Um Chanthon is a 41-year old woman who works as a moto taxi driver in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. She took up this job in 2000 after divorcing her husband to support her family as the sole provider. While moto driving was traditionally a male-dominated profession, Chanthon focuses on doing her job well and supports her two sons as a single mother. She faces challenges like long hours under the sun and not having savings, but her colleagues praise her courage in taking up this work. The document also discusses how gender roles are changing in Cambodian society, with more women able to work in jobs traditionally done by men."

1. Woman Moto Taxi Driver
By Ly Sopanha, Leang Srosromdoul, and Tey Channaret
PHNOM PENH: The world of moto-taxi driving in Cambodia has traditionally been dominated
by males. Surprisingly, there is a moto taxi service in Phnom Penh provided by a woman.
Forty-one-year-old, Um Chanthon, came from Chey Commune, Mean Chey Village, Srey
Sonthor District, Kompong Cham Province, has become a moto taxi driver since 2000. After
she divorced her husband, she response as the head of her family, so she has to go out and
work as moto taxi driver to support the family, including her mother and her two sons.
With no care of men talking about her being the female motodop driver in town, Chanthon
concentrates on doing her job, taking her customers from place to place. She gets around six
customers a day, which allows her to earn around 40000 to 50000 Riles a day on average.
Currently, she rent the house located Chroy Chongva Bridge which costs her $40 U.S. dollar a
month.
In Cambodia society that most women stay at home while their husbands go out to work to
support the family, Chanthon is a woman who tries to challenge within the society. She
normally wakes up in the early morning and takes her two lovely sons to school.
Um Chanthon: "Each morning I get up early to clean my motorbike and take my sons to
school. Then I ride a head to the place that I normally stand by for waiting the customers.”
When her sons are out from school, they take another moto taxi driver to go home because
Chanthon has to work a whole day without going home in lunch time. Her mother helps her
look after the children, and with work around the home, so that she can feel free without
worrying when she go out for earning money.
Women in Cambodia face numerous challenges and dangers, including gross human rights
violations. Many of these problems are related to the different values assigned to men and
woman in Cambodian society. Men occupy positions of importance and power and are not
censured for their frequent use of violence within family. The lower social status of women,
on the other hand, means that many are treated as mere possessions or objects ,and are
denied their rights and full participate in society. Nowadays , women are challenging

2. traditional in society because there are a lot of job that women can do like a men . For
example , women can be a president and women’s political participation in Cambodia.
According to Umm Chanthon said “ Since I have been a woman moto taxi driver in 2000, I
noticed that there are not so many women that do this career or I can say that there is only me
that the first woman taxi driver in Cambodia. But in 2009, there are more than ten women
that are moto taxi driver.
Gender refers to the roles and responsibilities of men and women that are created in our
families, our societies and our cultures. The concept of gender also includes the expectations
held about the characteristics, aptitudes and likely behaviours of both women and men
(femininity and masculinity). Gender roles and expectations are learned. They can change
over time and they vary within and between cultures. Systems of social differentiation such as
political status, class, ethnicity, physical and mental disability, age and more, modify gender
roles. The concept of gender is vital because, applied to social analysis, it reveals how
women’s subordination (or men’s domination) is socially constructed. As such, the
subordination can be changed or ended. It is not biologically predetermined nor is it fixed
forever. In society, women and men are have the equal right or gender equality .As we can see,
nowsadays, women can do everything what the men can do.
Even she can do her job well, it's not without its challenges. She just earn a day for fitting her
family a day withtout any money for saving because her sons study two schools, so she has to
spend money a lot. When she gets sick and can’t go to work, she has to borrow money from
her neighbors to support her family’s expense. Sometimes she feels tired of doing this job
because of sun’s heat.
Motodop is one of the most popular forms of transport in Phnom Penh, as the city does not
have a bus service or fast trains. There are taxis and Tuk Tuks, however motodop is the most
popular form of transport because it is cheap and takes customers directly to their
destination.
Um Chanthon: "Although I can do this work like a man, I sometimes get tired and bored from
the sun's heat. I have no other job to do because I have low education and here it is my
favorite job that I think it is suitable for me” added Chanthon.

3. Bun Long: "she is braver than other women and also more courageous than us that she can
do our work. I praise her heart that she can do this work to support her family after being
separated from her husband." It’s shown that, nowadays, women can do everything like men
do, and women also can be a president and can do much work that can help our society. We
cannot say women have to stay at home and take care of the baby since we all are human and
we can have gender equal. “
Her male colleagues praise her for doing what is considered in Cambodia to be men's work.
Chanthon gets both male and female customers as they trust her driving skills and want to
help her. They also choose her over others because she's friendly. She also has a lot of
foreigner customers for she can speak English very fluently. For this
Foreigner: “I think women and men are the same. If men can being as moto taxi driver,
women can being as that as well, and sometimes women can do it better than men.”