One morning, I found myself at a cafe inside the campus of the National Museum, talking about books and newspapers with my friend Leakhena. Cambodia had lost most of its independent print newspapers, and there were few magazines to be had because bookstores stopped bringing them in at the start of the pandemic. We missed the experience of reading text and seeing photographs inked in milky-coloured pages.

I sipped my coffee and read magazine articles on my laptop while Leakhena, who edits an online youth magazine, flipped the pages of an architectural guide to Phnom Penh she had recently helped translate into Khmer. The aim was to make it accessible to Cambodian readers. I wanted to get a copy for my brother, who would spend his last high school year entirely online before heading to college to study architecture.

• Tags: Cambodia, Issue 27, Khan Sokummono, My Bookshop