PHNOM PENH: During 'Hari Keluarga Malaysia’ (Malaysian Family Day) held at the Embassy of Malaysia on Saturday, 8 October, many Malaysian businesses in Cambodia expressed their gratitude to the Cambodian people for their support, and also showcased what they had to offer in the Kingdom.

Guests who attended the Hari Keluarga Malaysia event had a chance to taste delicious Malaysian food, watch traditional Malaysian dances and a fashion show, and were even able to witness the Malaysian Ambassador get up on stage himself for an impromptu song and dance performance.

“Today is for us to celebrate Malaysia day, together with our national day, and also to celebrate Malaysian-Cambodian bilateral relations,” said Malaysian Ambassador Datuk Eldeen.

Plenty of food stalls, booths for face painting and henna painting, and booths to play games were organized for guests to enjoy. Additionally, many Malaysian businesses based in Cambodia had set up booths to promote their products and services.

Tourism Malaysia had a booth promoting trips to Malaysia, the booth for Intercare Medical Center (located in Olympia Medical Hub) was offering free health checkups, and Limkokwing University, which has a campus in Cambodia, had a booth where staff answered questions about the courses on offer at the university.

Ambassador Datuk Eldeen had mentioned during a previous interview with EAC News that there are currently close to 6,000 Malaysians living and working in Cambodia, along with around 500 Malaysian business established in the Kingdom.

Speaking with Director Jean-Francois Brulet from Limkokwing University, he shared that the Cambodian university branch offers different courses all taught by foreign Professors who hail from at least 16 different countries, helping to strengthen students' command of the English language, both on a conversational and professional level. He said this experience will help students find work anywhere in the world.

“The branch in Cambodia is developing a lot, according to [students’] needs,” he said. “You can see that Cambodia’s [interest in] architecture is booming, so we respond to the need of the community.… We are offering [courses] based on creativity and design, [such as] interior [design], architecture, fashion design, professional design, software engineering, and business.”

At Olympia Medical Hub’s booth, the Sales, Marketing and Communications Manager, Mary Clavel, shared the different services offered by the Intercare Medical Center located in the Olympia Medical Hub building.

“We provide various services, medical services, such as general practice or health consultation... and at the same time we also have our own imaging center,” said Clavel.

She added that the medical center has both local and international doctors, and is currently developing an operating theater. In a couple of months, the center is expecting to open new maternity and inpatient departments, and is also considering opening new oncology, ICU and cardio units.

Malaysian clothing brand, Caftanist, supplied the outfits worn by the models for the fashion show, as well as the dress worn by the event’s MC, Tania Hodges. Speaking with Caftanist’s Manager, Nur Afifa Natasha binti Mohamed Anuar, she explained that the featured outfits were exclusively made for the Malaysian Family Day event, and were also designed to be one-size-fits-all.

“We did a fashion show emphasizing the ‘Kaftan Batik’ that we made exclusively for this event,” she said. “Caftanist was honored to supply the dress for the MC today, she looks very lovely, [and] what makes [our clothes] different is that we [make them] one-size-fits-all. [Our clothes] can fit from boutique to plus size.”

With over 400 guests attending Malaysian Family Day, Ambassador Datuk Eldeen expressed great happiness over the huge success of the event and said that it was a wonderful opportunity for everyone to get to know one another better.