Sabai Dee Pi Mai from Hillary

The photo was snapped when she was shouting the word Sabai, of Sabai Dee Pi Mai


Lao New Year
Hillary Rodham Clinton
Secretary of StateWashington, DC

April 11, 2010
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On behalf of President Obama and the American people, it is my great pleasure to wish the people of Laos a peaceful and prosperous Lao New Year. This is an opportunity to honor Lao culture and heritage, and to come together to welcome new beginnings and new possibilities.
As we commemorate the 55th anniversary of bilateral relations between the United States and Laos, I look forward to working together to broaden the partnership between our governments and deepen the friendship between our people.
I offer my warmest wishes for a happy and safe holiday.

http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2010/04/139973.htm

Là-haut (Yonder) - Outside the tourist bubble in Northern Laos

Yonder

Above the blogger Marine Richard, a French woman who travels through Laos alone. The  name of her blog la-haut translates into Yonder when I enter it into Google translater,  who knows if this is correct. I'd urge you to go to either language and take a look, read for a while. Better to just go and  read for yourself than to read what I think of it.

I found this blog by happenstance as I do many things on the net, I followed an incoming hit to my blog to see where it came from. I scrolled through the blog looking for a link, on the way I saw many intriguing photos. Intriguing in that they showed a keen eye for what is Lao, especially rural upland northern Lao. The blog was also in french. I have my eye out now for blogs in French showing very off the track type things.

A while ago I read an interesting account of a couple of French guys heading down by boat from Muang Khua to Luang Prabang, complete with capsizing, near drownings, and all kinds of other adventures.

And then there was that google translation I posted about xxxxxx-xxxxxxx-trek-in-phongsali where the guy walks the length and breadth of Phongsali off road.

I was beginning to think maybe the French have some sort of monopoly on remote travel in northern Laos. Imagine my consternation when I plugged the whole thing into Google Translator and found out this blog was by a woman. Not only a woman but a youngish woman, in Lao they'd say sao.

Ms. Richard carries with her the basic tools with which to take an in depth sojourn through the north.

1. A very basic familiarity with the language, not fluency, but a definite ability to speak some Lao.

2. A familiarity with the peoples and cultures. Enough to know the ethicities of those she sees and to eat sticky rice. Enough familiarity, to inform her observations which brings us to number three.

3. The ability to observe. So often we are caught up in our own desire to say or be seen that we fail to listen and watch. Ms. Richard can do both and she also thinks about what she has seen.

4. Lastly Ms Richard is not naive.

I'm almost done with my second reading. The blog isn't really a blog in the sense that it's not an updated entity, the story starts at the beginning and goes to the end. I'd urge anyone who can read French to go to the original web site and read. I suspect that it is much better that way. The address is http://www.la-haut.blogspot.com/

Below is another photo from Ms. Richard's blog. The photos she has posted on the left side somehow don't fit in the space provided, and so when I looked at the picture I could only see the left half of the picture. But it seemed familiar. In my mind I started ticking off the possibilities and eliminating them as soon as they crossed my mind. It came to me later while I was reading. Do you know where the photo is from? You should.

Lahu night out.

The Lahu are comfortable in the Forest

See the radio the little guy is carrying? I bought the same radio down at the market for eighty thousand kip. AM/FM and a whole lota short wave. They were tuned to Thai pop, happy and walking along.


We passed them earlier at the place they slept and now they were passing us at our break. We were to pass them again but still they made it to Nambo that same day, saw them rolling in around sunset. Not a bad walk for such a little guy.


They slept in what you see in the photo. They'd propped some sticks up and covered them with banana leaves and also the sides, the front open to the fire. The leaves overhead served two purposes, to reduce the radiant heat loss to the sky and to reflect some of the heat of the fire back down onto their bodies. The husband and wife slept on the outside curled around the children who slept sound and warm in the middle. The husband slept in a T-shirt only, his back must have been cold.


The nights at that elevation are chilly, the dew heavy.


Rice had been cooked the night before by putting it and some water inside a green section of bamboo and cooking it on the fire. They were eating left overs for breakfast. They drank from the spring.


They were coming from town, a shopping trip. They brought with them a knife and some rice.

ສມົຊາຍ

Stimson Center Video

Mekong Tipping Point from Henry L. Stimson Center on Vimeo.

Staff Trip to Sihanoukville

Last time we had a frizz staff trip was already a long time ago. I think it was in 2005 when we went to Kirirom National Park. So, it was time for another trip and a bit longer as well. I asked the staff whether they preferred to go to their families over the Khmer New Year or have a staff trip to Sihanoukville. Well, to my surprise they all liked the idea of going to the beach.

And there we went, on Tuesday April 14th in a hired bus with driver from Lyna Car Rental (highly recommended by the way, very friendy and good driver, good service, reasonable price). Unfortunately, without our manager Kear who was suffering from a migraine attack. Quite sad, as he was most looking forward to the trip and I really wanted him to come along.

The highlight of the trip was our boat tour to Koh Ta Kiev, a larger but much quieter island then Koh Russei (Bamboo Island) which is next to it. We had a very good lunch at the only small restaurant and we had the beach pretty much to ourselves. As I'm not too much of a beach and sea person, I mostly enjoyed the swimming pool at Orchidee Guesthouse back in Sihanoukville. And... the breakfast there! The fresh, crispy whole-meal bread! Wow!

At night we attended the concert on Ochheuteal Beach. Well, what can I say. Ummm, let's just say the Khmers fully enjoyed it, which it what counts...

Next day it was back to the capital and when we arrived in Phnom Penh it was raining cats and dogs. The rainy season has definitely started with a very welcome, refreshing shower every afternoon.

From left to right on the picture: Koshal (cleaner and kitchen help, she's very talkative and funny), Phalla (cleaner and help at the cooking school, bit shy but nice and friendly), Mau (new cook at frizz and I suspect a bit of a 'wild girl'), Somaly (kitchen help, although I think she by now is a full cook, she herself thinks differently), Mom (quite shy, but she developed from kitchen help to first chef), Sopheak (our youngest waiter who was very shy in the beginning but has evolved as a funny, good waiter), and Yoni (brought in by manager Kear, they call each other 'brother' as they grew up in a pagoda together). Not on the picture: Sophi, our chef (she just delivered a baby), and Kear, our manager (who was sick).

What I most like about my staff is that all of them get along really well. That had been different before with some staff that are no longer with us.

Grandpa!

Our manager Kear and his wife are fresh parents of a wonderful girl, named Socheata. She was born last Sunday around 1pm. The deliverance was a really quick one. Kear told me he didn't even witness the event himself as he was out of the clinic for some 5 minutes to get some stuff and when he returned his daughter had already arrived.
I think Socheata is a really cute baby:


Today mother and child have gone to their 'home village' on an island in the Tonle Bassac, some 15 kilometers south of Phnom Penh. There they will stay for one or two months, and the whole family will take care of the baby. I suspect I will miss my manager quite a few times in the next months when he is going to see his daughter. Well, as a proud young father he is allowed:


I'm already bombarded 'Taa', which means 'Grandpa' in Khmer. Well, I might be a bit young to become Grandpa but I'm quite happy with this little wonder:


Can't wait to see Socheata take her first steps... ;)

Cooking Class on China Television

Right, a little bit of self promotion here. Some time ago the Cambodia Cooking Class was filmed for a short feature available through Associated Press Video. I have long been searching for this video and finally found it.
The feature was broadcast by the international (English language) channel of CCTV (China Television) on January 7th. Unfortunately I was not aware of that, so I missed the live broadcast (yes we have the channel here on cable tv in Phnom Penh).
Fortunately, it is available at the website of CCTV9. Not sure how long it'll be online, suppose it won't be there forever, so hurry to have a look!
As an appetizer (or the opposite) a screenshot of myself:


Oh, by the way, soon we will be featured on Taiwan's SET television as well, they were filming at the cooking class last week. And still in the pipeline: Rick Stein's South Eastern Odyssey on BBC2, due in August or September.