Sata stringing one of the heads with nylon,
onto which will be stapled the handcut plastic squares.

Last night we were so HAPPY to welcome four gorgeous Youthstar people, who came after their dinner to staple plastic for more than two hours.. and say they will be back tonight! You are so welcome, and we are always struck with the utter professionalism and goodwill of any Youthstar people we come across. Anybody in Siem Reap area who wishes to join please just call us.

We are busy... yesterday we worked all day then after dinner.. stopping exhausted at ten pm. But everyone is, in true Cambodian style, throwing themselves into the task with humour and enjoying doing this great project together. It is a privilege.

Seckon strung up the heads - all ready for plastic! Borei and Sata carried on, along with Somoeun, expertly and carefully making sure each nylon was taut and evenly spaced. They are going to be perfect!

Aesthetically pleasing

We are quite stunned at the beauty of the Naga already. The Rattan structure is light, and the nylon and plastic adds nothing much, and with the breeze she sways and twitters

Thankyou so much to these lovely students from Build Bright University in Siem Reap... they turned up yesterday with their effervescence and raised our spirits right when we were realising how long 200m is, and how much surface area there is when the diameter of the ovals is 1.3m and there are 40 nylon strings to have plastic stapled on... Thanks so much, hope you like these pics!

Thankyou AAD so much for bringing your lovely people to help cut plastic... you guys are FANTASTIC! And we can't wait to see you walk your Trash Fashion in the show on the 22nd of March...

Each oval "bone" is strung together with about 40 nylon lengths, the bones must be exactly 4.1m apart ... oh yes... and onto every length is stapled, with two or preferably three staples, pieces of plastic which have been cut.... quite something, this Naga.

photos... Naga arriving on the truck!

It was quite something... the big truck took a whole day to get here with our Naga bones... then it got as far as Wat Damnak but could not turn the tight corner. Everything had to be moved onto a smaller truck and brought down to Darryl's house, at the end of a small lane.

Angkor Association for the Disabled

Thankyou to the AAD who have sent a team of seven of their members today to cut plastic and generally lend a hand with the naga.

AAD are quite famous for a fabulous dance fashion show they were a part of last year in conjunction with Epic Arts, called Celebrating Differences. Frank Schlichtmann made a really gorgeous short film about it. Last year Frank made a DVD of looping images for The Recycled Fashion Show. We are really happy that it will be projected onto the wall of the building the evening of the World Water Day party.

The AAD team will join our fashion show for the 22nd March with new costumes they are designing this week from trash! So great to have you all working with us.

the rattan has arrived!!!

It's all activity and hives and bees at Darryl's house. This afternoon the Rattan arrived.. the bones of our naga. It's looking beautiful... now we just need to make it.

I have that familiar feeling of community energies coming together.

Tonight we met with FCC to discuss details of the party on the 22nd. They have been very generous to sponsor a party for World Water Day, with accompanying exhibition to celebrate the installation of the Naga in the Siem Reap River right in front of the FCC. You can read more about it here.

The CWCC have some clients who will come to help tie long nylon between the bones, and then to staple the plastic over... our first estimates were that we'd need 16km of nylon. Many thanks to CWCC for helping.

Our workshop started today! Peppermint tea and biscuits for everyone cos cutting plastic is hard work... Seckon travelled to Roluos to talk bamboo posts with people who are driving them into the lakebed all the time (read: they know what to do about that!). We'll need around 50 we think, from which the naga will be suspended.

Iceberg

It's going to be a beautiful Naga.
We are in Siem Reap, waiting for the Rattan naga bones to arrive tomorrow morning.

We found this lady, who has a business selling recycled plastic to Vietnam.
She is excited about the Naga. There are a lot of businesses like this in Cambodia - recycling is good money. The bags are cleaned somehow and packed into compact bales like this one, then sold onto somewhere inVietnam where it is recycled.

The amount of plastic in the world is amazing.
Going to the Stung Meanchey dump.

While everything is breaking down the plastic lives forever.
It has some kind of godlike quality which defies normal processes.

In fact the dump is quite a beautiful place!
It takes you certainly to another place in your head.

Plastic fantastic.

Deadly place... every year people are killed and injured working close to the trucks.

Toxic place...
skin chemicals sky big
big wide sky
blue beautiful
grey breaking downness
muddy roads
-it rained last night while we were at seckon's opening-
how can we just be allowed to drive onto this mountain?
masks and landcruisers
recycling businesses and dump restaurants
children are here

amazing
people close to the toxic land

Arts Eco Forum

"As a community we are forced - more than ever - to consider the natural environment around us. Within this context, how are artists engaging with ecological issues and the natural environment? Australian cultural worker Bernice Childs will share examples of recent case studies from Australia and then open the forum for Cambodian and International artists to share their work. Hopefully this dialogue will be the beginning of future collaborations between artists and curators based in Australia and Cambodia.

Bernice Childs is one of Australia’s leading community cultural development workers, with over thirty years of experience."

Delightful Bernice held an arts-eco forum last week at cafe Living Room. Very interesting. We were there, along with a few artists and other interested people. I'm sure more discussion around the environment will continue in the arts community.

Hi Majesty has a website which we would like to recommend, you can see it here

We are so thankful to Your Majesty, King Norodom Sihamoni, for your letter supporting the Naga installation and the Rubbish Project.

We hope that your Majesty will love the end result of our project.

Thankyou so much

Leang Seckon and Fleur Smith

A letter of support from His Majesty King Norodom Sihamoni, dated 7th March 2008

the Naga, sponsored by the WWF's Sustainable Rattan Harvesting and Production Project

The Sustainable Rattan Harvest and Production Project of the WWF

We are sooo excited to be associated with the WWF
Last year WWF allowed us to use their logo; came up with small funding and were so lovely to join with us in the Recycled Fashion Show (here you can read their report about it).

When we approached them this year to see if they would like to be involved with us again for the Naga, they told us of their Sustainable Rattan project. At that stage we were planning to make all the "bones" of the Naga from Bamboo, but their powers of persuasion were such we decided to join with them and make the Naga from rattan! We are working with one of their partners to develop the Naga bones. We feel very happy to promote this project. Rattan is a great source of sustainable income as the rattan market in Cambodia is steadily strengthening each year.

in the news

aaaaand we are in the Sin Chew Daily (if you can read Chinese and here if you like to translate by goodle))

We are now offical! You can find us on the Siem Reap town website

Things are moving along so well.. Today we will travel again to Russey Chroy to see the bones of the Naga coming together

Fleur and Seckon

news...community spirit ..

We are soooo excited!! Last year when we organised the Recycled Fashion Show our experience very much was of that wonderful Phnom Penh community spirit coming together to make something very special happen, all with the aim of raising awareness of environmental issues in Cambodia.

This year as you know we will install the Naga on the Siem Reap River for World Water Day on 22 March. It's an ambitious project, that's true. But we are having the same sense of everything coming together and it is only because people are often so LOVELY and show Imagination and Generosity!

This week we are thrilled to have secured the ANZ Royal as our major sponsor. Many thanks to the ANZ for their great support of the Naga. Though they have been operating in Cambodia a few short years, they are already well known for their support of community projects.

Just today we also had other good news - The Mekong River Commission supports the Naga Queen project in celebration of World Water Day 2008. With the mighty Mekong being a living vein running through this country we are sooo delighted the MRC have joined with us for World Water Day.

And the World Wildlife Fund have a rattan project from which all the rattan for our Naga will come. The WWF were so lovely to us last year- especially seeing as Seckon and myself basically cold-called them, explaining our hopes for the Recycled Fashion Show. We must have seemed kind of crazy!

Seckon and I went to Siem Reap a couple of weeks ago, making connections, talking to people and happily FAO (the Food and Agriculture Organisation) and the Angkor Holiday Hotel have also given us donations!

And all this would be only less fabulous were it not for the lovely FCC Angkor who are true rockstars and are throwing a PARTY for the installation of the Naga, 6:30pm on the evening of 22 March, World Water Day.

Radio Free Asia

Click here to read an online article by Radio Free Asia, about the Naga

Auction Thanks

The Art Auction was a great night!! You can see the Expat-advisory photogallery here

Many thanks to everyone who came, supported, gave and bought art!

The auction was a splendiferous success, raising over $3000 towards the cost of the Naga. Once again we see the warmth of spirit of our community here in Cambodia, and we are looking forward to seeing the Naga on the Siem Reap River March 22!

The Mekong Times published this in Friday's issue...