is back after a while silent

It has been awhile since my last article. The internet at my office seems to be broken. It didn’t allow me to get into my blog. Oh maybe it is not the internet, but the virus in my computer. Whatever…hehe..

Good news, I was just elected as a president of Initiative of Change Association (ICA). I Was made aware of ICA at the 11th Asia Pacific Youth Conference in Siem Reap back in 2004. I was touched by the mighty concept of Quiet Time and the four absolute standards. I can still recall the excitement of seeing this young active group discussing what changes they could make for the benefits of themselves, families, communities, and the world. I was 18 years old at that time, and my inner voice asked, “How could an 18 years old girl change the world?” “This is too unrealistic,” I said to myself. There are just too many problems in Cambodia. I am too powerless to change any of them.

As time passed by, I began to realize that what I heard during the conference were true. Young people in Cambodia, no matter where we come from, have so much potential to change and to make Cambodia a better place to live in. Many of my friends immigrated to other countries, expecting better lives. I asked myself, “Should I move out too in order to have a better life? Or why don’t I make my country a better place and have a better life here?”

If I change, my family, my community, and my country change. So does the world.
Make the change for the better.

2009 is ending - Let's make plan for 2010

2009 almost comes to the end. I still can’t believe that time is flying that fast. Want it or not, 2010 is just two days ahead. Going back to the yearly plan I set on the January 1st 2009 and reflect how well my plan works, it scares me. I remember; I was laying on the floor, drawing my 2009 planning sheet together with my sibling and parents, this moment was like yesterday. Today is December 30th 2009 already. Why am I talking about this?

This is to scare you too. Time is flying really fast each day. Each minute gone and never ever return; therefore, making plan is truly important. You can’t just live your life according to anything. You need to be time master, and lead your life throughout time that passing by to achieve what you set. “Plan our future today” was the topic of the 2nd youth camp I organized in 2008.

If you are working in a project, you of course know what the important elements of a successful project are. I started working in 2004. That was when I know how the project was coordinated. Once, I attended a project planning meeting to apply for funding. I was trained to make vision, mission, activities planning, expected result and so on. One day I sat by myself thinking why don’t I apply what I have learned in the project planning in my life too. Vision, mission, activity planning, expected result are what a project coordinator prepare to get funding from donor. What about life? Then, I start making those stuffs in my life too. I plan my life on daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly base. Learning from my manager, I draw my life in a one page mind map.

All in all, I do encourage you to spend sometime making plan for the upcoming 2010. Having a clear plan is good, but don’t forget to follow up your plan and reflect on it.

If you have already done your plan, I do really appreciate if you could share how did you make it? Each person has different ways of making life plan, it would be good to learn from each other.

Happy New Year 2010 !

Love Languages

Offend in my radio program “Lovely Night”, lots of callers asked how do you know if he/she loves me or not? Well, the easiest way to know that is of course “just ask her/him”. However, young people especially women don’t dare to be so direct. Most of the time, my female friend would say “How can I go straight to ask him if he loves me? It would be so embarrassing”. Another male friend of mine experienced a time when he didn’t love her, but he has to say “Yes” because he doesn’t want to embarrass that girl who was directly asked him. He added that I don’t love her but she isn’t bad at all. Then he keeps the relationship moving ahead and hoping that he will love her one day. After a few months, he decided to tell her that he doesn’t love her and that he couldn’t be in this relationship anymore. They broke up. What do you think about that?

Back to a few years ago, I attended a discussion on “Love Languages”. They explained how people express their love to other.

1- Wording person: this is the direct one. Some types of people like to be straight forward. She/he uses sweet words to express their feeling toward their partner.

2- Gift person: this kind of people use gift as a tool of expression their love. Wherever they go, they will never forget to bring something back for the one they love. She/he used observation to buy her/his partner a gift. For example, by accident while walking together in a bookstore, she/he hears her/his partner said that “This book is so beautiful”. The next day, she/he will come back to the store and get that book for her/him.

3- Service provider: this type of person value serving. They like to serve their partner. For example, he/she visit someone’s home together with other friends. There is a beautiful lamp in the corner, and his/her partner say “this lamp is so beautiful. I have one at home but it doesn’t work”. So he/she would response “well would you like me to check it out for you, I may be able to fix it”. This type of person will always be there for him/her to make sure that his/her life is comfortable.

4- Touch person: These types of person like to express their feeling by being close to her/his partner. They like to hold hand while walking, they like to hug or kiss, and like to be around closely. In a country where tradition is concern, there are not many Touch persons.

5- Quality of time: for some people, spending time together is important. These kinds of people like to express their love by being around all the time. They may not able to help a lot, but they make sure that you are not alone and that you can also share with them your sadness. They like to share whatever moment with you no matter when you are happy or sad. And they like to have you with them.

There is a website that you can read it for more detail at www.fivelovelanguages.com , I never check it before, but it should be interesting, I guess.

Youth Camp in Pailin

Every early of the year, I make activity plan. Among those plans in 2009 was to organize a youth camp on "Youth and Social Engagement".

During water festival holiday, I managed to do it as plan.

I, together with my volunteers, brought 50 young people; who were carefully selected by face to face interviewing, to held a youth camp on this issue. This camp has becoming my biggest success of the year. I am so glad I have organized it and I am so thankful to other volunteers who have worked very hard to make it an unforgettable event.

At the camp, we shared, learned, danced, talked, sang, and cried together. We learned about each other's experiences of how we manage our time to serve our society. We shared our experiences on how to make ourselves successful. We created a new dancing band. We sang lots of song. And we cried a lot. You may wonder why do we cried at a youth camp like this ? it suppose to be a happy time. Well, our tears were a happy tear.

At the youth camp, we provided enough time and space for each participant to share their hard time history, their sadness, their family stories, and more. All these were organized because I know that behind all these happy faces, each one of us has a story. Each of us may need hug, need a word "I love you", we all need to cry at some point. After all the sharing, I realize how important is it to talk about our sadness. One of the participants said : "All I want in this is life is to have a Mum and Dad to call". His parents divorced when he was three years old. His dad passed away soon after that, and his mum had another husband and left him with his gradma. One other girl shared another long story and asked: "why my brother could forgive his friend, but not me?". Another poor girl said: "my mum doesn't love me anymore". we shared more stories in a room with light off and candle on. Listen to other's stories and saw how difficult their family relations are, one participants cried and said: "I just know today, how much my parents have devoted for me. I love them and I will be best for them." There are another 100 pages of their stories if I keep writing. After a few hours of honest sharing, we gave each other warm hug and said to each other "I love you".

Sharing is not a discussion. At my youth camp, participants were encouraged to share but not discuss. Everyone has a story, all I want is to let it out. To cry the most we want, to express our pain. So if you do have pain, let is out !

Expectation and Jealousy

Everyone has expectation on whatever they are doing, whoever they are in relation with, wherever they go, and so on. Student expects high score from their exam, manager expects her staff to perform the best, couple expects faithfulness from each other, and more. Expectation inspires each individual to try harder to get what they expect. If they don’t have expectation; what for?

However, is having high expectation a mistake?

Students who expect A+ from their exam, if they get only A- which is already very good compare to others, they will be very upset and feeling very down. Some people said that having this high expectation make you feel very negative about yourself. Other point of view claims that having high expectation is a guarantee of high quality. This question “is having high expectation a mistake?” remained a flexible answer. Expectation motivates people to put a lot of effort. That’s why when their effort doesn’t pay off, they are upset. However, isn’t better than not putting any effort to avoid that you don’t get upset afterward. At least, people who have high expectation give it a try.

Where jealousy does comes from? Does it also created by expectation?

First of all, there is no clear definition of this word “jealousies” or maybe there is but I don’t know. So far I am not a jealous person (I assume). Only when I have very high expectation on boyfriend, I realize that my expectation created jealousy. Logically, the first person who comes shall be the first person to be served, regardless of who you are. If you date a person before I do, you will have him because I date him later than you; however, because I am a girlfriend I expected my boyfriend to be there for me even if I date him later or at least he should had in his mind that his girlfriend needs him. Before he accepts other’s date, I expect him to ask himself “do my girlfriend needs me at this time?” Well, this sounds of course very selfish and unreasonable. Base on this experience, I concluded that my expectation create jealousy. And jealousy is selfish and unreasonable.

Quick advertisement

This is a quick advertisement of my talk show program "LOVELY NIGHT" at Sarika FM 106.5 from Monday to Friday, 09pm - 10pm.

Listen to other people's stories, call in to share your opinion, support them emotionally, and most importantly, learn from them to prepare your future.

Questions for reflection

There are many times that we ask people questions and we expect to get answers. We, human being, like to find out how good or bad others are? Sadly, there are not many times we ask ourselves. Let's take sometime to answer these questions. Enjoy !

1- What am I grateful for today?
2- Is there anything/anybody I have taken for grated in my life?
3- Are there any people I should thank, today?
4- In what way do I think my country need to change?
5- What kind of change do I need for myself, so that I can be part of solution, not problem?
6- What are the main motivations/force of my life?
7- How can I use my energies/talent/skills for others, for my country, and for the world?
8- What promises have I made in the past? How well have I keep them?
9- Have I ever let other down, in what way?
10- Is there any relationship I need to re-build? How? When ?