For my very first day of year 2012, we went for a ride to Oudong, the ancient royal capital of the Kindgom. I love going to Oudong, on the way, we pass by a disappearing beautiful village, the kind of places that seems to exist only in dreams, traditional houses, ricefields just harvested, old ladies in white blouses and black pants going to the pagodas...and no plastic bags and dump sites for rubbish !! It is the season of the prahok so we went to Kompong Luang on the way back. See my trip in images... sometimes, you don't want to eat prahok anymore :)
Fishermen live on the river. They go in these small boats which come back full of small fishes. This community on the photo is of Vietnamese origin.
People come to the boat to choose for the fishes
The net they use to catch the fishes - they are very small fishes, that we use for prahok
And one can also buy from the wholesalers.
Really fresh fish, shiny, just out from the river!
Can you see? the boat is filled up ... there is a man [...]
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Friends, I see I have not updated the blog for a year already ! Totally forgot about it since I try to give more frequent news on facebook. Follow me there !!!
www.facebook.com/bosbapanh
Let me wish you a wonderful new year 2012, may all your wishes come true. Bosba
My dad often receives calls from parents who are asking if we have a music school or where they can learn music. There are now lots of places where you can learn, but it costs quite a lot of money. In fact, I think music education should be free, like in many countries, even in China where my brother studies, music is part of the classes we have at school. But we are not quite here yet in Cambodia.
There are many private lessons given by artists (Cambodian or foreign living here) but the prices are high for a normal Cambodian family at 10-15$ per hour for Cambodian teachers and 15-30$ for foreign teachers. There are also private schools by Cambodian teachers / musicians (for example Khru Rithiravuth - Mozart Music Center and by Khru Ram Daravong) which are not too expensive, and you learn with others. If they receive some funds and instruments from the NGOs for example, then it is free, which is great.
There are also private schools opened by foreigners where you pay from 80$ [...]
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We have been meeting every Sunday since August to work with the musicians. In total 25 sessions and already half of these are gone. Only 13 left until the D-DAY ! Sometimes it is at home and it is sooooo small that we can't move!
We are lucky it is not raining like for the October 2009 concert, where we all had our feet in 20 cm of water because the rain water did not drain quickly enough ! that was fun. On other times, we have been lucky to be provided with some spaces in hotels. In fact, it is difficult for all the artists to find a free and large space to work in Phnom Penh.
The nice thing for the concert@angkor is that we mix the traditional ensembles (Mohori, Pinpeat) with the semi-classical band....
the Chinese instruments. For the Chinese music, we are working with Roland and master Liao who are from the Simphony Music School in Boeng Keng Kang.
We will have jazz stylings, sacred music (smot), modern music (master composer Ung Chinary). It is so interesting [...]
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