27 March 2025
Channich Kov: An Entrepreneur in Many Realms
I first met Channich in 2013 at the Royal University of Phnom Penh when she was my student in the "Professional Communication" course. She came back for more in "Southeast Asian Studies" in 2014. Then, as life has it, things accellerated. In 2017, I congratulated the lucky fellow won her heart and at our most recent meeting a few months ago she was holding her most recent "project" and probably the toughest yet.
Here, Channich gives to me image she made of a tree--my favorite metaphor for a student. I am reminded often of Channich's creativity. Part of a sketch she did is still my Facebook profile image.
When her friends learned that Channich Kov, who studied environmental science at the Royal University of Phnom Penh, took a job at Vital, a bottled water company, they could not help but to see this as hypocrisy. How, they wondered, can someone acutely knowledgeable about the environmental damage caused by plastic join forces with NVC Cooperation Co., a company that generates thousands of kilos of plastic every year?!
Her response: they need me.
And need her they did. With a newly minted B.Sc., Vital hired Channich as a Brand Executive, a job title that does not seem to fit a young 22-year-old. Nonetheless, Ms. Kov did make inroads to realize her desire to protect the environment by proposing to Vital packaging the reduces the making of plastic.
Her motivation to strengthen her knowledge and credentials took her to Monash University in Australia where she earned an MA of Environment and Sustainability.
Down deep, Ms. Kov is an entrepreneur, something difficult to shake. In 2023, she started Omnor Botanic, a company that sells gorgeous eco-friendly plants which are mostly purchased as gifts. Her Facebook page has over 11,000 followers.
Most recently, Ms. Kov took off on another worthy enterprise—bringing a child into the world. She took on parenting like she takes on all else: with vigor and a thirst for learning how to do her best.
In a culture where wisdom is passed down orally from elders, there is a gap in understanding about how best to raise a child. People of Ms. Kov's generation were raised by mothers whose mothers raised them during the Khmer Rouge time. At that time, children were torn from their mothers; families broken apart.
Nonetheless, Ms. Kov did a "deep dive" into literature about child rearing. She weighed cultural practices to ward off evil spirits with what she learned on the internet like mother-child bonding. Ms. Channich knows full well that bottles are not only not good for the environment; they are not so good for babies either. Many of these things she documents on the internet with joy and witticisms for family and friends.
When I was thinking to ask if she would ever return to "work", I stopped myself. This is more work than she has ever done.
A special tribute for
Since coming to the Kingdom, I have witnessed the lives of Cambodian women - the women who faithfully walk to the wat every ស៊ុល day, the ones who serve soup from dawn to dusk, the ones who ride bicycles to the university where they've earned a scholarship, the ones whose baby they hold with one arm and tend the rice with the other, and the ones who drive their motorbikes to offices to do jobs they've fought to earn. For so many, their lives are hard, harder than most.
This is why this year I have chosen to write about a few of these women who I have been honored to know in my time here. Colleagues and friends. Students who I have been fortunate enough to keep tabs on. These are just a few stories of inspiring people. I hope you too will write your own. And maybe be an inspiration for someone else.
"Stories of Women in Cambodia" is a special project hosted within the Sharing and Listening, Cambodia 1975-1979 website, a website I created some time ago to host my students' interviews with their elders about their lives during the Khmer Rouge time.