Village temple

I rented a gearless Chinese bike again today, and rode out of town on a dirt road, where my fellow tourists fear to venture. All it takes is a ride through Laos’ villages of primitive woken shacks and waving children to realize how ridiculous it is that it’s a communist country. Marxism-Lenninism and class struggle are the last things on these people’s minds. Just getting enough to eat is more important.

Even more unbelievable is that Laos was once considered the key to South East Asia, so we secretly dropped more bombs on them than any country in the world. Yes, tiny, insignificant, rural Laos, one of the poorest countries in the world, became the most heavily bombed in the world.

From the tourist’s perspective, there is no legacy to this war. People still wear their USA tee shirts as if nothing ever happened. But since the bombing ended, 5,700 people have been killed by unexploded American ordinance, and 5,600 injured.

Pretty girls

Only a few children and girls splashed motorbikes as they went by today. But on the main road, shaggy backpackers are behaving like children, armed with huge supersoakers. Why don’t they go to Thailand if they want to act like idiots?

Tonight they had a beauty pageant. The girls came out in their beautiful silk traditional costumes and the announcers talked about their hobbies and jobs, or where they went to school. They didn’t have talent or swimsuit competitions, though But that’s probably a good thing, since the Lao swimsuit consists of jeans and a flannel shirt. Or nothing, for those aged 5 or less.