SIEM REAP — If you stroll around the Old Market area in Siem Reap, you will come across a small book stall facing the Siem Reap River and managed by a 57-year-old man who lost both hands in a landmine explosion during the conflict of the 1980s.

Tok Vanna has been managing this stall for 21 years, selling books to tourists, mostly foreign tourists. He offers a variety of books ranging from fiction to regional history as well as stories of people who survived the Khmer Rouge regime, which claimed the lives of more than 2 million people in Cambodia.

“It had been my dream to own a business,” Vanna said. In the 1980s, he served as a soldier in Battambang province, fighting against the Khmer Rouge forces in the jungle. He lost his hands due to landmines hidden under foliage as he was on his way to fetch food.

“It was in 1988,” Vanna recalled. At first, he passed out. “I woke up without being able to feel my hands: They were gone. I thought that was the end of my life.”

After undergoing treatment in Phnom Penh, he became a beggar for a year.

Vanna had virtually given up on life when he got a second chance. With the help of social workers, he moved to Siem Reap where he was able to live and work with Rahab Craft Cambodia, an NGO that was selling souvenirs and gifts to tourists in the Angkor Archeological Park.

Over the years, Vanna kept alive his dream of having a business. Then one day, he gathered up his courage, quit the NGO, and started his own business from scratch.

Why Books?

Vanna was born in a poor family. He was in Grade 3 when the Khmer Rouge forces took control of Cambodia and schools were shut down. When the Pol Pot regime came to an end in January 1979, he did not have the opportunity to resume his education.

“I cannot read much, but I love books,” Vanna said. “I wanted to sell books…I was inspired by a friend who had a book business. I thought to myself: What if I try selling books to tourists who are curious about Cambodia and its tragic past.”

Vanna received a great deal of support to enable him to make his dream come true. Several NGOs provided him with funding to buy books and establish his business. As a result, he was able to set up his small book stall in 2004.

However, having limited education made it difficult at first for Vanna to keep his dream afloat. If he didn’t sell enough, his business would collapse at any time.

“I don’t read the books I sell because I don’t have the intellectual capacity to do so,” Vanna said. “But I was taught and advised to select some titles that would sell well.

“I consider myself lucky that people around me and even my customers always brief me on the books they have read, which gives me enough information about the books,” he said.

When there’s a will, there’s a way and Vanna definitely has had the will. He even learned by himself basic sentences in English language so that he could communicate with his foreign customers.

On most days, Vanna can sell at least 5 books. Some customers return the books for him to resell after they have bought and read them. He recalled that one foreign customer bought five books and gave them back to him one week later, having finished reading them, so that he could resell the books and earn money.

After a few years, his business was doing well, just enough to support him and his wife and two daughters. Vanna has also managed to build a small house on a piece of land he bought a few years ago, and where he has been living peacefully with his family.

Now running it without financial support, Vanna is able to continue his book business. He used to be his family’s only breadwinner, but now his daughters have started working at a restaurant and making crafts for him to sell alongside his books.

“I’m grateful for the support and help after all these years,” Vanna said. “Their generosity gave me hope to continue living after losing my two hands. I will continue my book business as long as I can.”