No Rich No Handsome No Love

Last week, CITA hired a new staff member. He is a 27 year old, single guy born and raised in Phnom Penh and thankfully for me, he speaks decent English. We have a mutual appreciation for each other as he enjoys practicing his English and I enjoy having someone whom I can somewhat communicate with while at work. We’ve covered quite a few topics over the past week, but on Friday, we somehow stumbled onto the topics of dating and marriage. It was an interesting conversation and I thought it was worthwhile to share a few of the tidbits I learned about finding love Cambodia style:

** Girls like guys who drink beer; if a guy can afford a beer that means he is rich.
** Independent girls are trouble and no good for marriage.
** The way to a woman’s heart is through love songs; specifically “Love Songs”, Disks 1 – 4.(I guess we now know who actually purchases these infomercial cds).
** The most important qualities when looking for a wife, in order of importance, are: beauty, big house, and cooking skills.

When asked whether he thought qualities such as honesty, kindness, sense of humor, etc. were important, he did agree that they were important, but not nearly as important as a big house. (The big house is important because typically the guy moves in with his wife and her family once married. After learning this piece of information, I can empathize why a big house makes the top 3).

To get another perspective, I asked my female colleague about finding love Cambodia. She is 26 and says she’s still single because she has yet to find a rich, handsome man. She said finding a husband is straight forward and summed it up best in just a few short words... “ no rich, no handsome, no love”.