Miss Grand Myanmar

Published on Apr 3, 2021 by Luke Hunt

Han Lay, Myanmar’s representative in the Miss Grand International beauty pageant, will remain in Thailand for security reasons after winning widespread applause for using the event to speak up for the atrocities being committed by the military in her home country.As she was crowned Miss Grand Myanmar 2020 at Saturday’s final in Bangkok, a tearful Han Lay drew thunderous applause as she sang “Heal the World” and pleaded for help, ignoring the pageant’s mantra that contestants remain apolitical.Read more here..

Breathing Life into Art

Published on Apr 3, 2021 by Luke Hunt

A podcast with artist Tyta Buth. At just 24 years of age, Tyta Buth has already established herself at the center of Cambodia’s arts scene. A portrait photographer who attracts hundreds of people to her exhibitions, she encapsulates the rise of a new generation of artists in a country which is rapidly moving away from a past overshadowed by war and genocide.Buth, who trades under the brand name TytaArt, studied Global Business & Design Management at Regent’s University London and Strategic Design Management at Parsons School of Design, The New School, in New York.With a keen eye, she captures the nature of humans in their rawest state or, as she describes it, an exposure of the soul. She spoke with....

Dancing with Mortality

Published on Sep 19, 2020 by Luke Hunt

Excerpts from Face Masks & Hand Gels; A Year of Living Covidly. These works were first published by Howl in Siem Reap, 2021, in response to the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.A near-death experience raises a question for Luke Hunt—international correspondent and author—’should I stay or should I go?’ “… my life review – a euphemism for near death experience or NDE – really didn’t do it for me.”As the new coronavirus took hold about 100 people were doing what they do best, sorting a barbecue, the last to be held in the garden of House Nine on Street 830 in Phnom Penh, my home for the last eight years.Old friends and the odd luminary – famed correspondent Jim Pringle....

Traveling in Southeast Asia

Published on Jun 29, 2020 by Luke Hunt

A podcast with Marissa Carruthers, a British journalist who spent 10 years working on newspapers in England before moving to Cambodia in 2012. Since then she has edited various publications in Cambodia and contributed to many regional publications.She currently freelances for various newspapers and magazines, specializing in travel, lifestyle and culture, is the Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnamese correspondent for travel trade publisher TTG Asia and often writes for the South China Morning Post.But the travel industry has taken an unprecedented hit from the new coronavirus and Carruthers says the challenges facing destinations, hotels and small business operators are daunting but could be overcome if there’s no second spike with the COVID-19 virus.She says a lack of coherency over what’s....

Reclaiming Angkor

Published on Jun 15, 2020 by Luke Hunt

SIEM REAP, CAMBODIA – The new coronavirus has left its mark on Angkor Wat, the world’s top tourist attraction. Foreign visitors are rare, the elephants are being rehoused and local businesses have gone bankrupt, but for Cambodians it’s a chance to reclaim their heritage. Authorities say the number of paying visitors have been measured by the dozens on any given day and all are among those who remained in the country after the coronavirus began crossing borders in late January, forcing lockdowns around the world and ending international travel. Read more from VoA. .