Category: Exploration

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Buiding Smart Home System in Houses of People With Disabilities- Agile Collaboration

Within your daily routine of turning your light at home on/off, or turning the fan on up on your ceiling, you might always think they are simple/easy habits to do. Have you ever thought of how challenging it is for people with disabilities to practice with this simple stuff? The lives of people with disabilities might be harder and/or much different from what you actually have thought of. Within some circumstances, they couldn’t do those things at home at all and all depend on someone to assist. As a young change agent, I really want to be involved in helping for the better and positivity of their lives. 

Agile Collaboration was an exploration which I and the other 5 of my friends involved in making for the betterment of people with disability’s lives with the implementation of Smart Home System. With the collaboration with Agile organization, we believe that the Smart Home System could genuinely bring conveniences including time-saving and security purposes to their houses. 

To achieve the above mission, our team went to a variety of organizations and companies to meet with experts and audiences to interview and discuss as a step toward making our goals become reality. We went to 17 Triggers in which they are working with design thinking, researching, as well as Human-Centered Design. We’ve explored and learned about a variety of projects that 17 Triggers have done in which it can benefit our team when we implement the system. 

Additionally, we took another trip to PPCIL (Phnom Penh Center For Independence Living) to do our first-ever observation and interview people with disabilities. It was an incredibly stupendous experience for our team to communicate with them as well as getting to know the struggles they are facing daily. 

During the process of implementation, our team used methods that are called Human-Centered Design. Those methods are an approach to problem-solving, commonly used in management frameworks and design in order to develop solutions by involving the human perspective of the problem-solving process. As a team, we discussed and chose some of the methods to practice in our process. Some of the methods are Analogous Inspiration, Expert Interview, Interview, and Define Your Audience. 

Along with the process, our team did a lot of research and found a lot of interesting products that related to turning on/off the light, door lock, gate opening, and more. Meanwhile, our team had also created a mosquito prototype to help lift their mosquito. Finally, we will be implementing all of these products in the houses of people with disabilities.   

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“Is It Possible For Rural Cambodian People To Have Their Own Organic Household Gardens?” – Household Garden

With the enormous amount of vegetables produced by Cambodians daily,  Cambodia still needs more tons of vegetables to supply the population. According to KhmerTimes, 540 tons of vegetables are needed in Cambodia to meet the demand, however, Cambodia can only make 400 tons for the country. Based on this statistical fact, it demonstrates that tons of vegetables are being imported. 

This was the root of why Household Garden Exploration created. Our ambition was to inspire some rural Cambodians to have their own fresh, organic vegetable gardens at home, instead of buying invalidated vegetables from the market. In addition, those vegetables that aren’t being ensured, are mostly produced with chemical fertilizer and pesticide in which the process could severely affect the health of the daily consumers as well as the producers. With this being said, a variety of organizations and projects are helping with the mission of encouraging farmers and households to grow more organic products to their needs.           

To achieve the above ambition, our team in this exploration went to different trips such as farms and research stations, conducted interviews to be able to observe and aware more on the current situation of vegetable plantation, type of vegetables that suitable for household garden, the process of creating organic fertilizer and pesticide, as well as the process of making compost. 

One of the best experiences, we visited Saange District, which is one of the heartland areas of vegetable farming that stretch hugely across the district’s land. Our ultimate goal was to understand the farmer’s lives and their farming practices. After the interviews, it shows that all of the farmers use chemical fertilizers because the process isn’t time-consuming and much more convenient. This result made our team a bit discourage, however, I hope that farmer’s mindsets will aware of the unbeneficial of prioritizing the chemical fertilizer. 

By the end of the exploration, as an experiment, we created a garden at Liger Campus where we grew different types of vegetables. With the little amount of time we had, we couldn’t clearly identify our goal, yet we had a much better understanding of vegetable farming in Cambodia. I positively hope we will be able to continue the project to better the lives of Cambodians.

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Foldscope, a Mini Microscope That Indeed Will Blow Your Mind

“Foldscope Cambodia aims to empower socio-economically disadvantaged students by providing more accessibility to the microscopic world so that they realize and are aware of their potential to create sustainable impacts in the community.” 

Imagine, you’re a young student who lives in a rural area of a province. In a matter of time, you would want to drink water that is from different sources around your zone. However, the problem is that the cup of water you drank is filled and crowded with billions of hazardous monsters and bacteria you could not notice with your bare eyes. This eventually leads to sickness and other menacing problems. 

On the other hand, have you ever wondered what might the onion cells that your teacher was talking about in your biology class look like? Isn’t it monotonous to learn about many organisms and cells but you don’t have the opportunity to discover with a microscope? Thinking about this particular concept, it could lead thousands of students to be uninterested when it comes to learning about biology, or science as a whole. 

As a matter of fact, those cells in onions or cruel monsters in your cup of water can only be seen by an expensive microscope that many rural areas and schools could not afford to invest in for the students?

Foldscope 

Because of the problems as stated above, this was why Jim and Manu who are from Standford University have invented the most amazing tool you have ever seen. A mini microscope called Foldscope that’s almost 1,000 cheaper than an actual microscope. Within their astounding invention, this is the hope for millions of students out there who are underprivileged and disadvantaged for their learning opportunities. 

Foldscope is made entirely out of folded paper, is exceedingly affordable, portable, and durable. On the other hand, this Foldscope has the ability to see objects and almost the same as the big microscope that costs thousands of dollars.

During one of the workshops with students
One of the students who was exploring with Foldscope

Currently, I am a part of the Foldscope Cambodia that is working on implementing workshops and creating Foldscope videos in Khmer in order to introduce this astonishing tool to rural Cambodian students.  To achieve this great mission, our team has implemented a few workshops in Kampong Thom, Cambodia, in which we brought this efficacious device to enhance the quality of visual experience for student’s science learning and self-exploration. 

Our team gave two sets of Foldscope to the school.

During our successful workshops, we covered a lot of knowledge with scientific skills as well as soft skills in which we have improved their curiosity in science and gave them opportunities to let them discover the microscopic world they have always wondered about. 

I believe that Foldscope Cambodia is one of the best projects that made huge positive impacts on the students from my communities. I hope we would be able to support and assist more students during our future workshops.

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China Robotics

Robotics was an exploration where I and the other three students from the Liger Leadership Academy, preparing for the 2019 Guangxi Adolescent Robot Competition and the ASEAN National Adolescent Robot Invitational Tournament that head in Wuzhou, Guangxi, China.

It was a memorable memory for all of us, to be privileged to represent Cambodia to compete with other ASEAN and China teams. We were the first and only team from Cambodia and our team named was NORAKBOT. It was a Lego League which we designed our robot to complete the missions on the board under the theme of Into Orbit (Space). Even though the tournament had some confusion rules, our team could adapt to it quickly and perform the best we could. During the competition, our team put our best to be as flexible as we could. 

 

It was our honor of representing Cambodia in such an amazing competition. We had one whole day competition and the other days of exploring different places such as the Museum of science and technology and the ASEAN theme amusement park. 

One of the nights during this trip, our team participated in the Culture Exchange where all the countries shared their wonders to each other by having different performances such as dance, sing, and more. 

Khmer Traditional Dace

In addition, It’s the way that introduces Cambodia and its culture to other countries in the competition. Especially, our team was honored to hold our Cambodia’s flag in this Science-Technology competition.

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Is it possible to create an ecotourism cite in an Indigenous community, Preah Vihear province? (Ecotourism exploration)

First of all, let’s me define you what is an ecotourism. Basically, ecotourism is from two words which are ecological and tourism, it is the travel to natural area, as well as local communities that conserve the environment, or sustain the well being of the local people. Our main goal for this exploration is to create an ecotourism site on a Kuy indigenous community. I hope this project will actually happen one day, because it give such huge impacts on the community. It creates job for local people, by being a tour guide, giving accommodation or homestay to people, ability to show their skills or other. Therefore, it give the advantages to the natural resources, and environment as well. Before, most the villagers in the community are cutting down trees to sell or make coal, hunting for animals… But if the project happen, all of those activities will not going to happen again.

In the process of creating this site, we need to do the research of the marketing for the project. We went to different places around Phnom Penh to interview the tourist from different countries. Basically, our main goal for the tourist survey questions is to ask,  If there’s an ecotourism site that supports indigenous community and wildlife on the loop to Angkor Wat temple, Preah temple, and Sambor Prei Kuk temple, would they like to visit or willing to go? Good news is that 82.6% of the tourists are interested to go, 11.1% of the tourists are maybe to go, and only 6.3% are not interested to go.

In addition, We went to their community and interviewed each family. Before we do our interview, we did a presentation to the villagers about what is ecotourism, the advantages of having the site and give some examples of the ecotourism place. Our main purpose is to know if they want us to create an ecotourism site in their community. According to the interview, 96.4% agrees and 3.6% disagrees.

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Travelling Theather Exploration, Round 3

          Traveling Theather!!!, definitely, the theater that can travel from place to place. It sounds unusual but our exploration and project made it happened once we’ve traveled to some places around Cambodia. Our main goal in this exploration is to showcase performances, educational films, plays like theatre to the rural communities and rural schools in the provinces by providing people with opportunities to watch performances and getting awareness while having entertainment. In this exploration, before we go on trip, we’ve prepared a lot of stuff. We’ve studied about the setting up our stage in different situations depending on the place we are going. Especially,  I am one of the communication crew which I need to contact people in orders to get their place to perform. It was kind of a challenge for us all because we need to contact from one person to one person to get the phone number that we want to have. In addition, we need to write the letters to request them also.

Image may contain: 37 people, people smiling, people standing

In this trip, we ‘ve been to three places in two provinces. We went to two schools in Takeo and Kampot and a community in Takeo. As our first trip to an elementary school in Takeo, it was a bit challenging for us to perform because the students are too young as our target audiences and they were not really paying attention to us all while performing. Our second place is at the parking lot near the market in a big community. The challenge for us in this place is finding the exact spot to perform. Consequently, this second trip is a successful one. Our third place is a really really wonderful one because the students at the school were enjoying our shows and having fun. This exploration and trip is a really enthusiastic experience for me while I’ve learned a lot of concepts.

Image may contain: 41 people, people smiling, child, crowd and outdoor

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Outdoor Leadership Exploration

Outdoor Leadership Exploration becomes one of my favorite exploration. A very enjoyable experiences I’ve got from both during class and outside of class which is during trip. I’ve gained so much knowledge of leader the participants and myself that involve during outdoor. I’ve realized how such a beautiful of nature and wilderness that we have during outdoors. However, This exploration changes my conscious to be appreciate to my admirable environment around me, as well as to supports and keep all the natural resources. It’s help me a lot of my future as well. We went to two trips which are in Kirirom National park and Mondulkiri province. One of the memorable moments is in Mondulkiri Trip.

Reflection: Trip to Mondulkiri province

I would say that, this was  a really wonderful trip ever which we traveled to Mondulkiri province for four days during outdoor leadership exploration. our goals was to learn how to survive in outdoor  while meeting challenges. It was such an amazing experience for my future, as will as take a step of preparation for later. It was a wonderful time of spending with my friends and facilitators, which is a great chance for all of us to get deeply know each other. An opportunity, with not many Cambodian children get the chance to do was extremely huge appreciate from me. In addition, I’m extremely thankful to nature around the place in Mondulkiri that let us to explore you, to know you and to appreciate you which made this trip to a word called “indescribable” to me and my opinion.

As a Cambodian girl, I will raise awareness to others human about how to get survive in outdoors, as well as to let them appreciate that the nature, or this special nature’s resources that we have right now in Cambodia. On the other hand, after travelling to this province, Mondulkiri becomes one of my favorite province. when I was there, every single minute I could see a great view with full of mountain, trees, and the sound of the animal s, birds singing along the way. As we are outdoor leaders, we have our core value promises while on the trip, which are help, respect each other, always encourages everyone, determination and more. While having fun, we’ve learned so many things which let us to experience and explore new adventures around us. For example, If I lost in the forest, I could know how to survive and believe in myself, whenever on an adventure.

In this trip, we were cooking by yourself, finding food, water, hiking together, packing stuff together, which becomes a wonderful adapting with friends, animals and nature. Especially, we were marking fire without using lighter, even though it didn’t work but we tried our best. I‘ve learned to resume people around me and myself. IN addition, the activities that we did during this trip were talking about self reflection, hiking the mountain, drawing and writing the view with the nature. As this is my second time in Mondulkiri, I felt more believe in myself, felt more confidence while hiking and go outside of campus. Every time I am in nature, I felt fresh and happy and I didn’t think of anything else beside keeping myself warm, calm, with a beautiful green species all around me. I’ve released all off my stress, release all of my conflict or homework at school.

On the second day of our trip, we went to Leng Truk waterfall. It was my second time there but I still want to go there again. Before we can get to that Waterfall, we need to hike up and down the mountains with small, big route along the trees. We hiked for 45 minutes to get there with our guide. He was really friendly and he is Pnong, which is one of the ethnic group in Cambodia. Along the way, he told us about the farm, the crops that the indigenous group grow on the mountain, as well as the way of living that they depends on agriculture sector.

After we get there, we started to cook some fish and ethnic soup. I like the way he used the natural resource to clean and to cook the food, which he used the bamboo to put in the fish mouse as a stick while grilling the fish. one the other hand, we used the bamboo to cook the soup inside and use the grass to clean the bamboo. After that we had a great lunch together. On the night time, I saw three shooting stars and star in the morning. I was very happy to see that and wish what I want too. On the third day, we tracked to two waterfalls about 12 kilometers. they are very big and beautiful with many people visiting there and having fun. During the hiking, I was a little tired but I had fun with my friends. During the walk, we were rested in a big grassland, and we played some games and take a lot of picture. What a Lucky day! we saw a big sun set up the mountain.

Finally, I have a lot of fun and realize how such a beautiful place in my country, especially the happiness of people face during hiking. I wish that all the people aware of the environment just like I do and stop throwing trash everywhere. The way we do this, it could start tourist come to explore our country. The best thing that I hope is to have the same amount of nature in the next few years.

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Publishing Geography Book

I and my friends were working on publish a book about geography in Cambodia. It is challeng to create an book and it is a enormous task to do. As a good author, there are many important duties to do. We need to work hard, doing research, trip or interview. We need to ensure that the sources are reliable and write in a good process in order to make the readers easy to understand. We divided into four regions. I am in a group in region four which working on northeast of Cambodia. In our trip, we went to four provinces to collect information.

  • At Ka Chanh waterfall, Ratanakiri province

We went to Ratanakiri, kratie, stung treng, mondulkiri province. These province are very far away and I was my first time.  In each province, we went to many places such as temples, waterfalls, mountains, forest, or departments of culture and fine art. The purpose was to create a book called Cambodian Geography book to share to the students in government schools or people who interesting in geography. It took us one year to publish this book. In this book, we included the information about the five theme of geography, provincial name and historical statues in each province and more.

I’ve learned many many concepts from this such as teamwork, writing and interview skills, and a lot more. Through this big mission, I am very proud of myself because I’ve created a big changes in my country by publishing a book which could provide advantages to the government students and people all over the world to know more about Cambodia which a part of creating impacts, especially in education system.

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Community Documentary Exploration

  • With the view of the rice field

Community Documentary was a exploration which documents information in rural communities. The goal was to documents the necessary informations because we want next generation to see what have been changed and developed in their community. We have four products to the communities such as creating blog, photo book, video and podcast. We collaborated with the World Renew’s youth which is the organization that helps to develop the communities that we are working on. We interviewed many villagers and we focus on different categories such as development, economic, human life, history and more. We went to four villages in Kampong Speu province.

During our exploration, we went to the villages three times. The first time, we went to absorb and think of what we want to do as our products which was pre trip.  I feel that the community that I went is very strange from mine because it is a rural area. We interviewed many people and I figured out that their life is different and more difficult that the people in my community.  At night time, we spend our time in Camkids with is a school. We did networking, communicate, sharing experience and play some games with the Camkids students.The second, we went to interviewed people again about each different themes which we have planned. And the third, we went to share our products and do the presentation about what we have done for the villages. There were many people come to watch our presentation and they impressed about what we did.

As a part of this explorations, I’ve learn about how how people live in rural village, creating blog skill, the experience working with world Renew’s students, presentation skill and collaboration in the group. I feel very comfortable in this exploration and learned many many things including skills and experiences during the exploration. During the trip, I could know more about the people life and the way they live in rural communities. I am proud of myself of being a part of helping and keeping the important information to get the next generation to know in the communities in my country.