Sao Lao

The only thing I know about Japanese Cuisine is sushi and sashimi. I’m very fortunate to have a sushi restaurant that you can dine in or carry out in town so I can visit on a regular basis.

Today’s weather is very wet and cold. After walking around the center for a few hours of shopping I didn’t feel like making anything for dinner or go out for that matter. Since Johan was such a good helper with carrying my shopping bags I told him dinner was on me. We picked up sushi and sashimi package and had a nice meal.

Guess who got to eat the only two oysters? Me, of course.

While I was in Kansas I gave away my digi-cam to my youngest sister. She’s the only one in the family that doesn’t have a digi-cam and I wanted her to have my old one so she can use it at school. In my family we have this practice of passing down old clothes, used furnitures, used appliances, as well as old gadgets. We even passed down old cars to other relatives and nothing goes to waste. I am sure other Laotians are the same way.

Before I came back to the Netherlands I went to Best Buy to find a replacement for my old digi-cam. Well, to my luck it was out of stock and then the store didn’t have it on the list anymore since the new model was coming out. To my surprise Johan got me a new Ixus 800 for my belated birthday gift. I am very happy with the new camera and still trying to get familiar with all the settings.

Since I like to take lots of pictures I decided to reward myself with a Media Drive. I went to a local media store (Dixons) over the weekend and bought a late Christmas present for little me. I did some research online for about a couple of weeks and couldn’t find one in stock for the price that I want to spend. Dixons has the Sitecom media drive for the lowest price in all over Europe but was out of stock online. It was meant to be when I walked into the store on Saturday and found one in stock. I bought one in less than 5 minutes of browsing around.

This baby will come in very handy when I am on a vacation. I can’t wait to test it out. I have a feeling that I will pass this media drive to one of my siblings in a year or two.

Vientiane, the capital of Laos is a sleepy borough located by the Mekong river. It is rather a messy collection of villages than a real city. For a captial Vientiane has a little over 133,000 inhabitants. There is not much movement in the city but will soon be very active in the near future.

Laos was colonized by France in the 1890s and was part of the French Indochine (Laos, Cambodia and vietnam). The French chose Vientiane as administrative capital. Vientiane means “Sandalwood city” and is pronounced as Wieng Chan, but the French gave its “romantic” orthography to the city.

Here you can follow Floortje (the show host) to Vientiane and Luang Prabang. The video clip is about nine minutes long and in Dutch but that shouldn’t let it stop you from seeing the beauty of Vientiane and Luang Prabang (World Heritage City).

Since the collapse the Soviet Union in 1991, Laos has changed many rules and has rolled out the red carpet for foreign investors.

Vientiane is in a tempo for change. Nowhere else in Laos has modernisation gone more rapidly than in the capital. Although much of the old French style houses in the old districts have been expired and replaced, there are still plently of temples and colonial buildings to explore.

Enjoy your stay in Laos, wherever you desinations might be. While you are there, make sure you sample plenty of Lao food and Beer Lao, the best beer in Asia.

As a kid in Laos, wearing Lao traditional skirts or sinh was a second nature to me. I went to school in white blouse and blue sinh, just like any other girls. Things changed when we came to the US. While we didn’t have a dress code at school, I didn’t quite feel comfortable wearing skirts or dresses until my junior year of college. However, whenever I put on my Lao skirt for a social event, I feel like that little graceful girl in Laos. I also get smiles and comments from older Laotians. They make such a big deal out of seeing my youngest sister and I wearing sinh, as if they don’t expect such an attire from the young and modern Lao women.

While visiting home over the summer I asked a relative to make four Lao skirts for me, two in modern style and two in traditional cut. At first I only wanted one made into a western style skirt, using a sinh sent to me by my deceased grandmother ten years ago.

But after going through my mother’s closet I found three more patterns that are simple and yet elegant. I decided to turn one into a western style skirt and the other two a traditional Lao style skirt. My two cousins (recently from Laos) told me I should have cut them shorter and that I am way behind when it comes to sinh style in Laos. They said the trend today is to wear them like a mini skirt, way above the knees. My cousins told me how all their friends are wearing short sinh and if I go to Laos wearing my sinh, I will not be in style!

Another Lao skirt in western style, at ankle lenght.

A blue Lao traditional skirt.

Lao traditional skirt with matching pha bieng (shoulder sash).

I told my cousins that I am too old to be wearing mini sinh and was not much of a mini skirt kind of person to begin with as a teenager. We all had a good laugh when they said that I am old fashion, something they didn’t expect since I have been living in the west for quite some time.

Using beautiful women in beer commercials is nothing new. Dutch beer company, Heineken tends to create funny commercials.

If you are man, which one will you choose? Jennifer Aniston or Heineken?

Women don’t know football? Also a funny commercial by Amstel Dutch beer.

I saw this commercial during the World Cup games. The theme was Hulp Holland or Help Holland.

It’s a pity the Dutch team didn’t advance that far. Oh well, there is always hope for the next World Cup. When will we see Laos compete with the big boys?

I don’t know much about Asian Pop and started to pay attention to Asian music about a couple of years ago. I have friends that are into BoA and Baby VOX.

Here is a clip of BoA - Be the one.

Here is a clip of Baby VOX - Xcstasy.

So far, I don’t know what to make of these two artists yet. You tell me.

I’ve been debating for months now on whether or not to get Cannon EOS 350D or EOS 20D. I’ve been using Canon IXUS 400 for two years now and wanting to have a more powerful camera since I like to take pictures a great deal. I didn’t like how the photos that I took from the First International Conference on Lao Studies (May 2005) came out. The day shots were good enough but the night shots were blah…

So, I devoted some time last summer to search for a good camera review site and found dpreview.com which has a really good review article for Cannon EOS 20D. After spending sometime going over the review, I was like whoa, this baby is too powerful for me! I will have to take a digital photography course for this. I will have to visit my high school art/photography teacher this summer since she is now teaching digital photography class and ask for some tips and tricks.

There goes the old days of seeking solitude in the dark room and the occasional panic attack because you’re not sure if the Home Coming Game pics will turn out well or not. Now I don’t have to worry about not capturing that special moment because I can see what is on the view screen. There is no need for me anymore to build a dark room either. I just need to buy a big enough external hard drive to store all my photos and vdo clips.

Now which Canon EOS is the best for me? I will be happy with either one of them and will put it to great use when I go to Laos later. In the mean time I can practice taking pictures of windmills, canals, and tulip fields.