Life After the Khmer Rouge....

Family:

The Cambodian people know the importance of family life. Often they have big families so they can surround themselves with all that love and happiness. That’s why the average family in Cambodia has four children. It is also very rare in Cambodia that a family break apart. When children get older and get married it is quite common for the new couple to move less than a block from their parents. Do they move near the woman’s parents or the man’s parents? Chances are, both. You see the Cambodian people are allowed to marry whom ever they want but they organize dating so that it’s limited only to certain boys. For example parents may not allow boys who live in different villages or who are too poor to court their daughter. The girl doesn’t object to this because she loves and respects her parents. In Cambodia single mothers try to marry but often can not find a spouse due to the financial burden the man has to take on. Most commonly, widowed mothers would join together to form their own "family," where they can help each other out when they need it most

Food:

The two main dishes in Cambodia are soup and rice. They dress these two items up according to what they have and location. They put anything from eggs to fish in theirs soups and add a number of different spices to make it spicy, tangy or savory. Rice is their main food. It is eaten at every single meal and is prepared accordingly. Cambodia use to have an abundance of food but during the Khmer Rouge era, it thinned out. The Cambodians also enjoy a wide variety of fruits and seafood throughout the year to accompany their rice and fish

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Source: Sheehan, Sean. Cambodia. Tarrytown, New York: Marshall Cavendish Corporation, 1996.

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