Sometimes the mere connection we make with each other can change people's lives. It doesn't have to be something big. The mere fact that you're interested in them makes them happy.

I have some advantages of viewing from the two lenses, the two perspectives. I think that a lot of visual artists who come back here from the United States and are Cambodian also write from their American references - looking inside the old culture, and looking at themselves as an American looking into the country where they were born.

Art is really about how you capture different things you see around you and bring them into forms and words and shapes and meaning.

I have a great advantage: I write from the perspective of my own voice. I'm not copying anyone's voice. It's my voice. I have the advantage of being a writer of English as a second language.

When I hear Khmer poets, when they recite their poems, I know what they're talking about, I get it right away.

You have to experiment with different mediums and things around you [making art].

I liked museums but I wanted to be a dancer, I wanted to go into performing arts, or be a writer.