Laos: The land of the silent ‘S’

At this point in the trip, Mike had perfected the art of pre-downloading a bunch of Wikipedia pages about where we were going so he could read them on the plane. So, on the way to Laos, he learned that Laos got its name from the French. They were trying to get different Lao kingdoms to merge, so they named the country the plural of Lao, which of course is Laos. But, then because they were French, the ‘s’ is silent. Tricksy that. Our only stop in Laos was in Luang Prabang, a sleepy town that is a World Heritage Site. One does not come to Luang Prabang for great excitement and hullabaloo. One comes to meander through narrow streets and along the Mekong, to browse the stalls in the night market , try new foods and perhaps go to a spa. So, we really took our time here. We started by rolling out of bed just in time to make it to the hotel’s breakfast (though we went earlier and earlier each successive day in search of warm breakfast. Alas, there was none to be found). We visited a bunch of different wats (Buddhist temples), a museum where the royal family used to live and another that was about the different ethnicities in Laos and went shopping.

Detail of a relief at a temple in Luang Prabang.

A reminder that "Zombie Nation Eats Your Head."

On our first full day in town, we stopped by the Tamarind restaurant for lunch. The food and their cooking class had been recommended to us by Kristen’s former boss’ daughter. And she wasn’t wrong- the food was amazing. Lao food is really interesting- it has very strong flavors- including combining bitter and sour together. Most eating is done with the hands, using very sticky rice. We both enjoyed it, though we probably wouldn’t seek out a Lao restaurant first when there are many options available. But, we were sufficiently impressed that we signed up to take the cooking class the next day.





We started out in the local market to learn about ingredients. One of our classmates threw up after trying a very small bitter eggplant. OK, to be fair, the woman was already feeling sick before she tried it, but given Kristen’s lack of preference for bitter things, she avoided trying it. Mike dug right in and agreed it was bitter. We picked up a bunch of ingredients for the class, including two live frogs that were placed on a Styrofoam tray and wrapped in cellophane. Mike volunteered to cook one of these hapless fellows. (It is not easy being green.)



He was given the option to have one of the assistants make sure the frog was ‘ready to cook’ (dead). Mike, whether out of heroic bravery or a heretofore unknown antipathy towards amphibians, opted to do the honors himself and after a few thumps with his trusty pestle he was given the next option in this choose your own cooking adventure. To clean or not to clean? Mike had gone this far, so he decided to really get close to his food in a Michael Pollan sense and gutted the frog. Then he turned it into a delicious dill curry.



Did it taste like chicken? Mike says yes, but more like a chicken foot (i.e. kinda fatty). Kristen’s participation in this was to photographically document the process and to try the frog. In her own dish she opted for curried fillet of fish, and was quite fine with that. The rest of the food was also very tasty, especially a spicy smoky eggplant dip, and herbed pork meatballs fried in lemongrass.



We also took a day to go visit a cave on the Mekong that is filled with many different statues of the Buddha. The cave itself was okay- after visiting we agreed that it was indeed filled with many statues. More spectacular was the journey itself. We had a great time watching village life along the Mekong go by as we floated along.





One of the major things people come to Luang Prabang for is to see the local monks process early in the morning. The tourists outnumber the monks, and sometimes the tourists aren't very self-aware, but overall it's still a cool experience.




Another highlight was the lookout from Mount Phousi at the center of town:




We also made a 3-hour visit to the spa that cost about 30 bucks (beat that, Pyara Aveda!), leaving us nice and relaxed. It was time to head to Siem Reap to explore the ruins of Angkor Wat.