My name is Theany, and I am 28 years old. I have two brothers and three sisters; I am the youngest in the family. I was born in Siem Reap and grew up in Siem Reap, but my parents moved to Battambang in 2001. So, since I was seven years old, I have stayed with my sisters and brothers. At that time, my oldest sister was 19 years old.  

When I was seven years old, my family was in a challenging situation, so my parents decided to go to Thailand to sell fruits for Thai and transfer some money for our studies even though we were poor, but they didn’t want us to give up for studying. After a year, my parents saved some money and bought a farm in Battambang. I kept studying to finish high school in 2012 at Hun Sen Wat Svay; my parents still supported and encoring me to continue for a bachelor’s degree. In the beginning, it was very hard for me because my house and university were very far, and I needed to ride a bike for a university class.  

My parents are farmers, so they work harder than me, most of their time working in the field. My father became thin, and my mother said that he worked more than 10 hours a day; sometimes, his breakfast was just a cup of coffee, and lunch and dinner only one time. He grows mango, corn, papaya, banana, potato, and cashew nuts. We have long term and short-term plants for our daily living and get some money to take care of the long-time plants. Due to my mother has weak health, my dad did not ask my mother to work hard as he did. Seeing my parents is harder; it makes me feel that I am not hard enough to say I am very hard.  

In 2016, I got a job as an English Teacher at New Hope Cambodia, and in 2017, I graduated from university (Teaching English as a Foreign Language).  

I got married in 2018; after being married for two years, we have got one daughter, and now she is almost two years. Due to Covid-19, it has been hard to find a job in Siem Reap, so my husband works in another province, but it is hard to earn money. Because of this, we decided to work together and keep our kid with my parents in law in Kompongkdey province. We feel really bad about this decision, but we have no choice.  

On 01st June 2022, I joined Reach Siem Reap as an English Teacher. I have many reasons why I try so hard to work at Reach, but the biggest is that I have the same goal to help poor people and one more, I hope my daughter will be able to study here too. In the future, I want to be the best model for everyone. 

All in all, working as an English Teacher is a big responsibility. We must know and face many situations to make sure we can handle and respond with a good model. And I am so excited to be here, and I will try my best to be the best teacher in Reach Siem Reap.