Aziza’s Place is a living and learning center for impoverished children located in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, founded in partnership with the Aziza Ghori Charitable Foundation (Aziza Foundation).

In 2006, Amjad and Fauzia Ghori visited Cambodia to oversee the filming of a documentary about an orphanage in the Tonle Bassac region of Phnom Penh. It was there that they met Nader Ebrahimi, who had been working to improve conditions at the orphanage for several months whilst working as a freelance filmmaker. Amjad and Fauzia initially tried to work with the management of the existing orphanage, but soon realized that the only way to implement the change they wanted to see was to open their own center in their daughter Aziza’s name.

Nader took on the direction of the project, and on February 14, 2007 Aziza’s Place opened its doors to 14 children. To date, Aziza’s Place has grown to 24 children, with over a quarter from Tonle Bassac and the majority from Stoeng Meanchey, Phnom Penh’s municipal dump site.

Stoeng Meanchey is a 3-acre rubbish dump at the edge of Phnom Penh; every day hundreds of people eke out a living picking garbage for up to 12 hours at a time, to redeem one dollar a day. The Tonle Bassac region is one of Phnom Penh’s poorest, and its inhabitants are now being forcibly relocated by the government to make room for a new shopping center.

Today, Aziza’s Place provides its children with 24-hour supervised in-house care, three balanced meals a day, medical/dental care, as well as full time comprehensive education with includes English, math, geography, art, Khmer history, computer, karate and Apsara dance.

The principal and short-term goal of the Center is to create a multi-disciplinary arts program that fosters the children’s unbridled creativity, through mediums as varied as drawing, painting, sculpture, photography, filmmaking, graphic design, animation, as well as the performing arts (traditional Khmer music and Apsara dance).

The rapid development Cambodia is currently experiencing will inevitably lead to a rise in demand (esp among the upper and middle class) for leisure activities and entertainment; cartoonists, animators, camera-men, actors, musicians, dancers, writers and designers (fashion, jewelry, furniture) will find that not only their craft but their innovation are helping to shape a new cultural identity here in Cambodia. We hope our children will not only are part of that movement, but lead it.

For more info, contact azizas.place@yahoo.com or call/send a text to +855 (0)092 511 023.