As we sink into the last days of the year for some much needed rest and recuperation, we look back at the events that made Raintree's 2019. The year has been one of our most active ones yet, having hosted over 100 events, trainings, and workshops as well as welcoming over 10,000 visitors to the building. The recent addition of the globally-loved tea shop Yi Fang to our cluster of retail outlets and exciting new office tenants SmallWorld Realty and Mekhala Radiant Communications also means our community is growing larger seeing the project almost completely full! But Raintree is much more than a workspace. Delving into our aspiration to be an enabler in capacity-building, we'd love to walk you through the highlights of our action in education, tech and empowering women in the workforce for 2019.
Year of Firsts
2019 marked new beginnings for a number of initiatives at Raintree. For starters, this year we partnered with Saturday Kids to pilot not one, but two international-standard coding programmes from Singapore to Cambodia. 200 students under 18 took the course for free, with the help of 50+ civic minded instructors, our education partners University of Puthisastra and Teach for Cambodia and the generous support of Smart Axiata and USAID’s Development Innovations.
With gender diversity and inclusiveness at the top of our agenda, came the launch of the first ever edition of #IAmRemarkable in Cambodia to mark International Women’s Day earlier this year. Led by Google, #IAmRemarkable is an initiative designed to empower underrepresented groups to recognise and celebrate achievements in the workplace, challenging social cultural norms. The Raintree edition included a 90-minute interactive workshop discussing the significance of fact-based self-advocacy in the workplace, providing participants with tools and actionable recommendations to go about self-promotion strategically. Read more about our focus on women in the workplace here >>
Meanwhile, the Kingdom's tech landscape has been bursting with energy and it’s been fun to be part of this phenomenon in different ways. After a long year of researching, we were proud to reveal the full version of the first Cambodian tech startup report. The report is an independent snapshot of the tech startup ecosystem identifying key challenges, opportunities, and existing support resources. We hope the report is able to catalyse constructive dialogue on how we can develop Cambodia's digital economy through more systematic approaches. Download your copy here >>
This year we've also collaborated with SmallWorld, one of the earliest homegrown startup communities in Cambodia, to bring SmallWorld Realty to the second floor of our professional home. Knowing that we'll be stronger with each other's ideas, we hope that this collaboration will drum up even more support for entrepreneurs to grow and scale. Read about the partnership here >>
Out and About
As an enabler, we experience first-hand the powerful force of true collaboration, and how it can drive both growth and impact. This is why some of our favourite humans of Raintree (that's right, we pick favourites) have been engaging in a multitude of programmes and speaking engagements both domestically and internationally to exchange our thoughts in places we believe will ignite provoking conversations to inspire bolder action. Some of our noteworthy highlights include our co-founder Zoë Ng's seminar at the National University of Management, judging the architecture competition "Designing Accessible Solutions for the New Phnom Penh", and of course her recent nomination for the inaugural Obama Foundation Leaders: Asia-Pacific Program.
Our Community Manager Penhleak 'Pinkie' Chan, has also been out and about, driving the two educational programmes 'Coding Cats' and 'Tiny Coding Cats' and also taking to the startup stages to speak at Digital Cambodia, Global Entrepreneurship Week and Seedstars Bootcamp. Her busy year was also marked by becoming the Curator for the Global Shapers Community Phnom Penh Hub, an initiative of the World Economic Forum, and representing Cambodia at the Annual Summit in Geneva, Switzerland.
Playtime @ Raintree
Nobody does 'work hard, play harder' like Raintree. This summer we kicked off ‘Frames & Beers’, bringing together our creative community for a lovely evening of tipples and nibbles to celebrate our love for architecture and design, through photography. The event revealed the winners of our first Archi-walk Photography Challenge in collaboration with Khmer Architecture Tours. We showcased the Top 10 images shot by Raintree residents, taken on a local architecture walk with two sessions - Vann Molyvann Masterpieces and French Colonial Craze - during a fun-filled day outside the office packed with creative learning.
The party did not stop here. Continuing our tradition of throwing a holiday bash, this year's edition of Christmas @ Raintree got an extra sprinkle of special with the theme 'Siem Reap in the City' to celebrate Cambodia's contemporary design culture. The two-day extravaganza welcomed over 2,500 guests, incredible performances by Hypelab's DJ Brandon Perez, vocalist Tasha Aleia and talented percussionist Derrick Siow from Malaysia. The event also marked book pre-launch of 'Siem Reap: A Designer's Perspective' a coffee-table book that paints a refreshing portrait of the majestic city co-authored by photographer and designer Nataly Lee and our favourite Cambodian architect Hok Kang. Keep a lookout for the official publication date out soon!
Bring it on 2020!
As we close the year, we look back with fondness and gratitude to the people who have helped us live our aspiration to become a dynamic professional community, fueled with passion and intention to do amazing things for the Kingdom. Here’s to more awesome projects, collaborations and partnerships in 2020.
Cheers!
Zoë, Hok & Team Raintree
