MRS. SOK PHORN
BORN IN TAKEO IN 1965. LIVES IN KANAGAWA

After they got married, Phorn and her husband moved from Khao-I-Dang camp to Chunbhuri camp. They stayed there for a while before leaving for Japan. There, her husband had a business of recording music cassette tapes for sale. Original tapes with old Khmer songs were sold in Thailand. Her husband crossed to Thailand to buy those tapes, which he copied in order to sell them in the camp. One copy costs 15 THB. Most of his customers were refugees who were readied to leave for a third country such as the United States, Canada, France or Australia.

In 1997, when they received news that they could move to Japan, her husband packed around 300 old cassette tapes with him hoping that he could continue his business in Japan, but things did not turn out as he expected. In Japan, the surroundings had changed. The Cambodian refugee customers no longer listened to old Khmer songs. As a result, he could not continue his business. Nevertheless, the couple has kept the 300 cassette tapes in their home. They do not want to throw them away.