Our spring Newsletter

We are so happy and proud that Soria Moria was named a Runner Up for the 2012 Tourism For Tomorrow Community Benefit Award. As a small social enterprice with the majority ownership held by the local employees, this is a huge achievement. A recognition like this is a great motivation for us to continoue and improve our work.

The Tourism for Tomorrow Awards are one of the world’s highest accolades in the Travel & Tourism industry. They are aimed at highlighting prime examples of best practice in sustainable tourism. The Community Benefit category focuses on initiatives that have efficiently demonstrated direct benefit to local people, including capacity building, transfer of industry skills, community development and support cultural heritage.

Dear Friends! Welcome to our Spring Newsletter. 2012 has so far been very exciting year in Soria Moria, and we are happy to share some of the highlights with you. We have tried our best to keep it brief -hope you will enjoy it! To read more about the different events, you may follow the links. For regular updates, you can check out our Newsblog, and follow us on Twitter and Facebook. We always value comments and feedback.

With the very best wishes from The Soria Moria Team

The first big news in January was that Thomas received the Royal Order of Sahametrei, a medal from His Majesty the King and a diploma signed by the Prime Minister. Shortly after we got the news from World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) that Soria Moria had been  shortlisted as 1 of 3 finalists in the 2012 Tourism for Tomorrow Awards. One morning one of our lovely guests, Mike, singer and songwriter from the UK, surprised us with a song he had composed for us. What a lovely gift! We now have an official Soria Moria song!!

In February we had an on-site evaluator, Professor Peter Burns, from University of Brighton/WTTC, staying with us for 4 days to thoroughly asses our business model. During his stay we also went out to meet with some of our local partners, and were overwhelmed by the positive responses. Thanks so much to all of you who spared your valuable time to give us your feedback.

We have hosted a few fundraiser events this year, but would like to highlight the wonderful event we held for the Giant Puppet Project, with performances from many of the top musicians in town. It was amazing to see a large part of the community come together for such a good cause. Thank you! And the Giant Puppet Parade was amazing – well done Puppet Team!! 

In March we were very excited to start using  biodiesel from Naga Biofuels to help power our generator. The biodiesel has been made from our recycled cooking oil. For the whole month we were lucky to have Tina, a guest chef from Norway, staying with us. She worked with our kitchen team and introduced some yummy new dishes for our $1-night menu. We also attended the workshop “Working towards a Sustainable Tourism Management Plan” at the Apsara Headquarters hosted by UNESCO and Ministry of Tourism. Good to see some progress in this area, and we appreciate that the stakeholders are being involved in the process.

In April Samnieng had his first trip ever outside Cambodia, to attend The Global Summit and Tourism for Tomorrow Awards ceremony in Tokyo/Sendai. He had many good experiences to share with the team upon his return.  

There are currently 13 students enrolled in Soria Moria Higher Education Program, and the new term has just started. We wish them the best of luck wit their studies.

It’s May and the low season has set in, and we are eagerly preparing for our annual staff retreat to Sihanoukville next week…

Siem Reap has just been rated as the No. 1 destination in Asia to visit, and No. 9 in the world in  Tripadvisors 2012 Travelers’ Choice Awards. Lets hope this will encourage more travelers to visit our beautiful Cambodia in the months to come!!!    

Kristin Holdø Hansen
Soria Moria Boutique Hotel