just as the sun rises over the expansive Tonle Sap Lake...
all in the hope of a good catch from the fishing nets laid overnight.
It's a routine that has not changed since he was 15.
What has changed, though, is the size of his catch.
In the face of climate change, pollution and unpredictable weather patterns,
Huat has seen his fish stock decline and with it his family's sole source of income.
"Nature has changed unusually now. Some years, it gets hot this month in the rainy season. Sometimes, it gets hotter and colder during the drought season. Sometimes, there's rainfall in the wrong months or gets so hot that I can't go out to fish."
Source: UNESCO
The Tonle Sap is the largest freshwater lake in Southeast Asia.. with some 1.3 million people living along its banks.
Experts say extreme weather brought by climate change, ecological disruption from dam-building, wetland conversions, and overfishing threaten food supplies and livelihoods.
Cambodian authorities are now scrambling to educate fishing communities on responsible farming practices, cutting water pollution and how to switch to fish farming or aquaculture.
Still - many are choosing to migrate away.
Huat, who's a father of five, wishes for a better life for his children:
"I wish for my children to study a foreign language, but I'm concerned they might find it challenging. I don't want them to follow in my footsteps as fishermen because the fish population has decreased. It would be better for them to pursue alternative jobs that offer better prospects than fishing."
The decline of the daily catch is also impacting fish sellers at the local market.
This 43-year-old fish vendor has over the course of just one year, seen her typical daily income plunge from $25 dollars to around five or seven.
She says there are days when she struggles to buy rice or cover the cost of the gasoline needed to get home.
As leaders meet for the UN climate summit, pressure is ramping up on wealthy countries to fulfill promises to help developing nations like Cambodia which are feeling the effects of the climate crisis.
Sim Socheata is the regional program manager at Oxfam:
"We hope that COP28 will be taking into account the important part. Which is to build the capacity of the community to be resilient to change and this could be done through some intervention that is really useful for them, intervention that helps improve their local livelihoods, (to be) less reliant on the resources that are currently impacted by climate change."
"For Cambodians, fish and rice are the main staples of our diet, so we need the lake to be able to function. Our interventions need to be put in place, to protect the lake ecosystem, so that it can function."
