Hello readers and welcome to my blog, Kissing Cambodia With My Feet. A weekly blog written by myself, Monika Metro, describing everything about my semester abroad in Siem Reap, Cambodia.

This is the first of many blog posts I will be making over the next few months documenting my time in Cambodia. I am excited and blessed to have this opportunity and to be able to share it with y’all. Check in here weekly to hear about the Cambodian culture and my Cambodian way of life as I learn new things about the world and myself.

My program will begin at the end of January in Siem Reap at the Center for Conservation and Development Studies. Here I will be living and learning with my classmates about the threats to biodiversity, environmental governance, and the ways in which conservation efforts and community livelihoods are intertwined. The urban center I will be living at lies on the outskirts of Siem Reap, near the fames temples of Angkor.  During this time period until the beginning of May, I will get the chance to travel to the elephant inhabited forests of Mondulkiri, the mountain and coastal ecosystems of Kampot, the Vietnamese Mekong Delta, and key sites along the Mekong River. This program will dig deeper into climate change, biodiversity conservation, environmental policy, community resource management, environmental ethics and justice, and sustainable livelihoods. I will additionally get the chance to conduct independent research that focuses on the impacts of climate change and unsustainable resource use in a rapidly developing country.

If you are further interested in what I will be doing in Cambodia you can check out the link below to the School for Field Studies page. Feel free to comment here or email me if you are interested in hearing more about it!

https://fieldstudies.org/program/cambodia-semester/

I am beyond blessed and thankful for this opportunity and the support of Virginia Wesleyan University, the Global Scholars Program, and all my professors, peers, family, and friends that have aided me in this process. So long for now and see you in a few weeks when I begin my journey!

As they would say in Khmer…

Lea heoy (goodbye),

Monika Metro

“We must open the doors and we must see to it they remain open, so that others can pass through.” – Rosemary Brown