Cambodia Calling: Popular Singer Shot

Sunday, February 25, 2007

Popular Singer Shot

Friday was a sad day for some of my Cambodian friends in Phnom Penh. A leading pop singer Pov Panha Pich, 23 was shot and critically injured. Rumours are that the attack was the result of a love triangle. But friends tell me unlike other Cambodian pop songstresses, Pov Panha Pich has never been tarred by negative publicity, so the shooting came as a suprise. According to my friends, Panha Pich was first rushed to Calmette Hospital in Phnom Penh but later moved to a hospital in Vietnam at her mother's insistence. I was also told that her driver was killed in the attack, but I could not find anything in the online news to confirm this.

You can see Panha Pich's photo here: http://www.voanews.com/khmer/2007-02-23-voa1.cfm

Acid attacks and murders are common in Cambodia among those involved in love triangles. Below is another incident, that happened in 2003, involving a pop star who was shot in the face twice. She later died. You can read about it here.

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20031023/ai_n12720964

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At Bloom, our mission is to alleviate poverty and save the environment at the same time, through our recycled bags.

As a social enterprise in Cambodia, we are competing with many NGOs on the one hand (which get donations) and for want of a better word, capitalistic businesses (which drive down costs in an effort to maximise profits). We recognise and accept the challenges that face all business, but are committed to principles of Fair Play, and will NEVER sacrifice those principles in order to be competitive. This means, for instance, we will never sacrifice workers' pay just so our bags will be cheaper. The average pay at Bloom today is 2.13 times the market rate.

So please, before you ask us to discount our bags, remember that we are not a minimum wage factory; we are a social enterprise. If you want a cheap factory-made bag, Bloom is not what you are looking for. If you agree that workers (where-ever they are--Singapore, Germany, France, the US) should always be paid fairly and are not here to produce goods and services at low wages for the profit of big business, then please consider Bloom. Bloom bags are all hand-made by our small team who spend our working hours dreaming up and making bags.

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Bloom is a social enterprise established in Sept 2006 with the intention of providing fair-paying jobs to abandoned, widowed and divorced Cambodian women. Bloom is not a factory. We are a small workshop of nine people who work closely as a team to produce original, quality handmade bags made from recycled rice and fish feed bags.

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