Truly a global citizen, author Menno de Block has lived in Canada, France, Ireland, and Turkey, after having been raised in the Netherlands. In August, 2014, he moved to Phnom Penh, Cambodia to work in the social enterprise sector. There, he quickly became inspired by the many young women who showed brave leadership in their lives and careers, and decided to write a book about their stories. Together with Cambodian women’s rights activist Kunthea Chan, he interviewed 25 young women leaders, and turned their stories into a ‘reality novel’ about four main characters, each of whom are based on multiple real women. Margareta Barchan, founder of The Brave Leaders Project, spoke with De Block in Phnom Penh in 2017, shortly before he published his book Diving Deep, Going Far (2018).

Menno de Block with co-author Kunthea Chan. Image courtesy of Sovrin Magazine.

What is happening with the women in Cambodia right now that captured your attention?

When I first arrived, I was staying in a hostel and quickly became friends with the receptionist. She was a young woman from a very poor family. She was lucky enough to get a scholarship to go to university for a year, but she also had to work 8 hours a day to pay for the rest of her education and other expenses. Her dedication was impressive. One morning, I came down and saw her studying at the reception desk, even though her exams had just ended. When I asked why she was still studying, she said that she wanted to see how the information would be useful for her job. The women here are the ones who take care of the community and fight for progress. I began to meet a lot of women like this, and that is why I decided to write a book about them.

What conditions allow these women to pursue their passions and work goals?

Cambodia’s society is matrilineal, which means that the family line is passed down through the women, rather than the men. This means that often, it is the husband who moves in with the bride’s family, rather than the other way around, like in most Asian countries. As a result, parents usually put a lot of emphasis on teaching their daughters a strong sense of responsibility, because they know that she will be the one taking care of them when they get older.

At the same time, over the past 10, 20 years, a lot more women have been getting higher education, and there have been many organizations that work on women’s empowerment. So when you combine that sense of responsibility with a rising level of education and growing opportunities, you get many women who have started to say: “I don’t want to go back to my village to live with my parents and get married when I’m 18. I want to have a career, study more, and make my country better.”

Does it take courage for these women to say that?

Absolutely. Each of these women is going against the expectations of their families, their communities, and a large part of their society. Even though daughters may be valued more than in many other Asian countries, women are traditionally not expected to play a role in society, other than just stay at home and take care of the family.

Of course, this is slowly changing, but there is a long way to go. Even most people who do support women leaders still expect them to also take care of the household and their family. Most people will always see the household, husband, and children as a woman’s first priority, unlike for men. So when they see a woman in a high position, most people, including most women, will think: “Oh, she probably works very hard. That must mean she’s not a good wife.”

Despite intense pressure to keep their daughters at home, as tradition dictates, some parents allow their daughters to pursue education. How are they brave enough to do that?

I think all the women I’ve interviewed had at least one parent or grandparent who supported their education. In some cases, the parents had a dream of getting educated themselves, but had to give up on it due to the Khmer Rouge and civil war. Now, they try to live their own dream through their children, despite having to deal with the gossips of their neighbors.

In other cases, it’s very much a gradual process, where a young woman gets her parents’ permission for only the next step. Many of them are quite clever about this: They dream of a different life all along, but they know exactly what to ask for and what to leave out. They know that if they told their parents their entire dream, the parents would never support it. But they may get support for just one more year in school, or just one more year in the city. And in the end, parents see the results, and often it does make them proud, even if it’s not exactly what they had in mind.

And in some cases, parents, especially mothers, know that education is simply the only way out. For example, Nika, one of the characters in Diving Deep, Going Far, grows up in a very poor family, with an abusive father. Her mother knows that education is the only way for her children to get out of that life, and she is willing to sacrifice everything to see that happen. From a very young age, she tells Nika: “Education is the only thing you can always carry with you. No one can steal it from you, no one can burn it.”

What role do you hope your book will play for the women in Cambodia?

Many of the women I interviewed mentioned that a lack of role models was one of their main barriers to become a leader. I hope that, together with them, we can turn this book into a platform for them to become those role models. Their stories show what is possible for women in Cambodia.

Author Menno de Block: Stories of Courage in Cambodia