Feb 5th

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A short blog for a day filled with lots of relaxation and not too much to report...

We found ourselves spending most of the day just wandering around and taking in the sights, smells and sounds of a new city and country. One thing I'm loving about Laos is the simple fact that scams are almost non-existent, everyone smiles at you, and everyone says 'hello', 'thank you' and 'goodbye' to you in THEIR language, NOT English. Everywhere we've been thus far has been on the tourist trail and there's been absolutely no lack of English speaking abilities. It's actually surprised us quite a bit just how many people can speak English, and great English at that...we've gotten so used to Shenzhen and the real lack of English. There's something to be said about not having a local yell "HELLO!" at you every five minutes in an attempt to get you to buy something at their shop. Laotians seem to have not been affected and jaded by the tourist industry as much as people in their surrounding countries yet...I only hope this will stay like this for some time to come. It makes me sick to watch other foreigners getting frustrated when a waiter doesn't understand their order- Hey buddy, why don't you try taking your own incredibly high-maintenance, complicated order in a SECOND LANGUAGE?! Don't be an ugly tourist. Learn to say hello in the language of each country you visit. Smile. Remember that those pennies you're bargaining over mean so much less to you. It's not that hard, really.

It was also a day spent eating food...starting with an incredibly VEGETARIAN BUFFET. Mmmm. It was so good, and so for the locals, not the tourists. It took us awhile to find it but once we did, we were in heaven...so much of it we had no idea what we were eating, but it didn't have meat and it tasted heavenly...

Later in the evening we headed to the riverfront (much less of one during the dry season, though) and enjoying Beer Lao with papaya salad (a Lao speciality) and sticky rice. It was DELICIOUS but left both of our mouths completely on fire. I love spicy food and can usually handle it, but holy crap that papaya salad was intense!

Next, it was time for real dinner, which we had at Makphet, another restaurant supported by Friends International, the organization that also runs the restaurant we went to in Phnom Penh. The food was more expensive, but seriously good and the $ goes towards a great cause.

And that, my friends, concludes another day in the beautiful capital city of Vientiane...

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Comments

[Mom/MD]

what an amazing day...all your food sounded just heavenly! Most importantly though, I LOVE your advice to people when the travel...definitely worth the time to try at least saying hi in their language...instead of always thinking that English and America is the best!