Story Cont'd.

Okay, I realize that, in continuing this story, it's not so interesting, so I'll quickly wrap up.


Sleeping shirtless man didn't wake up, even when yelled at by Ae, so we went off to find someone, anyone else.

I mean, for god sake, you can't just drop a fruit basket off on the Abbot's doorstep (my idea... Ae reacted like I said we should beat the Abbot with sticks).

So we walked over and found a solitary nun, sitting in her white finery (picture a monk, but with white robes. The nuns are quite asexual, as they have shaved heads as well. In fact, if not for the white robes, I would have figured she was some old dude).

The nun said that she was one of three people there, the rest were on some fun outing (she wasn't bitter, though). One other guy was in the shower and the third person was in an unknown location.

So we sit down in front of the nun and say we've got this small gift for the temple. She gets up, slowly, grabs her sash thingy, and comes back to sit down.

'I need to do a blessing for you,' she said.

'That's okay, we just wanted to drop this off for the temple,' Ae said.

'I NEED to do a blessing for you,' she said. Okay.

'Did you bring water?' she asked. Now, there is a certain type of blessing where the blessee slowly pours water on the ground while the blesser chants incantations/blessings in Pali, a language I know even less that Lao. Anyway, generally when you go to get a blessing, you bring your own water. How stupid are we?

upon learning we didn't have our own water, she says, 'oh, just grab any old thing over there and bring some water back,' So I found a coffee cup, Ae grabbed a plastic bowl, and we filled them up with water, then slowly poured it out while, you guessed it, the nun chanted in Pali. Good breath control on that nun, too.

So, blessing done, the nun went back to peeling some fruit that she had been concentrating on prior to our interruption, and we beat feet back to the Embassy car.

Ae tells me that we are certain to meet in our next lives because we went through this blessing together. What is uncertain is if we will meet as higher beings, based on our good karma gathered from a lifetime of good works, or if we will be two ants toiling in the same anthill somewhere, damned, as it were, to a life of toil by our bad karma. Or, if we'll meet when one of us, a higher being, steps on the other, an ant. It's really a crapshoot.

--------------------------------
Katherine and I have both been quite busy with stuff at the Embassy, but Diana and Alan have taken care of themselves admirably.

Diana gave Vone a lesson in Red Sauce today (so we had spaghetti and red sauce for dinner). Thursday she teaches Vone, Goht and others turkey, gravy, mashed potatos, etc. So we will have Thanksgiving in February on Thursday.

Saturday to Bangkok, and the luxury of the Peninsula.

story, cont'd

Sit like this!!! Pour the Water!!!...the life of a demanding nun

So today in an effort to finally deliver the remaining consular New Year's gifts to various agencies and contacts in Laos, I went to a temple with one of our FSNs. (Foreign Service National, a term for local and 3rd country-staff that are hired locally. Despite being widely used and accepted, the term has somehow been deemed offensive or something, and LES (locally-engaged staff) is the new term to use. It's just that it hasn't caught on. And anyway, LES will undoubtedly be pronounced as something approximating the word LESS, thus connoting that the locally-engaged staff are somehow less than...which will obviously be offensive and changed.)

Anyway, I went to said temple with Ae (our ACS FSN, isn't the gov't wonderful with the acronyms?) because we have used their cremation services in the past when a deceased AMCIT's relatives want to dispose of the body that way. It was the same temple I visited last March, and wrote about on our lovely blog on March 29 last year (for those of you who have this whole thing memorized by date).

At that time, we met with the Abbot of the temple, and there was lots of activity around, with novice monks cleaning up the temple grounds, villagers entering and exiting, etc.

Today we walked in to silence. Not even the cats were moving. Okay, when I walked up to see if a cat was indeed dead, it jumped up and ran away, but that was the extent of the activity.

So we stood outside the Abbot's closed door and called gently (last year we woke him up) to see if he was around.

Nothing.

We stood outside the other monks' quarters and yelled for them.

Nothing.

We climbed up some stairs to a common area, where a shirtless, decidedly unholy-looking Lao man was gently snoring.

Ae called out. aye! Aye!! AYE!!!! (Aye = older brother, sounds like a Pirate, or Scotsman, saying yes)

.....to be continued, as Katherine is here to pick me up to go play tennis.....

Sit like this!!! Pour the Water!!!...the life of a demanding nun

So today in an effort to finally deliver the remaining consular New Year's gifts to various agencies and contacts in Laos, I went to a temple with one of our FSNs. (Foreign Service National, a term for local and 3rd country-staff that are hired locally. Despite being widely used and accepted, the term has somehow been deemed offensive or something, and LES (locally-engaged staff) is the new term to use. It's just that it hasn't caught on. And anyway, LES will undoubtedly be pronounced as something approximating the word LESS, thus connoting that the locally-engaged staff are somehow less than...which will obviously be offensive and changed.)

Anyway, I went to said temple with Ae (our ACS FSN, isn't the gov't wonderful with the acronyms?) because we have used their cremation services in the past when a deceased AMCIT's relatives want to dispose of the body that way. It was the same temple I visited last March, and wrote about on our lovely blog on March 29 last year (for those of you who have this whole thing memorized by date).

At that time, we met with the Abbot of the temple, and there was lots of activity around, with novice monks cleaning up the temple grounds, villagers entering and exiting, etc.

Today we walked in to silence. Not even the cats were moving. Okay, when I walked up to see if a cat was indeed dead, it jumped up and ran away, but that was the extent of the activity.

So we stood outside the Abbot's closed door and called gently (last year we woke him up) to see if he was around.

Nothing.

We stood outside the other monks' quarters and yelled for them.

Nothing.

We climbed up some stairs to a common area, where a shirtless, decidedly unholy-looking Lao man was gently snoring.

Ae called out. aye! Aye!! AYE!!!! (Aye = older brother, sounds like a Pirate, or Scotsman, saying yes)

.....to be continued, as Katherine is here to pick me up to go play tennis.....

Our lovely weekend....time for a nap.

I don't have much to say, and certainly have nothing entertaining, enlightening, or witty to say.

The reason is probably that I spent an inordinate amount of time this weekend sleeping, so nothing much happened. This, of course, isn't true, as much happened during the few hours that I was awake.

Friday, as you know, we met up with Noah and Lisa Littin for some high school reminiscing (Katherine and Noah only), and beers and food on the river (all of us, plus my boss Greg).

Saturday was up early (okay, 9:45) for breakfast with the same folks at Kung's, followed by some relaxation and a long nap, a party and movie at home (Crash, very good, if a little uncomfortable).

Sunday was up early to play tennis, followed by a shower, some reading, a nap, the lantern festival, and now home.

So that was my weekend. Alan and Diana's was basically with the same, if not with all the napping. Katherine napped as much as me, although she wouldn't admit it if asked.

Diana and Alan are in the homestretch of their Vientiane adventure. We all head to BKK on Saturday for a couple days, then they head home on Tuesday. We'll be staying at the Peninsula, courtesy of Dietrich/Wilson.

Our lovely weekend....time for a nap.

I don't have much to say, and certainly have nothing entertaining, enlightening, or witty to say.

The reason is probably that I spent an inordinate amount of time this weekend sleeping, so nothing much happened. This, of course, isn't true, as much happened during the few hours that I was awake.

Friday, as you know, we met up with Noah and Lisa Littin for some high school reminiscing (Katherine and Noah only), and beers and food on the river (all of us, plus my boss Greg).

Saturday was up early (okay, 9:45) for breakfast with the same folks at Kung's, followed by some relaxation and a long nap, a party and movie at home (Crash, very good, if a little uncomfortable).

Sunday was up early to play tennis, followed by a shower, some reading, a nap, the lantern festival, and now home.

So that was my weekend. Alan and Diana's was basically with the same, if not with all the napping. Katherine napped as much as me, although she wouldn't admit it if asked.

Diana and Alan are in the homestretch of their Vientiane adventure. We all head to BKK on Saturday for a couple days, then they head home on Tuesday. We'll be staying at the Peninsula, courtesy of Dietrich/Wilson.

Katherine and I will be going here at some point.

But the piece de resistance had to be, "Naked Falang kid standing on a fish' head and peeing".

And the aptly-named...Shoe Store...curiously, there were two shoe shops within the park, but no other shops.

And the one titled, Cindarella and the 7 dwarves, that also had a snowman and what looks like Rudolph pulling a sleigh.

The people behind the exhibit created a few incongruities, like the Panda Bears in Holland...

The centerpiece of the lantern festival. A tall, lit up, chinese tower with piped in chinese opera music (complete with applause) blaring from it.

There is a Chinese Lantern festival/exhibit at the Cultural Park outside of town (on the bridge road) to celebrate chinese new year. So we headed out after dinner for a little cultural trip.

Alan, enjoying his day.

This little guy decided to hang out in our tree just outside our gate today. Trying to figure out what it is and just how scared of it I should be. I don't like snakes. It wasn't large, probably about 2.5 feet long and skinny, but still. Gives me the heebie jeebies.

Egg delivery.

Diana got a Thai cooking lesson from our friend Goht.

We had breakfast this morning at Kung's, the sticky rice pancake place. And today is the first day of Tet/Chinese New Year. So just when we were finishing up, a group of kids came by in their dragon costume, accompanied by drums and cymbals. Some of the shopkeepers, including the owners of Kung's, are Vietnamese, and so they tie some money on a string in their doorway, and the 'dragon' comes by and dances around, then 'eats' the money. All very fun.

Sometimes you've just got to take your chicken for a ride.

And just in case you were traumatized by Katherine's rude gesture, here's a soothing scene of the sun going down over the Mekong from our vantage point at the Australian Club. Yesterday, by the way, was Australia Day. Katherine and I attended a reception at the Australian Ambassador's house, along with probably 400 of our closest friends. It is true, by the way, that the Australians throw the best parties.

Even though she's fond of vulgar hand expressions, she is pretty cute in her silk wrap.

I asked Katherine if she wanted to send a message to everyone who reads the blog, and this was her response.

Dinner out at the Mekong Breeze Restaurant. Karaoke of Lao revolutionary songs, sung badly, no extra cost

'So, do you remember Zoe? Olivia? Steve? Noah Littin, a high school classmate of Katherine's, and an FSO in Ho Chi Minh City who I met when I was there, came to town tonight with his wife, Lisa. They're in town tonight, then heading up to Luang Prabang tomorrow. So a bit of catch-up during dinner.

Katherine took this picture of a boat on the Mekong. Isn't it beautiful?

There was a party on Thursday at the Embassy. Among other things, the Ambassador presented Naiyana, a Consular Associate (and wife of our Public Affairs officer) with an award for her work during the Tsunami last year. It was a delayed, for whatever reason, but well-deserved award, as Naiyana was sent to Phuket soon after the Tsunami and spent days working in quite hellish conditions trying to find, or identify, in some cases, Americans lost in the Tsunami. Naiyana will be leaving this summer to head to Hanoi with her husband, and will be sorely missed, as she is a native Thai speaker, making her invaluable to the consular section. Plus, she is a regular at our poker games.

Glass of Beer Lao, a thing of sticky rice (on the right), and a plate of food. What else does Alan need? The answer, of course, is a river to float on, which luckily he had. Katherine, Alan, Diana and Vone went to the floating restaurant for lunch on Tuesday to celebrate Vone's birthday.

Yao....check.

Okay, 5 down, 41 to go.

I interviewed a Lao Yao woman for a visitor visa yesterday, the Yao being one of 46 ethnic groups living in Laos. She didn't speak Lao, so her son did a Lao to Yao to Lao translation.

Now I have interviewed Lao, Hmong, Khmu, Akha, and Yao applicants. Frankly, I've probably interviewed many more applicants from other ethnic groups, but if they come in speaking Lao, I probably didn't notice.

For more on the ethnic diversity of Laos, click here for some information helpfully titled "Ethnic Diversity"

It's the beginning of Tet/Chinese New Year, so y'all know what that means. You guessed it, everyone from Ho Chi Minh City is coming to Laos, where the small Vietnamese/Chinese communities means that it won't be as crazy as in Vietnam or China. Tonight a guy I met in HCMC named Noah Littin is coming in with his wife, then they will head to Luang Prabang tomorrow.

In another episode of 'It's a Small World,' Noah and Katherine went to high school together at Midwood High in Brooklyn.

The Sunset Bar awaits.

Tooth Fairy Time

Our niece Emma lost her first tooth. Very exciting.

http://lifeincarver.blogspot.com/

Posted without comment....

By a fishbelly-white twit who's just biding his time between Rome and NW DC until his Ambassadorship comes through...

http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/62028.htm


....The key will be the people. Can the department attract new recruits with courage and a spirit of adventure, in place of the fishbelly-white twits it's always favored?....

A literal answer to the question asked

Today I interviewed an elderly Hmong couple (through an interpreter).

I asked, "what do you do here in Laos" expecting to hear a variation on the 'we're old, we don't do anything,' 'we're citizens,' or 'we watch the grandchildren' which are all common answers among elderly Lao applicants.

But this elderly woman, remaining teeth crimson-coated from a lifetime of betelnut, looked at me with a big grin and said 'WE GROW RICE AND WE EAT RICE' (all caps to connote a relatively forceful response).

Okay. A straightforward answer about their life here in Laos.

----------
Tonight we're heading over to our friend Jon's house for some poker. Diana and Alan are going to play. Beginners always win....we'll see...

----------

So, some possibilities for our next post, in no particular order: Moscow, Uzbekistan, Syria, Namibia, Belize, London, New Zealand, Australia, The Netherlands, Turkmenistan.

----------

Walletboy* wrote a book

Everyone's favorite sitcom star in the best damn sitcom noone ever watched ('Get a Life') has written a book.

That's right, Chris Elliott has written a thrilling historical novel titled 'The Shroud of the Thwacker'.

I'm only about 40 pages into it, but it's pretty funny already. Katherine's brother Christian is a pretty good present picker-outer.

Another funny thing is watching American Football on Asian ESPN, which I am doing now (rerun of Pittsburgh vs. Denver...noone tell me how it ends up). Because it's a foreign game here, they have all these 'NFL Rules' info thingies where they explain just what the heck is going on. For instance "the line of scrimmage is the place on the field where the ball is placed. Each team, 11 on a side, line up on either side of the line of scrimmage. The players are separated by the length of the ball, and cannot move across the line of scrimmage until the ball is hiked by the Center to the quarterback.....etc.

Pretty entertaining. But not THAT entertaining, so I'm going to bed.

But not before I read some more of the book.


*from one of the funniest episodes of one of the funniest sitcoms noone ever watched.

A big water buffalo getting his grub on at the water's edge.

Okay, one more picture of newly planted rice. It's just so damn cool. This was probably planted this morning, yesterday at the latest.

Then it was home to wash the bikes, wash ourselves, and go for a massage. Katherine may not, in the end, get a lovely massage tonight because of her tough-looking new wounds. But I will. Because I'm all man. Just look at the manly way I am washing these bikes. And getting massages is manly.

We stopped off for some sustenance at everyone's favorite floating restaurant on the way home. No boat this time, just a table on the floating restaurant itself.

A truck full o' bikes

Newly planted rice fields full o' cranes

Unfotunately he could do little about her dust-caked face and dust unibrow that resulted from the crash. That she had to take care of herself.

Reason enough to hang out with a couple Docs. Noah was up to the task of taking care of Katherine's near-mortal wounds.

Here we are getting ready to go for the long downhill ride back to the cars. Turned out it was 2.5 hours up, 30 minutes down. And a fun down as well.

Except for one little incident. Katherine spun out in some soft sand and went down. Luckily wasn't going too fast, and just skinned up a knee and an elbow.

The ride through the towering pine trees in the background was incredibly beautiful

So here's the group (minus me). From the right, Jon the Health Frontiers volunteer Doc and mountain biking machine, my cute wife, Tom, the security officer at the Embassy, his wife Goht (seated), Erin, and, proving that Laos is the center of the universe, and that 6 degrees of separation are brought to 1 here, Noah Rosenthal, a Doc visiting Health Frontiers and a classmate of Ari Kagan's at the Bank School (elementary school in Manhattan).

But a pretty lake, with water buffalo grazing around us, so it wasn't all bad.

And came to this little bump in the road on our attempts to ride the 'loop'. A lake. What kind of a loop road ends at a lake for goodness sake?

About 1 KM down from the crest of the mountain, we passed through a small village.

Then, when we could take it no more, 6 of us (and our bikes), piled into the back of a passing pickup for the last 1.5 KM up or so. Of course, Jon took a pass and pedalled his way up.

A rest stop.

Katherine and Erin, taking their bikes for a walk.

So we went on a bike ride today about an hour North of town (near the lovely golf course we go to, but sadly haven't been to since early October). The mountains in the distance are basically where we went.

Whoever built the road we biked wanted it done quickly, I guess, as the road was as short up the mountain as it could possibly be, meaning short switch backs and lung explodingly and leg liquifyingly steep. But beautiful nonetheless. We thought we were going on a long loop, but never did find the way to the loop. And, in mountains, it's never smart to take a road down where you don't know where it will end up, because you could come out in a different valley miles from your car.

So we basically did an up and back. The up, as it turned out, was a long walk for most of us. Probably 70% of the time 6 of the 7 of us were pushing our bikes and gasping for air. Our friend Jon, however, was a machine, and pedalled his way all the way to the top with a couple rest stops thrown in there to wait for us slowpokes.

From The Wife

Life is busy here in Vientiane -- I've got badmitton tournaments to organize, happy hours to schedule, tea parties to host, AND, I've got parents to entertain!

But I've found sometime today to give an update on our trip to Siem Reap. My mom, Alan and I had a great time seeing just a few of the many temples in Siem Reap. It really is an amazing place with so much to see and a lot of distance to cover. Our two days were full -- but we also made naps and good food a priority too.

Mom and Alan were troppers the first day and after walking around Angkor Thom, losing our driver for an hour, they were game to climb to the top another temple (forgive me I don't remember the name) to see Angkor Wat in the distance and the sun set. First there was a steep hill, then a huge set of steep, narrow stairs and Mom did this all in high heel sandals! Who says' being stubborn is a bad thing? The sunset was a bit disappointing but I don't think Alan noticed or cared since he was too busy talking to these cute young french women. That night we dined at this small and delicious restaurant called Angkor Kitchen, we had a curry, water spinach, fish and, of course the very tradition Camodian side dish: french fries!

On Saturday we were up early and headed to the market first thing to get some new sensible sandals for Mom. With that settled, we headed out with our driver and guide. The guide did a great job showing us lots of different and fascinating temples. But honestly, I don't think Mom, Alan or I could name them all if we were quizzed. They were all beautiful and fascinating but after a while, things start to blend together. I had to look up the names in the guide book when I posted the photos below. But we all loved Bantrey Srei (or some such name) for the incredibly well preserved stone carvings. And Ta Phrom was another favorite -- famous for theall the the trees in, around and on top of the temple. It is also famous because parts of Tomb Raider were filmed here.

There -- That's my summary of our trip to Angkor Wat.

Most temples have very steep, very narrow steps to climb -- to symbolize climbing to the top of a mountain. Lesson learned: high heel sandals -- even though they look good -- are not a good idea.

Day two at Angkor with new (sensible) shoes!

Scenes from Tomb Raider were filmed at this temple (Ta Phrom)

Ta Phrom has not been cleared of trees or restored so you can really see what the state of the temples were when the French "discovered" Angkor in the 19th century. Very cool.

Banteay Srei (beginning of 11th century)

Carving of Indra at Temple Banteay Srei

Angor Thom (early 13th century)

The gateway into Angkor (12th century)

Alan enjoying his first Angkor Beer in Siem Reap Cambodia

And I call this one 'hot ancient chicks with big boobs and funny hats'. Who says I don't appreciate ancient architecture?

Since Katherine hasn't yet posted anything about their trip to Cambodia, I thought I would throw another picture out there. I call this one 'dorks in hats'.

Can you feel the mother/daughter love? I know I can.

By the way, this is what we ate. A delicious, and somewhat spicy, green curry with chicken. Just about the best damn thing in the universe, as made by Vone.