A Good Weekend!

Bahn Tong Pong (my now-home village) has very little intermittent internet; the guest house has none, so I have begun journaling. Pardon me if I am not clear or if I repeat myself as I don't know what I've written where or whom I've already told what. I'm going to call it cultural adjustment. Sounds so much better than old age.

I found a place for noodles just up the street from the guest house on Friday morning. Ah, sustenance. Unfortunately they also sell Coca-Cola. I have yet, however, to see a McDonald's.

Saturday afternoon Po Vang came with a hot pot, some tea bags, an electric cooking pot and a bowl, knife, and spoon. Simple pleasures are the best. He has had a bothersome rash and is getting it treated. Apparently a latent allergy to bamboo shoots which grieves him no end. They are sold here fresh on the streetside; low cal, low sodium, low fat, low cholesterol, but no longer for him! In the interim, I explored Bahn Tong Pong.

Sunday, Phouvienh picked me up on her motorcycle and took me to her home for talking. As last week, but a bit more upscale (Phouvienh and her husband Phoumah are considered middle class here with a gated multi-room home including a patio and small yard and a store bought birthday cake for her 10-year old daughter Marissa), we met and talked on the living room floor, small but mighty. After conversation and cake celebration, I was invited for Sunday dinner which Phouvienh's sister made practically totally in a squat surrounded by a bucket of fresh water, a cooking pot, vegetables, eggs, meat, noodles, which she seamlessly cut, trimmed, cooked and served in minutes. I honor her. There was a poor, young, neighbor mother and her two children who joined us. The mother's baby was constantly on her knee, in an over-the-shoulder sling, or at her breast. (There is no end to my appreciation of the Lao folk and many of their customs. The baby starts to fuss? Simple. Feed it.) This impossibly slim Asian woman went from cross-legged sitting on the floor to a squat to standing in one fell swoop. Agility and strength are not problems here.

I am currently in the Ed. Center a neighboring village where there is, tra-la, intermittent internet. Tonight, I supposedly start some english teaching with some local folks. Stay tuned.