative solution where we can propose it to make changes in Cambodia in many ways. I noticed that all of these projects have a huge dramatic impact to Cambodia in term of solving the problem we all experienced in our daily life.
Liger’s mission is to make the change in Cambodia. One way that Liger tried to do in order to reach the goal is through education, educate the students to become a change agent and have the agency through many projects and events that I listed above. Cambodia is a developing country and it’s slowly growing but at the same time, I also faced many problems from my experienced. Cambodia tried to make a lot of changes and improvements already such as education, infrastructure, international relationship and etc. Even though there were many changes already, we still need to work harder and harder to change this country into a better place. I love my country, I want to see Cambodia in the future with happiness, environmentally friendly and especially everyone lives in a happy life. Climate change is a world global issue where a lot of regions already concerned about it already like Cambodia. As a developing country, we can not do much about climate change but we can slowly stop it if everyone takes action from their daily life. In this year I involved in the Carbon in Cambodia exploration where we learned about climate change and focused on the carbon. It’s just a waste of money when people don’t really care about the value and the impact of wasting the food. Before, I didn’t know that wasting food can increase the impact of global warming but after learning in this exploration, I realized that human shouldn’t waste their food even a single piece of rice. Part of this project was to distribute the message that we had learned and created something where we can share to others people around the globe but as well in Cambodia. In Liger we did a small experiment where we tried to calculate the food that had been wasted during our three meals for four weeks. At last, we came up with the idea of getting the data that we collected in Liger, the information that gets from our researched and turned it to a short video clip as well as the graph where it explained the data from our collection. Mostly, in the video, we tried to give out the message and explained about the impact of wasting food. During sharation, we presented the information to a lot of visitors, especially we can share the information with the Cambodian students. After finished editing the video, I uploaded the video to the Liger Youtube channel which was a great way to share the message. Furthermore, I tried to send out the email to the ministry so that I can post my video clip on their website. But, unfortunately, they didn’t reply back so we couldn’t post our video. Even though we did not make it happen but we still have a determination, have a commitment and tried to become a change agent for Cambodia. All of these small steps are really important in term of changing Cambodia. Without a small step, the big change in Cambodia also not going to occur. I’m enjoyed what I had done so far and I promise I’ll continue changing Cambodia in the future.
At the beginning of the school year, there was a Ted talk in ISPP. It was a great opportunity for me and it’s finally time for me to give out the message and shared what I had learned about the impact of air pollution. Because of lack of education that’s why I’m here to give out speech and tried to get everyone to involve the action to fight against the air pollution in Cambodia. Every time that I have traveled, I have seen the effects of air pollution with my own eyes, right here in Cambodia so I cannot ignore the problem. I believe that the facilitators and anyone who traveled around Phnom Penh have seen air pollution too. We are a human being, we’re here to make this world into a better place but now if we take a look to our own region it gets even worse in term of air pollution. It’s not late to stop air pollution, but we need to work hard enough, get everyone involved with this action in order to make it happen. I strongly believed that education is the only way that can stop the air pollution in Cambodia, as well around the world that’s why I’m here. As an example from my own experience, before I get this amazing opportunity to learn in the Liger Learning Center, I didn’t know about air pollution at all. Moreover, I didn’t even know what’s air pollution. After learning in Liger for a few years, I started to understand more and more about air pollution. At the same time, I feel passionate about it and wanted to stop air pollution in this developing country. I can not wait to present the information that I had learned and experienced from my past. Part of my speech was to give out message about air pollution but also propose a solution where everyone can do it in their daily life. The solution is about each individual. If our actions create air pollution, we should be responsible for offsetting that pollution. For example, if we produce a lot of pollution by using vehicles, we can offset that pollution by using a bicycle or walking instead. Another way would be planting trees and reduce the amount of trash we burned. But it really depends on each of us, if we want to stop air pollution or not. “Be your own life and be responsible for your own work. Your dream will become true and this world will have no more troubles with air pollution if we take responsibility.” I still believe that education is the only way to get people involved in the action against air pollution. If Cambodian working harder and harder on this problem, eventually our citizen will live in a good happy environment and we will not deal with any more troubles and diseases from air pollution.
Two years a go there were 8 students including me had a project called TosTov where we tried to create a system to help the passengers and the drivers in Cambodia to interact more with each others. We had this idea from our own experienced, most of the time when I wanted to come to Phnom Penh or go back to my hometown my family always struggled and find a hard time to get the taxi. Even though we know the station, it takes us an hour just to wait for the taxi to leave, so it not efficiency. This’s a major concern from most of the passengers that we had interviewed. So our solution is to create an app where the passengers just message to our server phone number and the app will automatically reply back with the best status for the passengers. The main reason that our team decided to use text message because from our researched, more than 60% of the population use the normal phone and also there is a bigger potential market for our app. As a change agent we always looking for an opportunity to make change and use our knowledge to apply to problem. We have a good team with many skills, some of us work on technician part, some working on designing, marketing and advertising. We’re here to make change in our own country, as a developing country we will face many problems but we cannot ignore it but instead try to solve the problem and find a creative solution that is best for Cambodia. There are many startup companies that tried to solve this issue but they not look at the big picture. Cambodia still new to the technology and not a lot of people know how to use or even have a smartphone. It’s really annoying when we want to go to somewhere but we need to wait so long until the taxi leave the station. From the business perspective meaning the longer they wait for the taxi the more money they will lose. So if we can make this system work it will benefit two things, first the system can help the passengers with efficiency and second it will attract more locals and international business to invest in our country. I still believe that our team can make it happen and I will give my best work on this project to help change Cambodia. I’m proud of my team even though we are young but we can work like the adult and especially we can help change our own country.
In conclusion, as a change agent I still strongly believe that I can change Cambodia. As an example, I already started changing Cambodia from the three projects which are Carbon in Cambodia, Tedx, and Tos-Tov. Liger’s mission is to create change that’s why I’m here and I will try my best, give my best work to make it happen and to change this country to a better place. I love Cambodia, this place is where I started my life and it gives me hope in my life. I want to see the improvement in this country, no one will start to change if we, as a Cambodian citizen not start from ourselves. There are many problems in this country needed to change, so if we put our hard work and find the best solution that could improve the country, we will get something back from it maybe not today or tomorrow but in the future. That’s why we need to start to make change from now and everyone in this country have to involve in order to improve and create changes in this country. I’m proud of Liger that has a huge dream and mission in this country by recruit young Cambodian students teach them to become a change agent. I believe, everyone will try their best to bring the best quality works and projects to change Cambodia into a better country.