Since it’s the first year, the images don’t have to have been taken during 2010, anytime will do. Maybe next year we’ll restrict it to the previous 12 months.

For now though, it’s worth digging out your photo albums and sorting out your finest!

Sadly, if you’re out of town, your only reward will be the praise of your peers, those in town however will have the added benefit of a couple of free beers to be enjoyed at the Circle Bar, just off the Golden Lion Roundabout.

To find out more visit http://www.circlecambodia.com/photocomp/about

To view the images and vote for your favourite visit http://www.circlecambodia.com/photocomp

Traditional hardwood construction : Sawn frame carvel plank, with ironwood trunnels. But: caulked with polyurethane to the back of the seams (no cotton), gluing the plank edges together.
Her spacious open deck can accommodate more than 20 morning , afternoon, and evening revelers along the shores of Asian resorts, (i.e. Sihanouk Ville, Cambodia; Pattaya; Phuket in Thailand etc.)

Click image for more detail

“Gray Dove” is a tough traditional working sailing vessel with no Frills, suitable for long distance, fully equipped diving parties (to the Natunas, Spartley Reef , Tubataha, Tawi. Tawi, etc.,) at low sea mile cost.

Click image for more detail

This interior layout shows 8 bunks with 2 wet heads (telephone showers with floor drains). Two tight staterooms aft, double, stateroom amid ship, double stateroom forepeak. The dining table folds in half to allow the dining settee to become a full length (6’9”) bunk. There is a settee / bunk with fold-down desk stbd amid ship. The engine hides under the middle dining seat. The lazarette is large enough to house the genset with easy access.

THE SCHOONER
‘GRAY DOVE’
under construction:

Girard Dewitt is a retired small vessel designer and builder with over 35 years of experience in Fiberglass, metal and wooden boat production in the U.S, (Florida and California), Thailand, Ecuador, Mexico and now in Sihanouk Ville, Cambodia.

Girard is seeking a 50% partner to be able to complete “GRAY DOVE” in timely fashion, and to put her to work, either in tourism, or island trading in coffee and other lucrative legal products.
Alternatively, Girard will finish this useful craft for a purchaser to suit.

For more detailed Information
E-mail: paradise_internet1@yahoo.com
or
In Cambodia : 855 (0) 89 568 631 Mr. Girard

It’s no surprise then to find that books which reference the many locations such as beaches, bars, restaurants and temples, are extremely popular. They help refresh the memories of places you have actually visited, sometimes even reminding you of people that you have actually met.

Two such books are ”Buddha’s Tooth” and ”Chalice”, both written by local, Sihanoukville based Author Robert A. Webster.

These books detail the travels, turmoils and temptations of a group of friends as they make their way around Thailand and Cambodia, I won’t give away any of the story, but I have to say that although the works are in the main ”fiction” the detail that the Author goes into allows you to become completely transported back to Asia where you can once again relive and enjoy memories of places you have visited.

Written with an ”insiders knowledge”, the books give a fascinating background to the towns and people which combined with the sharp wit of the Author makes the book ‘unputdownable’!

Robert Webster has graciously allowed Sihanoukville Online to provide his two published books as free downloads, and here are the links.

Buddha’s Tooth

Chalice – Buddha’s Tooth 2

Together these books have already been downloaded and enjoyed by over 5000 readers!

If you would prefer to read the actual books however, you can call into the Golden Lion Plaza and pick up either or both books and even have them personally signed by Robert himself.

Contact me via this site for futher information.

At 95 year old vessel, only two years younger than the HMS Titanic, MVDoulos is the worlds oldest Ocean going passenger ship and has been used as a floating library with the slogan ”Bringing Knowledge, Help and Hope” by German charity ‘Good Books for All’ since 1977. During this time they have sailed to over 100 countries and received over 21 million visitors onboard.

MVDOULOS will be in Sihanoukville until the 28th July and during their stay here they will be holding daily ‘bookfairs’, entrance is 1000 rield, and a number of Internationally themed Events, including ….

Family Days – 12th, 19th and 26th July

Café International (for English speakers only) – 14th. Price is $1.50

Love Boat (Youth Program) – 17th. Price $0.50

Dancing around the World – 18th. Price $1.00

Around the World in 80 minutes – 21st. Price $1.00

Phnom Penh – A former Khmer Rouge official photographer has put on sale for 1.5 million dollars what he claims to be Pol Pot’s clothes, sandals and toilet, along with thousands of photographs and other artifacts he collected during the genocidal regime’s 1975-79 rule. “I will sell Pol Pot’s sandals, toilet, his uniform and cap, thousands of photographs and the two cameras I used during the Khmer Rouge period,” said Nhem En, who was recruited to take photographs of detainees when they arrived at Tuol Sleng torture prison in Phnom Penh.

“I am asking for 1.5 million dollars, but the price is negotiable,” he added. Nhem En said he would use the money to establish a Khmer Rouge museum in Anlong Veng, a small town near the Thai border where the Maoist group hid in a jungle fortress until it disbanded in 1998. “I am selling these items, but I have others that will be housed in the museum,” he said. “I have already asked for donations for this museum from the US, France, Germany, Canada, Australia, Vietnam, South Korea and Thailand, but none have provided funding.”His appeal came as the trial of the former head of Tuol Sleng prison resumed before Cambodia’s UN-backed war crimes tribunal.

Kaing Guek Euv, known by his revolutionary alias Duch, faces charges of crimes against humanity, torture, premeditated murder and breaches of the Geneva Conventions, allegedly committed at the school-turned-prison, where at least 15,000 men, women and children were imprisoned and tortured before being murdered in the “killing fields” on the outskirts of the capital. Nhem En said the millions of dollars in international donor funding spent on bringing Duch and four other Khmer Rouge leaders to trial would be better invested in his museum.

“Nobody in the Cambodian government supports my museum plan, so it will need a great deal of international funding to be established,” he said. In April, Nhem En offered to sell Pol Pot’s shoes and toilet for 500,000 dollars and said he would keep the other items to be housed in the museum. Up to 2 million people died during through execution, starvation or overwork during the Khmer Rouge’s rule

First published in Earth Times

More than 100 boarders were on the school’s premises when the incident occurred at about 6 a.m. but no one was hurt, the school said in a press release.

The fire did not spread beyond the two soundproof rooms but two firefighters failed to save the facilities that were built in February.

School rector Salesian Father John Visser said losses amounted to tens of thousands of U.S. dollars. The studios and equipment, used for students’ media education, had been bought with donations from benefactors in the Netherlands.

In an interview, Ros Buntha, head of the school’s social communication department, said two computers, a projector and other audiovisual materials such as CDs, VCDs, video cassettes, cables and microphones were completely destroyed.

Vice rector Father Albeiro Rodas, coordinator of the school’s social communication projects, said the fire was a setback for the school, but hopes to receive support and assistance from the public.

“We wanted the studios to be a center of production for the education and development of this country,” he said, adding that he plans to rebuild the facilities.

“We are going to do it better … We believe in the young people and we believe in Cambodia,” he added.

Don Bosco Technical School is a leading vocational training institute in Cambodia run by Salesian priests. Apart from Sihanoukville, it has four other campuses in the country, in Battambang, Kep, Phnom Penh and Poipet.

The institute provides technical skills training to thousands of young Cambodians and the campus in Sihanoukville has a yearly enrollment of more than 350.

Saint John Bosco, commonly known as Don Bosco, founded the Salesian society in the mid-1800s in Italy.

Royal astrologer Kang Ken said after the annual ritual, which was held in a park near the Royal Palace in Phnom Penh, that the oxen ate offerings of beans and corn but snubbed offerings of rice, sesame seeds, grass, water and wine.

‘This means that annual rice production will fall by 30 per cent, but there will be plenty of rainwater this year for agriculture around the whole country,’ he announced to a crowd of more than 1,000 people at the ceremony presided over by King Norodom Sihamoni.

The event is said to be taken very seriously by Cambodia’s rural poor, who make up roughly 85 per cent of the population and are regarded as highly superstitious by city dwellers.

Sim An, a farmer from Kandal Province in central Cambodia, said he was saddened to see the oxen reject the rice offering.

‘This is not good for me because I plant rice every year and unlike other farmers, I grow only one kind of crop,’ he said.

But Nub Sophal, a farmer from the southern province of Kampot, said he was not worried about the prediction.

‘Even after listening to the astrologer’s prediction I am still happy because we always have a good crop in my province,’ he said. ‘But I still wonder why the oxen did not eat the rice or grass because we all know that it makes our harvest much better.’

Prime Minister Hun Sen did not attend the ceremony, but the king was joined by an audience of ministers, ruling party leaders and foreign diplomats.

Hun Sen is pushing for Cambodia to become a major rice exporter after a lifting a ban on exports in May last year.

In January, the premier predicted that rice exports would increase from about 1 million tons in 2008 to more than 2 million tons in 2009.

Britain company New Island Clothing is setting up “a high level standards product development center,” making the company one of the first to conduct the whole garment-production process — from development to the placement of orders — in Cambodia, New Island General Manager Kevin Plenty was quoted by the Cambodia Daily as saying.

The company, which has been in Cambodia for nine years and produces up to 75,000 men’s shirts per week, had decided to set up the center here because it makes “the whole production process quicker for our customers,” as the majority of materials come from the ASEAN region, said Plenty.

Kaing Monika, external affairs manager of the Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC) said New Island’s strategy showed the factory’s “long-term vision and commitment in Cambodia,” adding that most Cambodian factories only do “cut, make and trim” — a production formula in which raw materials and designs are supplied and factories only really stitch the clothes together.

Tuomo Poutiainen, chief technical adviser for the International Labor Organization’s garment sector program Better Factories Cambodia, said New Island’s decision was “very positive for industry” and showed there was “enough confidence in the Cambodian garment sector to invest even in bad times.”

Hundreds of factories have constituted the backbone of the garment sector of Cambodia, which used to generate above 70 percent of its total annual export volumes.

However, due to the global financial crisis and rising labor disputes, at least 60 garment factories have been closed and more than 50,000 garment workers lost their jobs since late 2008 and the sector’s export volumes have also seen an obvious slide in the first quarter of this year.

But Plenty said he believed that the industry will see an economic turnaround within six months, and that he is not the only one within the garment industry to feel that way.

Foreigners may be able to purchase property in Cambodia for the first time following the proposal of new legislation by the country’s Government – but they will still be limited to apartments, houses and condominiums above the second floor…

Currently, international investors are not allowed to own land or homes in Cambodia – a limitation that is seen by some locals as a good thing, preventing speculation and price volatility.

Back in 2005, the Government amended an investment law to allow foreign ownership of buildings, but Cambodia’s property market was then experiencing one of the biggest booms in Asia and, as a result, the law was never put into practice.

Between 2005 and 2007, the property markets in major hubs such as Phnom Penh, Siem Reap and Sihanoukville, skyrocketed, with prices rising by as much as 40 per cent.

But now, with the economy and property market suffering in the downturn, the foreign investment law has reared its head again.

If passed, it could pave the way for foreign ownership of houses, apartments and condominiums from the second floor up for resale. Foreigners would also be able to inherit property.

The Minister of land management, urban planning and construction Im Chhun Lim said, “We want this law to be passed as quickly as possible, but we need input from the private sector, so we have passed it on for feedback

“The discussion with the private sector will focus on how many units and how much of the building can be bought, as well as which floors they can purchase,” he added.

The Cambodian Government is keen to pass the new law as they hope it will revitalize the country’s housing market and economy and prevent the market from sliding further.

It is also hoped that the laws will enhance foreign consumer confidence in the undeveloped property market.

As there is some local opposition to the ownership of land by foreigners, the Government is planning to specify a zone near international borders in which foreigners would not be able to buy property, which would prevent foreign ownership of property in disputed areas.

Picture by Magalie L’Abbe

First published on http://www.themovechannel.com

Australia’s Toll Holdings finalising rail agreement to refurbish lines as part of regional network, says broker

Photo by Tracy Shelton

The agreement with Toll Holdings would see Cambodia’s rail network upgraded.
THE Cambodian government and Toll Holdings of Australia are close to signing an agreement on outsourcing the management of the state railway, said an official close to the negotiations on Wednesday.

“By the end of the [Khmer] New Year, we should have an agreement,” said Paul Power, team leader at the Railway Restructuring Project for Canarail, who is brokering the deal.

Under the US$73 million proposal, 594 kilometres of Cambodia’s neglected rail system would be repaired and refurbished with new sleepers and railcars and 48 kilometres of destroyed track would be replaced. The project is seen as a major step in upgrading the country’s ailing freight and logistics system.

Toll Holdings would be given the concession to manage the system and collect revenues for 30 years, with payments to the government commencing in the sixth year of operation. The Cambodian government would retain ownership of the tracks after the upgrade.

Sources close to the discussions say the parties are still finalising details of risk and cost sharing.

“This deal is extremely important to this country because, until now, there has been only one mode of land transport and that’s road. I think everyone appreciates the problems with congestion on Cambodia’s roads,” said Power.

This is part of a wider project to link Cambodia to the region.

Cambodia’s rail network was built in 1929 and saw its last upgrade in the 1960s. Protracted war and conflict destroyed or damaged parts of the system from the 1970s until the 1990s.

Of the $73 million budget, $12 million would come from a 32-year Asian Development Bank (ADB) loan at 1 percent interest for the first eight years and 1.5 percent for the remainder. The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) would provide $13 million, and the Malaysian government would supply $2.8 million in used rails. The Cambodian government would pitch in $15.2 million, according to the ADB.

Renovations are planned for the Sihanoukville-Phnom Penh stretch, which would be capable of carrying 20 tonnes of freight at a top speed of 40-50 kph, up from 15 tonnes currently. The Phnom Penh-Battambang line would also be refurbished and would carry 15 tonnes, followed by the Sisophan-Poipet stretch, which needs to be completely rebuilt.

A line would also run to the Sihanoukville Port, which businesses said would reduce cargo transport costs.

Crews started replacing the sleepers in March 2008, and the system upgrade is set to be completed in early 2011.
The ADB’s external relations coordinator Chantha Kim said the railway upgrade will benefit Cambodia’s rural economy and link the country to a regional rail network.

“It will allow better transport and allow products to be transported from rural areas to the cities at a much cheaper price,” he said. “This is part of a wider project to link Cambodia to the region through the Singapore to Kunming rail project,” he said.

The Singapore-Kunming network will link up Asia’s railways in a system stretching from Singapore to southern China, the ADB said.