CAMBODIAN COMICS!

So, I've recently joined the board of Siewphewyeung (Our Books), a Cambodian non-profit promoting the cause of Khmer (Cambodian) language comic books. This is cool stuff, as I'm a big fan of Khmer comics... It's a wonderful, local tradition that's in danger of dying out due to lack of intellectual property rights enforcement and competition from other media. I recently wrote an article on the subject for Punk Planet magazine (I'll be posting a version of the article on my site after three months, when their "first publishing" clause runs out), and because of that I was asked to be on the Our Books board.

Right now, we're working on getting together a yearly Cambodian comics award that would publish a graphic novel in Khmer (and, if funds permit, in English and French). We would print the book in Cambodia, pay the cartoonist properly for his/her work, and distribute the book to the booksellers and libraries around the country (and perhaps abroad).

After so many years of bumming around the world with a backpack, it feels good to actually be doing something positive in a country that I've felt a connection with... and it's especially amazing to be doing it through comics, my passion.

The image is of the cover of an anti-corruption-themed comic book that Our Books published recently called Life's Choices.