"The Cambodian community in the United Kingdom is relatively small (about
800 people) and scattered all over the country. A few of us have started off our life in the early 70’s as students
or as members of the Cambodian Embassy Staff, caught out by the political change in Cambodia in 1975. About 60 of us became
refugees then, not by choice but by circumstances. We had never thought or dreamed of living permanently in the United Kingdom, let alone to be here today – perhaps
the fate or the karma of what we have done in our past life.
The majority of the community arrived in the early 80’s on the basis of family reunion with the early
settlers or via the Charity Organisations from the refugee camps in Thailand;
there were also some from Vietnam. They
have all experienced ‘The Killing Fields’ traumas.
Life
in the UK, for all of us, was not as easy as it looks. On the one hand, we
would like to preserve our culture, and on the other, we would like to normalise our life, to adapt and to adapt to the new society. Unfortunately,
the two cultures are in contrast to each other. For some, we have nightmares
of what we have come across during the bad time, either through personal experience or learning about the loss of the parents
or brothers and sisters. We have, however, learned a lot from that experience and we are very proud to say that we have weathered
that stormy episode quite well. This, in many ways, has made us even more resilient than we had anticipated"
Dr Heng Phalla Sambath
Refugees Studies Programme, University
of Oxford, 5th June 1999
CASUNIK is the strength of the community, thanks to the
few core active members who always take the Cambodian interest at heart. The
main events, organised by CASUNIK, are the Cambodian New Year in Mid April and the Pchum Ben ceremony in September/October
(also election date of the new Executive Committee Members). Both
events are social and religious (Buddhist). We have also organised to teach the Cambodian mother tongue language and
the Khmer classical dance, which provides a lot of appreciable interests
to our youth.
CASUNIK is a non-political organisation whose aim is to advance
the education of the public in the United Kingdom about any aspects of
Cambodia, including the people, history,
culture and tradition. CASUNIK was formally formed in October 1979, during
the Buddhist Phchum Ben festival, from the ashes of the Student’s Association of the Khmer Republic (SAKR) and some
of the Embassy staff, and their families who were left stranded in the United
Kingdom due to the political upheaval in 1975.
Following the discussion with the British Council for Refugees (BCR) and with the help of the National Council
for Voluntary Organisation (NCVO), CASUNIK took a step further to become a full Charity Organisation in 1984. CASUNIK registered
with the Charity Commission under the Charity Act 1960 (Registration No 292074).
CASUNIK remains as a registered charity organisation to the present day. With the elected Members of the Executive
Committee, CASUNIK has worked extremely well among the Cambodian and British communities at large, in preserving and exchanging
cultural and other mutual interests amongst its members in the United Kingdom.
The Society is established:
-
To advance the education of the public in the United Kingdom
about any aspects of Cambodia, including
its people, history, culture and traditions.
Further information, together with membership details, can be found on CASUNIK’s website:
