This entry was posted on Saturday, March 7th, 2009 at 12:53 pm and is filed under Khmer-Related, Travel, Culture, Economy, Cambodian American. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Cambodia: the land of opportunity
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Loading ...Calling Cambodia “the land of opportunity” may seem counter-intuitive, especially to people living abroad who read all the negative news about corruption and human rights abuses here. But after having lived here more than half a year, I can say that I feel more empowered here than I was in America. Here I feel like I can accomplish anything, and if I don’t, it’s all because of my own laziness.
I want to advise people not to come here to do politics. Why? It doesn’t matter how much more knowledgeable and enlightened you think you are as someone from overseas; you’re not going to succeed in overturning what people have been accustomed to all their lives. You can’t change people for the better by telling them how lousy they are. You must lead by example– by being the change you want to see in them. In the long run your efforts would prove more fruitful by avoiding confrontation and educating and motivating those around you toward righteous and constructive ways.
Besides, if you’re looking for people in Cambodia who could do politics, you’ll find, oh…maybe 14 million people who could fill the position. As a matter of fact, many positions of power have been filled by individuals with few qualifications.
If you’re looking for someone here with a high level of expertise in IT, finance, management, or engineering, on the other hand, it’s like finding a needle in a haystack. So there is a lot of opportunities for young, highly skilled Khmers from overseas. While the average salary is less than $100, many companies aren’t afraid to pay $1,000-$2,000 a month for qualified people from overseas (you can live a comfortable life here– complete with a couple of maids if you prefer– on that salary). If the non-Khmer foreigners can come and work here, I don’t see why Khmer Americans can’t do the same, especially since many of us are bilingual and have some familiarity with the culture.
Things work a little differently here. Khmer people can be very easy or very hard to work with. It just takes some getting used to. Personally, I am drawn to the gentle, understanding nature of our people. This is one of the precious qualities of our culture that is truly worth preserving.
Generally, people will leave you alone if you leave them alone. To be honest I haven’t felt much “oppression” here at all…not yet, at least. In fact, I feel like I have more freedom and opportunities here. I think people are generally happier here than they are in America, where you live under the constant oppression of bills, taxes, job insecurity, etc. I think the unhappiest people here are not so much the poor people, but people who don’t have enough. People who don’t have enough are not necessarily poor and desperate– many of them are just greedy and envious of others. So, they never have enough, and they’re never happy with what they have.
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