From factory to beer garden

Vong Sokheng

Phnom Penh Post

A CROWD of young women lingers at the entrance to a Tuol Kork district beer garden. The hostesses sit in rows waiting for customers. Their dresses are cut short, and their make-up is carefully applied under perfectly sculpted hair.

It is a scene that has long been typical of drinking dens across the city. But some of the women at this establishment – and countless others like it – are new to the entertainment industry.

The global financial crisis saw Cambodia lose more than 75,000 garment factory jobs between September 2008 and October 2009, according to Ministry of Commerce figures. As laid-off employees struggle to find new jobs, some have accepted work as hostesses and promoters in beer gardens, where the country’s informal sex trade thrives in the open.

That’s where Huon Chetra, 26, found herself after the garment factory that employed her shut its doors late last year. Seeing few other options, she soon took a job as a hostess in Tuol Kork.

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