Ecotourism
What is Cambodia known for? Of course, Angkor Wat is what makes Cambodia a tourist site. Angkor Wat has always brought tourists to this magnificent country that people overlooked. That’s one of the reasons why an ecotourism project was created.
The project was to create an ecotourism site in Preah Vihear province of Cambodia because the area was seen with high potentials and hopes that it’ll bring the community significant results.
If you’re wondering what ecotourism is, it is a combination of two words: ecology and tourism. Ecology is the interactions between living organisms towards nature such as; humans, animals, etc… Tourism is the operation of holidays and vacations. Together it’s a tour that you’ll be interacting with nature and the community there. This type of tourism is intended to support the community and preserve natural resources and wildlife.
Our aim was to help the KUI indigenous community in Preah Vihear province to create this ecotourism system because the village was seen with magnificent possibilities of developing the village into an ecotourism site. It was to help them make a better living and provide the villagers with more jobs opportunities such as; tour guides, cook, etc… Additionally, this ecotourism site will be another interesting tourism site that local tourists and international tourists would be interested in and would love to visit Cambodia.
Tourists are usually complaining about how Cambodia has so much trash, but they haven’t seen it all. Having this ecotourism site will bring them to their senses that Cambodia is not all about trash or dirty sewage, but about the green environment that they don’t know of or realize that it exists.
This seems like a small a project at first, however, if the ecotourism is actually created the impact is huge. We’ve already made an impact towards the community by spreading this ecotourism term and create a visual of how it’ll going to help themselve, their community and Cambodia.
I believe that this project will continue to run smoothly and will reach the aim and we’ve all been working so hard to achieve it. This is not for our advantage, but for the individuals in the community, the whole community and Cambodia as well. I’m so proud of how far we’ve come and will create change for a better tomorrow.
Khmer Literature Event
Have you ever attended or heard about any Khmer Literature Event? Students of the Liger Leadership Academy organized the first Khmer Literacture event at our campus for the purpose of promoting Cambodia’s culture and tradition. It was a full day event that we needed to wear Cambodian traditional clothes. These traditional clothes also help define and show our identity as a Cambodian child as well.
There were varieties of booths to look at on the event day, some are organized by our first cohort and some are organized by the second cohort such as; the Geography Book of Cambodia, Indigenous People of Cambodia, Humans of Cambodia, Khmer Poems competition, Khmer Debates, Public Speaking in Khmer, Story Writing competition, Khmer musics, Cambodian fishing styles, etc….
I participated in one of the booth’s activity, which is the debating booth. I have a team of four other Liger students against 5 other students from another school. We debated on the topic of “Should students wear uniforms or it’s their choice?”. My team was on the for team, so it was pretty easy to debate on that topic. I was very proud of everyone, including the against team.
After participating in this Khmer Literature Event, I feel like schools in Cambodia really need to have this kind of event because we don’t usually create this kind of event and I believe that all Cambodians should participate in this type of event once a year or so, in order to promote our Cambodian culture.