Have you seen this girl (or boy)?

The story:

For Maria Elfversson, news that her missing six-year old had been seen safe and well with her father just days before she arrived in Cambodia - and had then disappeared once more -was bittersweet. The distraught mother of Alicia Elfversson, allegedly abducted by her father, says only a mother can understand the relief she felt when she heard recent news of her daughter during a visit to Sihanoukville this week after nine months of waiting.

But there was more disturbing news, too - the witnesses knew little Alicia as a boy called Al, and said the man she was with who identified himself as her father, Norwegian Torgier Nordbo, had cut her hair short and was dressing her in boy's clothes, possibly in an attempt to disguise her.

This is the suspected father:


The whole story on Expat Advisory

If you see this girl and the father, please call police!

Power cuts and the economy

We have now nearly daily a power cut. It takes between one and two hours, on average we are loosing two hours a day on work time. Just count this for the whole economy, and then please tell me where the boom is?

I can not see any progress in Cambodian power plants, but I can see more and more buildings and companies coming up. Imagine a six hours work day instead of 8, and then think about return of investment in 8 instead of six years.

Just some thoughts.

Sister Krama Gig

Max
Originally uploaded by thomaswanhoff

Sister Krama had their second gig yesterday at Talkin to a stranger, The picture shows Max, the awesome singer. Great music, kind of singer-songwriter-style, two guitars, bass, vocals, thats it. Check if they have more public performances!
More pictures: http://flickr.com/photos/wanhoff/sets/72157604210911144/

Artcafé Phnom Penh

Artcafé Phnom Penh
Originally uploaded by thomaswanhoff

Bob Dylan Abend

Bob Dylan Abend
Originally uploaded by thomaswanhoff

Guitar Player

Art Café

Art Café
Originally uploaded by thomaswanhoff

Bob Dylan concert at Art Cafe Phnom Penh

13 years for russian investor

PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - A Cambodian court sentenced a prominent Russian investor to 13 years in jail on Friday for the sexual abuse of a 14-year-old girl, the latest foreigner to be caught in the country's drive to stop child sex tourism.

In a different case a German man was sentenced to 13 years also because of sexual abuse of underage girls.

The russian case was followed by rumors if there was a trap for the successful investor just to get him out of the way of others.

One laptop per child: how its benefits

If you don't really know why every child should have a laptop, or you are concerned about cultural issues if children in rural places using laptops instead of learning traditional dances (ironic tag off), then read this story of a small village in Peru and how the OLPC effects the school and daily life. Amazing story.
Excerpt:

Three changes
Mr. Navarro and Mrs. Cornejo spoke amongst themselves for a few minutes. Then Mr. Navarro said they agreed there were three key changes.
As there are few roads in and around Arahuay, the children don’t communicate much outside of school — with anyone. The teachers started independently pointing out to Mr. Navarro that this was changing once the laptops arrived: kids started talking to each other outside of school hours over the mesh, and working together more while in school. They started talking a lot more with each other in person, and conquered their previously paralyzing fear of strangers.

The second thing, Mrs. Cornejo jumped in, is that the kids used to be pretty selfish, an unsurprising consequence of the abject poverty in much of Peru. It’s not that the kids are starving, it’s just that they don’t have very much; what they do have, they’re reluctant to share. With the laptops, the kids had to turn to each other to learn how to use them. Then they realized it was easy to send each other pictures and things they’ve written — and it became commonplace. The sharing, asserts Mrs. Cornejo, extended into the physical world, where once jealously-guarded personal items increasingly started being passed around between the kids, if somewhat nervously.

Barcamp Phnom Penh

after weeks of discussions and delays just a few people decided yesterday to try to set up the first barcamp on Phnom Penh.

BarCampPhnomPenh is Cambodia's first BarCamp to provide people with interest in technologies and Internet to come together for a two-day gathering to learn and share skills and knowledge.

The pace of changes in technology is amazing. Too many people may find not only that this is the Age of Information, but also have to live with the so called 'information overloaded'. And too many people may tell you that they have been left behind. This event hopes to give an open space for everyone to learn.

The BarCampPhnomPenh is free of charge to everyone. Participants will have presentations, talks, and meet-ups on a number of topics of interest to both people running businesses and non-profit organizations.

Barcamps are so called un-conferences, because normally the schedule will be fixed on the first day. More important is, that all the participants are also volunteers for the barcamp. So if you have anything you can contribute, please help.

On http://barcamp.org/BarCampPhnomPenh you will find all the information as well as the wiki. everyone can edit this, so feel free to share your thoughts and ideas with the community.

For now, we are looking for the best location. We need one big conference room and some smaller rooms. And of course we need sponsors for t-shirts and free coffee (and some other things too).

We will set up a googlegroup soon.

Please help us spreading the word about the barcamp and support us!

Tech Saturday Phnom Penh aka Bloggermeeting

Since weeks of silence the geeks and freaks gathered again at T N Coffee at Monivong. Of course we had a topic (Viirak and me decided to talk about Twitter), and of course it ended in a total different way. Preetam Rai from Global Voices was announced to come, but even in the century of wirless communication sometimes its hard to get connected. He finally showed up at 4 when I had to leave.


But tomorrow on Sunday will be another meeting, 2 p.m. at T N Coffee, should be a talk about the first barcamp in Phnom Penh.

Concerts at the Art Cafe in Phnom Penh

It was the second time today when I went to Art Cafe in Street 108 for a concert. Today it was classic music, two violins and one flute, and songs from Mozart and Händel.

To be honest, I was totally surprised how good the artists performed - although the neighboring bar had a birthday party with a lot of noise.

Personally, I think the Art cafe is the Number One spot for cultural events, because they are not only focussed on what is chic and trendy but they bring it back to the ground.

I will try to join all of the upcoming events in March, so you can meet me there!

Schedule:
FRIDAY, 14 March, 7pm
Berlin & “La Belle Epoche”
Melodies of amusement,
fun and lightness
a piano recital with
Juergen Assmann/Germany

SATURDAY, 15 March, 7pm
“Wine and Music are one”
German Baroque Music/ Fine Wine & Dining

Andrew Brouwers Blog

I just got the message that Andrew Brouwers Blog was actually stolen. He had a blogspot account and was victim of what was apparently a phishing attack. At the end he could not get into admin level and recieved an email from the kidnappers, as John Wekks told us today on the Tech Satirday meeting.

Fortunatly a lot of content is saved, so you can stll read Andrews Blog, but please change your booksmarks. Its now:
www.andybrouwer.co.uk/blog

Beach Party Hotel Cambodiana

Beach Party Hotel Cambodiana
Originally uploaded by thomaswanhoff

Beach Party Hotel Cambodiana

Beach Party Hotel Cambodiana
Originally uploaded by thomaswanhoff

Wrong way in economy

One of the biggest problems if you have a business is the fact, that neither products are produced in this country nor you get them in for a reasanoble price. Today I got the news that import tax on toys will increase about 35 percent. No, not everything is better, as some people say. High Import taxes are a lot of steps back.