Jac’s Journey

What can I say about Laos? Let me borrow from a French Official during the period of French colonial rule.

“The Vietnamese plant rice, the Cambodians watch it grow and the Lao listen to it grow.”

I haven’t seen Cambodia yet to judge, but the Vietnamese certainly have commercial energy about them. The Lao have the view that other things are more important – I think they might be right.

Lao people are friendly, fun, gentle, welcoming and curious. Their natural reserve makes them a little detached in the first instance, but as you begin to understand that and see past the reserve, you get to the gentleness and fun-loving aspect of their nature. My experience was that the people were more gregarious as I travelled north to south, but this might just be that I was learning how to connect with them better. There’s no hard bargaining in Laos. At the night market in Luang Prabang, probably the biggest tourist oriented market in the country, negotiations went like this…

“How much is this please?”
“X kip (already a decent price)”
“Do you have a discount?”
“Yes, Y kip (a decent amount less)”
“Ok, I’ll take it, thanks.”

After three months of hard bargaining in China, I’ve now completely forgotten how to do it, and might be going a bit soft, thanks to Laos!

I loved watching the happy children run around barefoot, playing with whatever toys could be created from what was lying around, and being cuddled and adored by every member of their extended family. The women never seem to stop working. Men are commonly seen drinking beer and playing draughts with Beer Laos crown caps (player 1 face up, player 2 face down), but the woman always have something in their hands. While trekking in Bolaven, Robert asked our guide about this. “Oh yes!” He said. “Lao women work much harder than Lao men. They do all that work in the house, cooking, looking after the children, and then they go out into the fields as well, bring in the harvest and often do extra things like weaving too.” Interesting when compared to the western view of the value of running a home…

You already know how much I love Laos public transport. I’ll never forget travelling on buses with live chickens and huge bags of vegetables, being asked to take my backpack inside the (already crowded) bus because the luggage holds underneath were being used for freighting tonnes of vegetables, having half a bum cheek on the seat beside people spewing into plastic bags… How I have enjoyed it all!

It’s very much a developing country. People are generally very poor. $25 US per month is a common wage. $100 US per month can be considered middle class. Over 50% of the population have malaria, access to education is expensive for families, who often cannot afford to send all their childen to school, or for very long.

Laos is a ‘communist’ country. China is investing heavily in roads and infrastructure. It’s greedily buying up land and planting rubber and sugar cane, at the expense of primary forest. The country can’t afford to turn away such investment, and it remains to be seen how much China will help shape and form Laos’ development over the coming years. Thankfully, there is a strong focus on the development of eco-tourism, and that seems to be spreading the tourist dollar fairly widely and helping preserve certain areas through a system of national parks.

There is a still a strong reliance on international aid, and the clearing of UXO from the land remains a huge task.

I feel so priviledged to have visited Laos at this time. It’s been one of the highlights of my trip so far, and I’ve met so many interesting people. Just thinking about the country leaves a smile on my face. And a thirst for that fabulous beer…