The exhibition runs from February 22 to March 12 at Olympia Mall in Phnom Penh. Its opening day was attended by Minister of Information Khieu Kanharith and Tun Saim, undersecretary of state at the Ministry of Education, Youth, and Sport.
Kanharith said at the opening ceremony for the exhibition that he personally intends to buy several books to read and to donate to the ministry’s library and the Scholar’s Library.
“With half-a-million books on sale this year, I think at least 300,000 could be sold. Who thinks that because the books are selling at cheap price they must all be old books? They aren’t! They are good books that are normally expensive, but selling at cheap prices,” he said.
He said that books are still useful even in the electronic age and reading is essential to being an educated person in addition to gaining knowledge from teachers at school.
“Now, compared to my generation, there are a thousand times more books and the quality is a thousand times better. The quality is much higher than in previous years. In the past, there were very few beautiful books printed in Khmer,” he said.
The information minister also invited the organisers to hold the Big Bad Wolf book exhibition in Cambodia every year to encourage reading and give book lovers a chance to pick up the latest books.
Originally from Malaysia, over the past decade Big Bad Wolf Books has hosted large scale book exhibitions in 15 countries and 37 cities. According to the organisers of the exhibition, Big Bad Wolf wants to build a culture of reading in Cambodia by bringing affordable English-language books for everyone to enjoy.
The exhibition includes children’s books, fiction and non-fiction for all ages, and that includes best-selling and popular books, novels, science fiction, romance, personal development books, serious literature, graphic novels, business guides, architecture and design photo books and coffee table books, cook books and more.
“Not only that, for readers who have a favourite author in mind, do not forget to come and support them, because apart from the foreign books in English, we also have many Khmer books on sale written by countless local authors,” said event organiser Andrew Yap.
Yan Bopha, a fourth year student of the Institute of Technology of Cambodia said with enthusiasm that she wished they held the event here every year.
“The prices are very reasonable, even when the prices are not yet discounted. The important thing is that this exhibition has many types of books,” she told The Post.
Ouk Chantha, who collaborated with Yap on organising the exhibition, said that at the first exhibition in January 2020, just before the pandemic, more than 300,000 books were sold.
She said the Big Bad Wolf has returned with even better books and more specially discounted books than before and many books that were aimed at local customers.
According to phnompenhpost.com
