Work Live Laos

I've been following a new web site from Vientiane on Facebook. It seems to keep tabs on current events in the capital maybe from an expat point of view.


Work-Live-Laos

When I stopped by today they had this kind of fun you tube video.

Beginnings

Sun setting over the bridge on that day a decade and a half ago

Laos began for me the way lots of things do, as a visa run.

It was the late in the dry season 1995 when I found myself sitting in a nearly empty restaurant in Thailand, the place was set out over the Mekong. I was waiting for time to pass. My visa was for the next day. I had no book. Internet wasn’t yet, and there were no other people to while away the time. I did as many others have done before and since. I stared at the river mesmerized by it’s endless twistings and turnings as it slid by the front of my view. I nursed a beer or two for several hours.

Before dusk is a quiet time. Motors and air conditioners cease, people take their evening bucket showers and quietly gather for dinner. The Mekong is wide at Nong Khai yet when a fisherman cut his motor a mile out I could hear every scrape of his movements as he put out a line and moved a paddle in the bottom of the boat, he might well of been ten feet away the sound carried so well.

Quickly dark came and the lights of the luxury hotel up by the bridge came on as well as every little restaurant and house up and down the shoreline and in the town behind me. The number of lights was doubled by their reflection in the water.

It was when I looked across the river for the first glimpse of the lights of the country I was to visit that I noticed the difference. Laos was dark, lights out. Not the glow of one bulb from one single restaurant or house. No lit up half built construction sites, no hotels, nothing. The contrast was stark, on the Thai side was the shimmering gaudy beginnings of another night of the dazzling, lit restaurants, hotels, and sing song bars.

Across the river dark and silent trees.

I had one of those non immigrant double entry visas to Thailand which were the semi official long stay visas for people the authorities for whatever reason were ok with. All I needed to do was leave Thailand and do a U turn at the border, get stamped out, get stamped back in, and I’m good for three more months.

The usual routine was the multi day train ride to Malasia and back, but of late there were rumors of not only tourist visas to Laos but also available in 24 hours at the border close to the capital. I was living between Lam Sak and Petchabune on the edge of Isaan, Laos was close.. My employer was understanding and I was making a small vacation of the whole thing.

Laos wasn’t so much a step back in time, but a different ending to the same story. The currency had too many zeros, the roads weren’t paved, a lot of people lived in bamboo houses, hardly any traffic. People walking, too poor to buy a bike or take a bus. No traffic lights. No advertising signs, lotta dust.

The language was different, more tone range. The people laughed easier and louder. Women wore the long traditional skirt called a sihn and wore their hair long. Commerce was at the market, people raised chickens and grew vegetables in the city center. The men had hair cuts and clothes of two generations ago. The light filtered through the ubiquitous red dust gave everything the sepia tone of old photos, I was smitten.

Laos was a country just emerging from a long self imposed exile from the family of nations and after a quarter century of slumber it was slow to shake off the sleep. A Rip Van Winkle of South East Asia with a Ho Chi Mihn countenance.

This is actually from the time of our first trip back in 01

My Short Career as a Professional Writer

                                           Abandoned Mansion on Mekong 2001


A couple of months ago I was contacted by an online media specializing in news and info on East Asia. They wanted me to write somthing, AND THEY WERE WILLING TO PAY ME!!!!!!!

Ok, it wasn't much. $50 for around five or six hundred words. The idea is what grabbed me, Pico Iyer, Paul Theroux, and VS Naipaul, Somchai, writers.

They said they'd actually read my stuff! I should have known better. They did tactfully mention that they were prepared to edit for spelling and what not. They were starting a new website and needed someone to write about Laos. That should have been another tell. I, ahem, am hardly a very knowledgeable person about Laos, I just blog about it, one after all hardly needs to know about something to blog about it, the internet is replete with examples of clueless bloviaters.


I responded.


They wanted a few hundred words about Vientiane, like what are "must do" things, and sights to see during a typical one day stay, a short tour guide to the town. Might as well ask me to write about nightlife, I went to a nightclub for one drink fifteen years ago. Transportation, eating, tourist junk. Ok ok I'm a tourist too, and I freely admit it, postcards in pocket, camera, bermuda shorts and flowery shirt, but good grief I'm about the last person to ask where to go in Vientiane, took me ten years before I stopped by Tat Luang, and most people go there first day. I've stayed in a guest house which closed a dozen years ago and a hotel that most say is slightly dingy, otherwise know nothing about lodging. Have never eaten at any of the places mentioned in guides that I'm aware of.


So I wrote it. Not great, not horrid, but typical. You know, about how Vientiane is half about expats NGO workers and the other half is doing the obligatory one day in the capital city to tick the sights on the way to the plane. And I also mentioned the visa runners. If you've been to Vientiane since the changed rules in Thailand or driven past the Thai embassy you have to realize that 200 people a day cycle through Vientiane to renew visas. I did give a general layout of the town, old part near river, little China town, markets, and so on.


Spell checked it, made sure most sentences had a noun and at least the suggestion of a verb and pushed send.


My best line, "Vientiane, a town that rises late, sleeps early, and is lethargic in between". I made that up, really. They kept that line but I'm not sure how much else. They asked for a photo so I sent that one from years ago when I was like 50 years younger and ok looking, with a bolo tie no less, doesn't get much more western than that.


It took a long long time for someone to completely rewrite it. Starts out with something about the "mighty Mekong", ewh!. My mind immediately leaps to never ending dry sand stretching out away from those riverside restaurants. Photos of monks, description of Bhuda park where I've never been. I've done the same for a Chinese Government Tour company only without having someone else's writing as a beginning point. Just crack open a guidebook, read it, then write down all you can remember so it's in your own words of a place you haven't been.


Worst thing is it's posted under my real name. What if an old girlfriend googles my name or the alumni association from that boarding school I've tried to hide from for 35 some odd years reads it! I'm a bad enough writer, I certainly don't need someone adding cliches or describing places I'd never be caught dead in. I didn't save the original so I've no idea how much to blame on some poor fellow who re wrote.


I wrote a short, not snarky at all, email saying we probably weren't meant to be. Never did open a paypall account for them to send money too. I'm keeping my day job.

Ban Ha Sip Song

Tree in front of Wat Song Buay on the way there

To kill time waiting to leave Laos I took my rental bike and drove up to the Hmong town at kilometer 52 on the road to Luang Prabang, named Lak Ha Sip Song, appropriately enough.

I stopped at Lak Ha Sip Song once before when riding up to Vang Vien with my in laws. I'd always wanted to spend a little time again looking the town over. For many Hmong in America the town is their best known destination in Laos. It's a Hmong town, but being so close to Vientiane it's accessible.


Market from the south west corner.

The bike was some old clunker I rented for four dollars a day from the guy who has a sign on a tree across from Kap Jai Duh. Both brakes weren't so great, rear ones sounded like metal on metal and they're the ones I like to use first. My usual technique for a quick stop is to lock up the rear tire then pump the front brakes letting off on them only long enough to keep the thing off the ground. It's worked so far. On this bike I had to use the front breaks a lot more than I like, oh well, just go slow and drive defensively right?

It was Saturday morning and traffic was light. The road is fairly straight and flat. The road passes through mostly rural areas but of course being the main road stores and businesses are frequent.

Alley on north side of market


Shophouses in Ban Ha Sip Song

For quite a while I followed a truck hauling an old D-7 cat on a lowboy. He was moving right along and used his air horn gently but often to clear the road of motorbikes and pedestrians. There's something about the idea of fifty thousand pounds of steel hurtling down the narrow two lane road that clears the way. He was moving faster than all the local traffic and the rich folks in SUVs and pickups were reluctant to get in front of him.

My biggest worries on the motorcycle are people entering traffic from the side blindly and others driving down the shoulder on the wrong side. Following the lowboy all I had to do to be safe was to tuck up right behind his rear tires until the road cleared out again.


Maykue Guest House next to market

Actually being there wasn't so thrilling, I was glad I hadn't wasted time actually getting off a bus and getting a room there. Just another Lao town. Ok, the people have longer faces, they are Hmong. But they wear Lao clothes and listen to Thai pop music. The market is alright but then so are the markets in a lot of towns. It's supposed to have a lot of food from the forests, I didn't see any endangered dolphins strung up to make jerky or anything. Maybe there's more to the place and I was just in a cynical, "been there done that" kind of mood.

There is a guest house, and the owner claimed they had rooms with hot water. Hot water is my new standard for hotel rooms. Place has hot water it's ok with me. If there were internet in town it would probably be a nicer place to hang out than Vientiane. Damning with faint praise.

Lao Ethnic Handicrafts Store

It would be difficult to spend much time in Laos and especially in the houses and villages of the Lao Seung (upland peoples) without developing an appreciation of their handicrafts. Obscuring the line between what is utilitarian and what is beautiful I bring the uneducated view to handicrafts. I usually buy what can be used as originally intended anyway.


Above is the entrance to the handicrafts cooperative in Vientiane. It's right next to the post office and across the street from the morning market on the South side. Map is below. On the map it's called "Hmong Market" for good reason, most of the stalls are owned by Hmong people and most of the patrons are Hmong. Many overseas Hmong go there to buy ethnic clothes to bring home and wear at festivals. There are also a lot of forest products to buy, the horns from small deer, tusks from wild pig, porcupine quills, plants and animals, powders and potions.

There are also a heck of a lot of clothes and crafts from other ethnic minorities but you have to know what you want and find someone to sell it to you. Most tourists wander through without buying so the shopkeepers don't bother trying to sell anything to you. The lack of tourists also makes for nice shopping experience. I think the first price offered was good, I didn't bargain. The quality was much greater and the work more authentic than at the morning market. Many items were the same as you would see in an upland village, except brand new. No pillow cases or duvet covers. Prices were a fraction of across the street. Things are displayed Asian style. Large piles or hung from the ceiling seemingly haphazardly but really grouped in a systematic order so that the required item can be found quickly.





Above a small bag to carry stuff that all Lao people see have called a tong. This one is Akha, woven like a fish net from the inner bark of some tree or some other naturally occurring fiber. We have to go to the post office down the street to get our mail and sometimes I wear it while pedaling the bicycle. My wife makes fun of me, grown man wearing a pocketbook and all. I bought it in Vientiane at the store in the photo up top.


The basket above hangs beside my computer to catch letters and small screwdrivers and markers I don't want the kids touching. It was made by the Lanten people and I bought it in the crafts coop in Muang Long. Now there is a bank where the coop used to be and a woman runs it out of her house. The bamboo is darkened by being hung above the fire, this hardens it or keeps it from rotting or something, all people seem to hang bamboo stuff above the fire for some time, the darker the better.



Notice the different weaving around the bottom, and also just below the top. I figure this would be a great "go to market in the morning" type basket. Baskets keep greens from being crushed. The Lanten make good stuff.


This sticky rice basket is Lanten also, my wife just recently started using it, remarking that the weaving is very good. Again notice how the weaving changes bottom to top and also a star shaped pattern across the top. I bought these also in Muang Long but had forgotten about them for a couple of years.


Lastly this is a tong made for sale, probably after export, it has a zipper which I haven't seen on the ones regular folks carry, also it's very small, so to be sold as a small purse for women. I think it's Yao by the red pom poms, but I'm not sure, never spent any time in Yao villages. The fabric is hand woven cotton, grown on the side of a hill somewhere up north no doubt. The dye no doubt the natural blue black stuff everyone seems to fancy. The embroidered designs are intricate and with tight stitching. This tong belongs to Thipalada who is modeling it, her first pocket book, she puts lots of things in it. I also bought this at the cooperative in Vientiane.

Motorcycle Accidents

I love these outlines in the road. Somehow they seem to trace the edges of a life, well maybe a wrecked motorcycle anyway. I took this up at Xiengkok. How a motorcycle could get in an accident on this road I don't know. I mean he'd have to like run into himself, there is no traffic. I've waited on this road for hours to see anything moving at all. There was the outline of the other bike too.

On Thursday evening my nephew got sideswiped by another motorcycle, T-boned to be more exact. Ran right into him from ninety degrees. Of course maybe my nephew jumped out in front of him too but in Laos the one who does the running into is at fault. Broke his leg into pieces above the ankle. The guy driving the other motorcycle was drunk, and also had his own kid on the bike in front of him. That kid fared worse, probably crushed between the driver and the bike. You know how it is, if the kid is little you like to keep him in front of you so he doesn't fall off. I don't know how many miles I've ridden holding my oldest on with my knees while he nods off to sleep.

If you get in an accident don't go here.




They call this an international clinic but it's always been empty when I've gone. I had an infection in my jaw from an abscessed tooth and it took them 3 hours to round up a dentist. Good dentist mind you but he probably had to leave his paying practice just to treat me. Between buying the xray film and trying to find some antibiotics it took quite a while. If I'd of known I would have just gone to one of those dentists across from Dalat Sii Kahm or whatever it's called.



Ooops! another fender bender during rush hour. Everyone in Laos just leaves the bikes where they lay until the police get there and do their investigation thing. Pretty impressive I think. In Thailand when I was there the way seemed to be first you pick yourself up, then apologise, then make sure the other person is able to drive away, then you both skedaddle before the police come and start demanding money.



This is around the other side of Mahasot. Mahosot is down by the river just down from the tourist part of town and it's the only hospital I know of.

My nephew went to the place called Loi hasip Dieng. Something about the fact that it has 150 beds. His room costs 7$ a night, they think the surgery to put the plates in his leg will cost $300. The ambulance to Udon Thani would have cost $200, they can come get you right through customs. The cost there would have started at around $1000. My brother in law has never been across the border and they are more comfortable in Laos anyway. A woman I rented a house from who is a GP said the orthopedic guys are pretty practiced at putting legs together, lots of practice.

The Asian Development Bank estimated that in 05 the cost of traffic accidents cost Laos 4% of GDP. That's just about four times the rate in most of Asia. All of a sudden everyone can afford to buy a bike and get liqueured up too. Deadly combo.

Just remember if you get in an accident of any kind, as a foreigner it's your fault. Best get some of that insurance everyone carries.

Sok Dee

Thatdam (Black Stupa)

I like the Black Stupa in that it is a historical Tat that is simply in the middle of a roundabout in the middle of a busy town. No one selling postcards or pictures. You don’t have to make a special trip, you pass by it on your daily travels. It hasn’t been plated with gold or in any other way refurbished to buff up it’s appearance. It just is.

There is now a kind of upmarket boutique guesthouse on one side of the circle, a sign of things to come?, but much of the neighbourhood remains the unchanged. On the East down a soi is the entrance to the US embassy, no parking anywhere close by. The guards will direct you elsewhere, and at the entrance to the soi a dilapidated old colonial house.

I like the grass and bushes growing out of the cracks, lends that “lost in the jungle” type feel. It’s on Chanta Khooumane just north of the mini mart on Thanon Samsethai. I took this photo from well back by the school so to include as many wires as possible.


Top Centre

City Food on One Street

This is a street I started eating at the last month I was in Laos.

We moved into a new rental over in Ban Amon, and though nice it didn't have a fridge or stove or internet connection, the basics of life for me to survive. Everyday I would take the short drive into Vientiane.

At first I was satisfied with the baguette sandwiches, with all my fellow tourists, next door to the internet place, but the bread wasn't always the freshest and after a while I had a hankering for more. Most stuff down by the river was out of the question. Overpriced and bland it's special food for foreign consumption. The push carts are good but I wanted to sit down.

I found a street out past the cultural hall off Samsenthai that fit the ticket. Lots of restaurants, not many guest houses, not over saturated with falang.

A portion of a map liberated from the ecotourismlao site, hey its for a good cause.

On the map above you can see the cultural hall across the street from the national museum. The hall is really set back from the street more than the map would lead you to believe, my food street is the one with two dead ends parallel to, and slightly south of Samsenthai. I think the first picture of this blog post is taken from in front of the hotel called "Lao" on the map. You can clearly see the stop sign on Chao Anou, and the ostentatious pillars of the cultural hall down the street.

The first day I had Kao Piak. It was ok, and it certainly filled me up, but I'm a Kao Piak snob. The broth was from pork bones, I like chicken stock, and the noodles themselves weren't as good as mama makes. I wouldn't really call Kao Piak city food, and I don't know that it was brought to Laos by the Chinese, but it sure doesn't seem "loi percent Lao", no insects, no pla dek, no roots and leaves from the jungle.


Sen for Kao Piak

Above are the soft noodles of kao piak before cooking. Most people use half rice flour, half sticky rice flour, my wife uses half tapioca flour. I like the extra chewiness that tapioca brings to the noodles. The noodles are coated with flour to keep them from sticking while rolling them out prior to cutting with a long knife. The loose flour thickens the sauce and gives it that "stick to your ribs" comfort food quality. Hard to feel hungry after eating a bowl.


Kao Piak Sen

Notice the "brown tofu" floating around, that's lueat, or in English congealed pig's blood. Pieces of cilantro, green onions, bang nua, the usual culprits. Actually this isn't just kao piak but more exactly kao piak sen, sen being noodles. Kao piak kao is kao piak rice. To round out the language lesson, kao piak means wet rice. Kao piak kao is known as conge in Chinese, (Cantonese?) and joke in Thai. Kao piak (sen) I've only seen in Laos, maybe it's a Vietnamese invention.


Moo Daeng

The next day I tried across the street at a place that looked vaguely Chinese. The restaurant could have been in Nong Khai or Chang Mai, or even Penang. I had Moo Daeng, red pork, it's sold all over Thailand at restaurants close to the bus station. It was good, and the rice was very fresh and good quality. So good I had to try the rice before taking this shot. Cucumbers on the side and a bowl of very thin soup in the background.



Kao piak, and moo daeng are fine, but I've eaten them a few hundred times, when I wandered back down the block towards the cultural hall I hit pay dirt. Notice the pot this young lady is pouring the batter on? It looked like an upside down cooking pot, except the handles are reversed, as if this is the way the pot was designed to be used. She is cooking up Bun Guan. The filling is some sort of pork, mushrooms, cilantro, onions, mixture, and the wrapper is a very thin almost translucent chewy pancake. I suspect there is Tapioca in there somewhere but I don't know.



The whole thing is served with a sprinkling of deep fried shallots across the top and a very thick peanut, lime, fish sauce, bang nuea, chillies, sauce on the side. I could gain weight eating these.

I wasn't familiar with the food. My wife doesn't cook it, I haven't seen it around at all the markets or restaurants. When I asked the girl cooking it what food it was, she replied, "Vietnamese food" of course I didn't mean where does it come from, but rather what's it called.


House above the bun stand

Looking around I noticed that the card table I was eating off of was set up by an alley leading to some very old houses. out front was an old sign advertising suits I presume, and next to it a laundry. I could barely understand the signs as they were in Lao and French, there were old paintings showing a suit. I imagined a scenario of a Vietnamese family left from the days of Indochina, surviving the various changes in regimes and wars. A Scent of Green Papayas compete with whirling fans and long lost histories.

The next day when I went back I struck up a conversation with the granny who seemed to be in charge. I noticed she was speaking Lao to the girl. She told me the reason she spoke Lao to the girl was because the girl was Lao, when I asked if the house belonged to her family she laughed and said she commuted a long way into town every day. So much for assumptions. I didn't dare ask if she was Vietnamese, I wanted to leave some of my imaginings intact.


Bun Xiao

The other food sold there was a similar food in that it was a filling wrapped with a pancake type thing they cooked right then called bun xiao. The ingredients besides including rice flour also include corn flour and turmeric. The whole thing is a bright yellow. It came with a heaping plate of mint. I know the word "home laap" means mint, but I don't know the name for the different kinds. This kind has smaller leaves and a very delicate flavour. Great for eating as a green on the side.


Sun Saap

Haircut

Barber Shop Ban Nong Tang.

Above is the place down the road that I went to most often. Creag was usually well behaved. It was also my chance to take a picture and have him sit still, that or get his ear cut off.

What you are seeing in the photo is this barber's entire house. There is a small bathroom off the back, and they cook in a pot outside the back door. Behind the cabinet that contains all of their earthly possessions, is a bed to sleep on during the day.


Finished Product

There is something universal about getting a haircut in a barber shop. Same set up everywhere and for some reason not much talk needed. You go in, sit down, notice who is there before you, get bored until it’s your turn, get up sit down, get cut, pay.

One time a few years ago, I stopped at the side of the road and was overcharged. There was a sign stating the price in English and Lao. My wife was with me and can read Laotian. I just paid. Kind of weird ripping someone off for fifty cents. He’ll probably come back next life as a head louse if not worse.


Osama's Barber

In mid February we moved to the other side of town, out past Ban Tat Luang, and I had to find another barber. We only went to this guy once and it looks as if he could have used the clippers on himself. I have no idea what the pencil sketch of Osam Bin Rotten, was all about.

I've tried to not use that most famous terorist's full name in fear that automatic web crawlers might filter out his name and put me on some kind of terrorist-watch-body-cavity-search-at-airport list. Phil if you are reading this please use your influence to get my name purged.

Loa Terrorists (Yer either with us or again us)

Above is a picture of the ones that are out to kill you.

In twelve years Laos has gone from having almost no private motor vehicles to about a gazillion murdercyles. Most of the traffic seems to be concentrated in Vientiane and the surrounding area. But every town of any size has people doing dumb things in the road.

In the normal course of life I’m seldom fearful of middle aged moms driving their kids to school or grandpa headed to the coffee shop to hobnob with his palls. Here in Laos it’s perfectly possible they could give you a real bad day.

It’s hard to say what is the potentially most dangerous habit. How about driving on the wrong side of the road on the edge until it’s possible to veer across all lanes to get to the opposite side. Or the standard practice of entering traffic without yielding or even looking. Take it for granted that the first few feet of the edge of the road belong to anyone.

Somewhere I’ve read the statistics of how many fatalities per kilometre driven and it’s one of, if not the, worst in South East Asia. How so many people could kill themselves so easily is a wonder to me. Thailand has much faster traffic but they’ve also had motorcycles for a lot longer.
A few years ago the powers that be made a rule that all the motorcycles had to have rear view mirrors. The first thing people used to do with a new bike was to take off the mirrors. The non use of mirrors should give you a clue as to local rules of the road. Nowadays I seldom see a mirror that actually is adjusted to look behind, more likely straight up to apply makeup or other very important things.

Lately they have painted in left turn lanes some places and I’ve even seen some people using them. Usually people have two options, cut across traffic at the first chance and drive up the wrong side of the road until their turn comes up, or slow down in the breakdown lane and look over their shoulder before cutting left across all lanes of traffic.



Cars are worse, they hurt more when they hit you and due to their size there’s more there to mess up with. Cars make slower progress due to all the motorcycles and they need to push to make up for it. Kind of like how a queue forms for a line at the post office, except in this case it’s a thousand kilos of metal they are pushing around with. Backing up and especially parallel parking are skills beyond many.

Once a kindly neighbour gave me a predawn ride to the airport. The road to the airport is divided and he ended up on the wrong side of the road forcing motorcyclists coming the other way off the road. He was of that crucial age of forty and over. Older folks didn’t grow up with motorcycles and so never learned to drive in their wild and crazy years. You can spot them ahead of you in traffic they wander and seem to float, unaware of their surroundings trying only to keep from hitting someone in front of them.

At night things get scary. There are a lot of things out there in the dark and many of them don’t have any lights, like cars and trucks and motorcycles. Drunks that can barely walk getting into their pickups and thinking they are stunt drivers on TV. Come to think of it Sunday afternoons are pretty bad that way too.

My only hope lies in the younger generation. The other day I saw a high school girl driving fast but skilfully through rush hour traffic, watching her rear views continuously for out of control maniacs approaching from the rear. Used her turn signals, anticipated entering traffic the whole bit. Another twenty years and things should be safe.

Ping Moo, Jeao Maclen

Jeao Maclen, grill with meat cooking in the background

The other day I was in town and it had been a long time since breakfast. Seeing this lady frying up some flesh in front of the post office I decided to give it a go. She had a large discerning clientele with all the tuk tuk drivers and the Hmong women that sell herbs and embroidery. Mostly she had tongue, liver, and intestines for sale, but I did spot a good cut of meat.
Oh.. An explanation… Ping means to cook over a fire as in barbeque, Moo is pork, Jeao is any one of a million dipping sauces for eating sticky rice and mac-len is vegetable-tomato.
The pork had just come off the grill but she put it back on to sear both sides. Most people like their meat back on the grill for a couple of seconds before they take it to insure that any germs it has picked up from flies are killed. I also ordered a thousand kip of sticky rice, the pork was five thousand so the meal cost sixty cents.
When I asked if she had jeao and what kind the woman replied jeao tamada. Tamada means regular. I don’t think there is such a thing as regular jeao, every jeao needs a name. I was very happy when she showed it to me. Jeao maclen is my favourite. I was even happier when she served it up.
Look carefully, see that dark colour. Not the red of tomatoes. That’s the charcoal that flaked off the tomatoes. I like all the ingredients for Jeao cooked on the fire. Not just cooked but slightly blackened on the outside. The taste is different. I’m going to do a post on how to make it later. For now, the other ingredients are green onions, garlic, hot peppers, fish sauce, bang nua. I don’t like it with pa dek, too earthy.

Sorry couldn't wait for the photo
I’ve gotten jeao maclen in Vang Vien, Hway Xai, and Luang Prabang on the street and always been disappointed. Fried tomatoes, tastes like tomato sauce for spaghetti.
The rice was fresh and hot, the water free and plentiful with the communal cup being clean. There was a big umbrella for shade.

Foe

Foe

Pronounced Fuhhh. Spelled in Vietnamese as pho, it’s pronounced the same. Whatever you call it, I call it liquid heaven.
When the French brought the Vietnamese to Laos to be their bureaucrats, the Vietnamese brought foe. I’m very appreciative as I like it best of all the things they brought, better than the fresh baguette, better than liver pate, better than the dark coffee in drinking glasses, better even than the pretty Vietnamese girls.
I’ve never been to Vietnam, so I can’t compare. Lao foe is above all fresh tasting, similar to the rest of the food. In Thailand they have a noodle soup called Quway Tyow. Quway Tuow is dead and heavy. Foe is alive.
The basis for foe is above all the good soup stock. When we butchered up an elk back home one of the best parts was that we now had a large supply of good quality bones. We can’t buy good bones in the super market where we live. Normally they are sold for dogs and are old, or with ribs and too meaty. Good bones make a very flavourful but light soup stock. Good foe needs to be transparent and shiny.

Tdooee Foe Jao Gow

This restaurant is called Tdooee Foe Jao Gow and it’s in Dalat Kuwa Din. Dalat Kuwa Din is the wet market next to the bus station in downtown Vientiane. To find this foe restaurant walk all the way to the back of the market to where there is car parking. Not behind the market next to the klong where there is also parking, but rather the car parking that is in the market. Along the south side of the parking lot are a row of dry goods stores, follow that row of stores east past the edge of the parking area and you are there. For reference the big road out by the front of the market is south, the bus station is west. You could print the photo here and take it with you.
We found (meaning my wife found it, I use we in the liberal sense) this market three years ago and it’s still there today, maybe it will be around for a while. The name would lead you to believe so. Tdooee is simply a name like Joe or Mike, foe is the soup, joa gow means the old one, or the old place.
I asked what was in the stock and the daughter of the owner said yes to beef bones, salt, and bang nua, but when I asked what else she just smiled. I tasted a tiny hint of cinnamon, maybe it was star anise, whatever it was it’s not there to be tasted, only in the background. They were light on both the salt and the bang nua. Probably they figured if someone wanted it they could add, it’s on the table, or maybe they figure the sauce is rich enough to stand on it’s own.
The greens on the side were the classic three, mint, basil, and fresh leaves of lettuce. As soon as I would eat some lettuce more would appear. There is another plate with hot peppers and slices of lime on it. I always squeeze in a couple slices of lime, just the kind of guy I am. I always skip all hot stuff in soups, My cilia don’t work and hot stuff goes down the wrong pipe. No cilia from doing hits on short hot pipes for too many years, burnt em.

Daughter of Tdooee

Besides the broth and greens this place does the noodles to a T. At home I always over cook them and they come out droopy. The other sin is to under cook them, and that’s worse. At this place they are cooked only, just barely enough. They have to remain perky even sitting in the hot foe water.
The meat is the least important part for me. Of course if they cut corners they would lose customers, so they do it right. They use good fresh beef, sliced paper thin and placed in the bowl just after the broth and noodles. The heat of the water is the only cooking it gets. When they throw in the meat balls and sausage the temp comes down cool enough so you can dish in right away.
The broth is hot, piping hot. I typically drink the water before eating the noodles. Serves two purposes, one it’s the part I like best, and two, when I eat the noodles they aren’t as wet, and don’t splash all over. The Loa call this draining the pond. The expression comes from the way they drain the water out of the rice field then catch all the fish left stranded. When the girls at the restaurant saw that I had drained the pond they brought me another bowl of just broth, I squeezed in a couple more limes and dug on in, almost couldn’t walk away.