Villages

Last night was the coolest it's been- I didn't use the mosquito net- no way mosquitoes would be able to fly in that cold. It's funny- the staff are all wearing jackets but the guests are still in shorts. It's like a warm day in SF, which is how cold it is. So still the shorts and t-shirt, sandals, but def. not sticky, which is a nice change.

A., M's wife, who is Lao, took me to the village, and we walked to an edge of it, on the marsh, where water buffalo were herding to their sleeping spot. I've never seen anything like it. It was really neat.

And she'd spot some villagers, many of whom didn't recognize her in her perm. They live in houses raised on stilts, so there's an open under storey. Then you climb upstairs into the main room. No furniture. One girl was sifting rice and from their hulls, giving the latter to the pigs. She wasn't paying us too much attention, but seemed very open for some company and chit chat. Another, maybe her mother or granny, was preparing a meal, and she was smiling and giggling as we were asking her about betel nuts. She'd spit them out with a huge grin showing off her blackened teeth. A. would ask her how she cleaned them, and took her finger and rubbed them, taking some of the black off, all the while giggling.

Another woman we saw walk into the marsh to set a very small net to catch fish as the water buffalo walked by. A. asked "Auntie" if she caught anything. Nothing, just a leech or two (!). The water is milky muddy, and you could see mud splashes all over the bushes caused by the buffalo. At first we were intimidated by them, only later to realize they're scared of humans, and would walk around us. The sun was setting. They'd go into the water, sometimes swimming, just their snouts showing through. And emerge completely clean, their hides glistening in the golden light. Most were black, others light tan, which we joked were falangi (European foreigner) buffalo. Fires and smoke were rising from near the huts in the distance. Later the fisherwoman found a dugout canoe, and recast her net in a better spot.

Walking back, we happened upon two girls bathing, still wrapped in their sarong or sins, their clothes resting on the branches of a nearby bush. I was wary of approaching them, but, A. has told me, there is no word for "privacy" in Lao. They were using water from an open well- sort of an iridescent deep green color. You could smell the soap they used.

Then we ran into village kids who were running all over the place, chasing a pig. They started following us. So I did the digital camera thing, and they loved it. We'd take their photos, then show them; "that's me! that's me!" they'd point. They were dirty, or half-dressed, or had snivelly noses. They were very cute and full of personality. It was nice to be there with a Lao like A. She's not from this village, but they've lived there long enough. And they can communicate: she says they don't speak standard Lao, but no one seems to look at her, or me, for that matter, as if we had two heads or anything. We walked through the local wat, which was getting a face lift, and young monks were running around in their bright orange robes. If they weren't wearing robes, they'd seem like the other kids we met, just older and all boys.

TV has just arrived in this village, so in a generation it will be completely different. We saw a Thai ad for cheese pizza as we were walking by.