This is why getting a Chinese symbol tattoo is stupid

3 t-shirts and 3 unsuspecting people wearing them.

First, an nice-looking (as in he seems like a good person) Thai guy was wearing a shirt that read FBI in big letters. Underneath it read F.emale B.ody I.nspector. Sure, he might have understood it completely but I don't think so. This didn't look like the type of guy that was trying to advertise his willingness to "inspect" loose women on Khao San Road.

Better still, an angry old fat Thai women -I'd say about 50 years old- was frowning while walking down the street wearing a t-shirt that read: I'm a VIRGIN. Underneath in small letters it read: This is a very old t-shirt. I've seen this shirt a lot and don't think it's all that funny, but this old bird didn't seem to get the joke (or know that one existed.)

And best of all I saw some unsuspecting (or totally slutty) chick wearing a shirt that in Thai script read, "Nahm Kuei." That translates to "pussy juice." Who knows what she was told it read in Thai. And what the hell does it mean anyways? Does she really like pussy juice or well, perhaps I don't want to know. I just wish I could have followed her around just to see the stares she was getting from all the locals. I imagine it won't be long before someone pulls her aside and tells her the real meaning.

I come back from Laos with some T-shirts that I think are cool and then I become the butt of a joke

It's probably indiscernible to you, and it's a small difference to me, but it's very obvious to Thais. The difference between "บ" and "ข" is a small bend where the small loop is but that's the difference between a "B" sound and a "K" sound in the Thai alphabet. However, notice that this shirt is from Laos. Thai and Laos languages use similar alphabets but there many of these small changes in letters that prevents Thais from easily reading Laos and Laotians from easily reading Thai.

As the joke of my t-shirt goes, the Laotian letters read "Beer Laos." That's fine and dandy, good for me I have a beer t-shirt. But the Laos letter "B" looks like the Thai "K". That is, they switch the two letters above. So, in Thai, the t-shirt does not translate to "Beer Laos", instead it translates to "Laotian son-in-law." This was not a small joke back in my town. Everyone thought it was hilarious. Everywhere I went people would read the shirt, laugh and then start the rhetorical questioning. As their joke goes, I went to Laos for just one week and but found a wife, married her, and come back to Buakhao with the t-shirt to prove it. Sure, it might not be as funny to you, but to Thais it just doesn't get much better than word-play jokes like these. And if there's one thing better than a joke, it's a joke about a falang.

Not the best pictures I've taken, but you've got to see these karaoke booths

It all started with karaoke. Not my forte but it’s insanely popular in Thailand. So much so that my students asked me to sing karaoke with them at a small karaoke “shop”, sober in the middle of the day, like they were asking me to play football.

The karaoke shop is little more than a small building with wooden walls dividing the space into several small booths equipped with TVs, computers, stools, large speakers and microphones. The booths seemed way too small, but it’s normal to see someone enjoying himself or herself singing alone. We, on the other hand, were packed into our strange wooden booth.

50 baht buys 10 songs. There were no English songs but I was expected to sing. For me it was more like a fast reading exercise, trying to pronounce the Thai syllables as they were highlighted across the bottom of the screen. As horrible as I was at it, it was great practice for reading and speaking Thai.

Big Ass, Bodyslam, Clash, Palmy, Potato, Pu. We hit all the favorites. Concentrating on the letters I missed most of the videos of handsome and beautiful, love-stricken Thais fomenting their feelings about unrequited love, break ups, being cheating on or any other moments that incited hysterical actions and crying forlornly, looking out into the pouring rain.

May, Tik, Ing and Iw were nice enough to not force the microphone on me too often and sang most of the songs themselves, cheering or groaning when the computer scored their performances. At the end of the 10 songs we left and Ing and Iw (twins from the birthday party) I was delighted that they had their fill and weren’t ready to go another 10 songs. I was however invited to Ing and Iw’s house for a home cooked meal.

I already forgot what the dish is called but I think it's Yam Yo San

There’s no direct translation for the dish. I don’t know what to call it on a menu, but the longer description would be spicy, sweet, and sour thin glass noodles mixed with pork. At my students Ing and Iw's house, they decided to teach me to cook this dish admitting from the beginning that it might be delicious, and it might not. The did however guarantee that it would be edible.

First we chopped up the pork. Well, kind of. We just mutilated it with a knife, somewhere between mincing it and pulverizing it. By the time we were done with it, it didn't really look like anything.

Then we boiled water and softened the glass noodles in it. Seconds later we took out the noodles and put them in a bowl before dropping in our pork. The gelatinous pork cooked quickly and was then added to the noodles.

Mixed with the noodles and pork was: peanuts, fish sauce, lime juice, thinly sliced cucumber, more fish sauce, 7 chilies (an amount we decided perfect after a small debate and each eating one raw), garlic, sugar, more fish sauce, chili sauce, tiny tomatoes, more chili sauce, and MSG (pictured). And then we took a taste only to find out it needed more fish sauce.

It’s a strange mix to stir. The noodles stick together, the meat and noodles stick together and the rest just looks funny and spreads around unevenly. After stirring long enough, it finally mixed well enough and the result was a classic Thai dish; an intersection of just about every flavor and texture our palates can sense. Spicy, sweet, sour, crunchy, soft, chewy.

I will say that this dish is not photogenic. If you went to a Thai restaurant and saw a picture of it on the wall, you’d go for something else. It’s actually quite delicious. Maybe my palate has adjusted after living here for over a year and a half but I really liked it. It wasn't the only thing we ate either. Along with the dish we had sticky rice, an omelet, garlic-dried pork and red fanta. Sap!



After dinner we took a walk through their village. Admittedly, I didn’t expect to see much but I guess this is why I take these chances and try to say yes to every opportunity that arises. A small walk down a dirt road turned into a bio-culture class taught by Ing and Iw.

Whether they know it or not, the girls are extremely aware of their natural surroundings. As we walked down the street they pointed out different flowers, naming them in Thai and an English. One hanging bright yellow flower was a culture symbol of Thailand, another was used for the traditional flowers they decorate Buddha images with. As I looked out into the woods and saw dry, crackling brush growing amongst boring trees, Ing and Iw saw food. They showed me the tiny fruits of different trees and easily identified other fruit trees that had been picked clean. It soon realized that just about every single tree in the village produced an edible fruit of some sort.

Jackfruit, limes, tamarinds, papayas, pineapples, coconuts, bananas, and a myriad of fruits I’ve never heard of grew everywhere. The girls even pointed out root vegetables that looked like weeds and trees used for making paper, all on a 2 kilometer walk.

Half way through I laughed thinking that if I had been stuck here all alone, I’d have starved unaware of how most fruits and vegetables grow and clueless as to what other things are edible. The girls on the other hand looked around the woods as we Americans would look through our pantry.

While walking by houses I was stared at. A lot. Ing and Iw told me I was the first white person they’re grandfather had ever seen. He’s 90. I was afraid I was going to give the old guy a heart attack. I'm sure this small street and village is not a place falang usually end up. As we walked through the village people looked out and quickly asked the girls what the hell I was doing there. I avoided most conversation, pretending to not understand, just smiling instead. This made the walk go a little faster and allowed the girls to decide when and where we should stop and chat.

A walk through time, old women worked in front of their family home weaving large rugs and blankets on complex looms of bamboo, wood and string. This lady said she had already been working on this particular piece for a month. Beyond the actual weaving, the slow process of spinning the homemade yarn into spools and preparing the loom is a task I can hardly imagine. Sure, these ladies have nothing but time but it's still hard to imagine having that much patience to spend a couple months making it and then sell the rug for $20.

As the sun burst through a cluster of small clouds, we continued walking to a local pond where we saw several people leading their cows and water buffaloes back home. Ing and Iw found river snails and clams in the river, both of which they claim are delicious, adding to their long list of edibles that I would have looked over. (I'd kill a cow.) Heading back in a different direction we walked to a wat where monks had built a small waterfall, and strode past a school yard busy with volleyball, takra, and potato sack races. By the time we were back at their place I was completely exhausted, ready to head home, my brain full of new Thai fruits and my belly full of new Thai food.

Good Bye, Vang Vien

Well, there goes the river

THANK FUCK IT’S FRIDAY? I sincerely doubt anyone in Vang Vien had a week from hell. I didn’t even know it was Friday. And I don’t think anyone else did either. Lying down while eating “happy” pizza and watching Friends, or tubing down Vang Vien’s river-gauntlet of bars and tree swings doesn’t make for a tough week. And thus being so excited for Friday seems strange because everyone’s been partying like it's New Year’s every night anyways.

You only need to look at the drink specials to see what a tiny town in the mountains in Laos has become. I didn't see it coming, but when I was here a year ago all this was on its way. The town has grown drastically but only in businesses that cater to backpackers like bars, Internet cafes, restaurants, bungalows, and roti pancake carts. Unlike Luang Prabang or Vientiane, Vang Vien has become a party destination for the young backpackers. Here in the middle of the day, the streets are quiet while everyone hides in the river or in the shade, but at night bars offer beer Laos, vodka shooters, rice dishes, weed pizza, and mushroom shakes, all on the same menu.

Tubing down the river has become the highlight of a stay in Vang Vien, complete with spectacular views, cold Beer Laos for cheap, tree swing stunts, and Lao Lao. The river is wide, in some areas deep, and if it flowed any more slowly, it would be sitting still. Only a year and a half ago the scene was relatively quiet with only a handful of bars offering to pull you in with a long bamboo pole, but now it's been turned into a Laotian river theme park of bars and crazy structures daring tubers to swing, dive, or zip down into the water in front of everyone. Several new large bars have gone on the back along with three bridges. A year and a half ago I felt I was lost in Laos floating down the river, but now cars park along the side reminding the tubers that town isn't far away.

For as awfully touristy as the river tubing has become, it's fun as hell. Going down the river is a great way to keep cool during the day, and looking out at Vang Vien's mountains is a great way to relax. The different stunts are fun to do and even more fun to watch if someone does something daring or stupid or both.

But the build up on the river has come at a large cost. Showing no signs of letting up, more and more bars are being built as the land is bought up. In one stretch of the river a large piece of machinery was reshaping the bank to make room for a new bar and on the opposite side, a line of 16 new concrete bungalows were going up. The quiet was replaced by re-mixes, the clunking of a backhoe, and the static sound of welders.

While the tubers got in and out of the water jumping, drinking, relaxing, the locals came down to wash their hair, fish, and collect water. The water is clear and the fisherman were able to catch some fish, but this place is a conflict of interests. The Laotians are making great businesses out of their bars but the 200 backpackers that go down the short stretch of river are doing more to hurt it than help it. Similarly, what used to feel like a quiet, relaxed tube rie with the occasional party at a bar has become a night club on the river. Maybe I'm getting old but some how, hearing "My Hump" blared out of speakers while floating down the river isn't what I'm looking for.


At the end of the day, the tubing was fun despite the construction along the way. The boys out to catch fish caught fish, and the tubers had a great time too. This part of the river is a small stretch several kilometers long, and outside of it the calm and serenity of the Laotian countryside remains. Still, the growth of Vang Vien has been strictly catered towards the backpacker party tour of South East Asia. Without the mountains looming over the town, it would be easy to forget where you really are. The stores in town now lure people in to Skype in A/C, or, "pimp your iPod", or maybe just lay back and watch an entire season of your favorite TV show on DVD. The sad thing is that when you're staying in Vang Vien you forget that you're out in the middle of nowhere.

Good Bye, Luang Prabang

What can we learn about the differences in Thai and Laos culture by looking at this picture?

1. Laotians take pride in their beer. Thais like to drink it just as much, but they keep the Singha, Chang, or Leo on ice. Although slightly overrated, Beer Laos remains the backpacker favorite beer of S. E. Asia and as such, watering the tasty brew down with some ice is a bad call in Laos. (Note: they don’t give you straws with every single drink either. Did the French have something against straws?)

2. There’s a salt shaker on the table. Sure, they still use fish sauce in their traditional cooking, but the baguettes, hamburgers, and quiche are made with out. In Thailand you're more likely to find chilies chopped up in fish sauce or that spicy orange sauce that goes so well on Thai omelets. In Laos however, it's in with falang food and out with the Asian food. Goodbye rice, Hello Bread. No more fish sauce, cover your french fries with mounds of salt.

3. There are napkins (serviettes) in a glass. Thailand on the other hand always offers toilet paper in a "cute" box disguising it as napkins. I can deal with it while living in Thailand, but still, in Laos it’s nice to use what’s meant for you hands with your hands, and what’s meant for you ass, with your ass.

Monk Chat

I think the population of Luang Prabang can be split into thirds. A third tourists, a third locals, and a third monks. There are more than a handful of wats in the city and each of them are home to upwards of a hundred novice monks. Some of the boys come from Luang Prabang, but others come from different provinces in the countryside. Some monks wander the town in their free time becoming a Kodak moment for the busloads of old French tourists (and the rest of us.)


Walking around without a plan, I ended up at a wat on a quiet side of town with nobody around. I walked around the grounds for a minute looking at the different Buddhas and temples until a monk approached me. The spoke in English, asked me my name, where I was from, and how long I was staying in Luang Prabang. His conversational English exhausted, we switched a mix of Laos and Thai and continued chatting. His name was Pang, he was 20 years old and he had been a monk for 7 years. He was the eldest of the novices in the wat, and I slowly saw this in his personality. While we talked other monks came and went, listening in for a while, never interrupting, only saying a couple things, then walking off. Every fetched things for him and treated him with respect, like a Pee (elder.)

I asked Pang what he did on a normal day at the wat. "This" he said, meaning sitting around, thinking, meditating, relaxing. The pace of our conversation reflected his pace of life. We spoke for a couple seconds, then just sat and watched the day go by in silence, before talking again. Neither Pang nor any of the other monks were ever in a rush to do anything. After a while he invited me to sit down. We talked for an hour. Then he invited me to see his and the other monk's quarters. Their room was modest to say the least. In his 7 years as a novice, Pang had collected a small but strange array of books and pieces of paper with obscure collections of English vocabulary on them. The other monks who stayed in the same room had collected even less possessions, amounting to only a tiny stack of things pushed between studs in the wall.

Pang complained of not having any English teachers. He wanted to learn but there were no English speakers around to teach he said. We looked at some of his English books. They were strangely complicated. The first exercise in one book gave categories of parts of speech and asked the student to check the box under which each word belongs. Nouns, verbs, and adjectives are easy enough, but the vocabulary the book asked to be categorized were complex words like "contaminated", "commitment", and "hysterical." Without knowing the definition of the words, somehow Pang knew which parts of speech each of them were. He's a good student, but without the right teacher or materials, he hasn't got much of a chance with English.

I hung out with Pang and the other monks for several hours that day, him teaching me Laos and me teaching him English. Walking around that evening I really took notice to how many monks there were in Luang Prabang. With Pang and so many other monks extremely interested in speaking English better, I'm amazed I haven't seen more people chatting with the monks around town.



The next day I hiked up the main wat in Luang Prabang that sits atop the tallest mountain (or hill) in the town's center. The hike up is just enough to get your heart racing and cover you in sweat. The views from up top are well worth it though, and it was there I found another opportunity to chat with a monk. Only 18, this monk left his family in the countryside years ago to come and study in Luang Prabang. Living in another wat, he had walked over to the wat just for the day.

He spoke no English but was real friendly and impressed by a foreigner who could speak Laos. We spoke about very little -just where we were from, our names, where he studied, how long I'd be in Laos, if I'd been to the waterfall and the likes- but I think the conversation is something more than that. For me it was a glimpse into what life is like for the novice monks: slow, relaxed, but curious about all the westerners that came to visit. For the monks, finally talking to a tourist is a chance to hear why they came, what their home is like, and really, just see what these people called falang are like. Another thing Laotians always want to know is: what do you think of Laos? Do you think it is dirty (a common complain from old travelers) or do you think it is beautiful? Is it similar to Thailand? Which is better?

Making both of my times with the monks even better, I ran into each of them randomly later on in the week. I ran into Pang at the same mountain wat and he was excited to see me. His friends were shocked to see he had a western friend and then to see I spoke Laos. Later in the evening I ran into the younger monk passing by the market with some friends and again, his friends seemed shocked when he stopped to talk with a falang and the falang knew his name.

I sometimes wonder how much western influence is good for places in South East Asia. Bangkok and Phuket suffer from too much change while other places in the middle of nowhere lack basic needs. Luang Prabang is perhaps the best conflation of western and eastern worlds into one incredible city. Still, it's tough to know whether our presence here is only helping to erode the culture and beauty that are the main reasons we are here in the first place, or whether we're helping this place being spending time here. I believe in times like these when people meet and talk about their cultures, traditions and the differences or similarities of each, it is the differences that are celebrated while the similarities help show us that no matter where you're from, some things, whether emotions, troubles, wonders, or passions, are innately human.

Downtown Luang Prabang

Lao Lao on the Nam Khan

I should have known better than to offer to buy another bottle of Lao Lao. What I needed was a way to show gratitude for the food and whiskey they had already shared with me and what I ended up with was a bag of liquor. From a local shop at the top of the steep banks of the riverside, a young girl wound down to the dusty then muddy then wet then rocky path down to our place in the shade. What she handed over was a bag of clear liquid that looked so shiny it seemed extra wet.

In my inebriation and in presumably his, I believed Sai’s perfect pour of the contents of the bag into the empty bottle without spilling a drip was a drunken miracle. Sai on the other hand appeared unimpressed by his own feat, and simply started the rotation again pouring out the next shot. Sai always had the bottle. He poured glasses for everyone in the circle, never forgetting himself, one person at a time. Vidoung, Chanh , the guy’s name I was so drunk I forgot, and I, each took our turns in the rotation with little break. I think this was one of those ‘let’s do what the locals do’ times.

I met the guys randomly earlier that day, just walking down the river. They were just some 20 year old “college” kids enjoying this Sunday like any other Sunday, relaxing on the river with a bottle of Lao Lao. They spoke absolutely no English so conversation was rough at times, but I picked up a lot of Laos and they understood Thai from watching TV and listening to radio. Still, there’s never any rush in Laos, ever, and silences in the conversation were normal, keeping the day relaxed.

Sitting on the bank of the Nam Khan River these guys found a nice place to build a fire between some large boulders and make some traditional Laos food. Some cabbage, a carrot, chilies, garlic, and fish sauce all fried up on a wok in the rocks. When dinner was completed and served with added bowls of limp green weeds in a thin brown broth and some pork rinds we dug in. Our opinion of their cabbage was unanimous: Kem! Salty! Kem lai lai! Very, very salty! Kem lai e-lee! That really is a very salty! The dish had its advantage though. It countered the fire-hell Laotian munshine of death well by completely overcoming the bitter sting of Lao Lao with a punch of fish sauce, garlic, and chilies. Soon out came some more pork rinds and then some sticky rice. We ate the sticky rice quickly but then they pulled out some sunflower seeds, then a guava. Sai took out two and gave one to one of the younger kids who had been hanging out and had helped collect twigs for their fire. The boy jumped down the rocks to wash it in the river, then brought it back it, peeled it, cut it up and gave half to his friend.

There were other young kids always coming and going, playing in the water then just sitting, hanging around to listen in on conversation. One woman walked down in front of our spot and slowly washed her hair. No one else seemed to notice. Later two men came down with a weighted net for fishing, then another fisherman with only a mask. Gangs of young kids came down holding large plastic containers I thought were used to collect water but were actually used as floating toys. Sao sao, or some Laos girls walked along or floated down the river and the guys threw out simple lines. “Pretty girl, where are you coming from? Where are you going? Wanna eat some rice? Drink some whiskey? Where are you going?” One time the girl scowled at them and as she walked away the guy’s name I was so drunk I forgot called at her, “Katooey!” Eventually two girls took them up on the offer and the party came to life.

After lunch we moved to take shade behind the rocks. Sai gave one of the girls a bag of guavas who washed them, peeled them, gave some to the kids playing in the water, then set the rest down for us with some crushed coriander. That was when the whiskey ran out and, especially with the girls around, everyone wanted to drink some more. Then came our bag of trouble.

The drank the second bag quickly and eventually we headed off the riverbank and back to one of the girls’ houses. There we faced another question. Another round of whiskey? Drunk as I was, I knew that was a bad idea. We settled for the much better but more expensive option, Beer Laos. Beer’s got alcohol but I’m telling you, those glasses sobered me up and I some how made my exit soon enough that I was still able to find my guesthouse that I had previously gotten lost trying to find earlier that morning, sober.

I was in bed passed out by 6 o’clock. Then I woke up a 9, made it out to the market for a baguette and some orange juice, and then passed back out at 10 in order to feel good after a cup of coffee at 9 the next morning, ready to do it all over again.