Since French colonial times Laos has been known for its calm. Comparing the people to their Indochinese neighbours it was said that the Vietnamese planted rice, the Cambodians ate it and the Laotians watched it grow. Its unassuming people gave slow-paced Laos a soothing charm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That charm is not all gone. But things have changed \u2013 Laos-style.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Vientiane, the capital, has a new raised boulevard along the Mekong, where before people sat in caf\u00e9s on stilts and made of wood and with palm leaf roofs. The promenade got them moving. Save for a few boys that have taken up skating it\u2019s no more than ambling though, one shouldn\u2019t overdo it. Twice I see someone jog and for a moment I am perplexed. But they are expats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Walking in the city nowadays you have to actually watch out and wait for cars before crossing a street. The amount of vehicles has even warranted introducing traffic lights and one-way streets. The newspaper runs a story of parked cars blocking streets and sidewalks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Having experienced Laos\u2019s laid-back old times, it isn\u2019t nice to see the new times. \u2018In the good old days\u2026 et cetera\u2019. Well, that is of course a nostalgic foreigner\u2019s view, Laotians will be happy they are gradually catching up with modern times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So much so that this time I even flew from Vientiane to Luang Phabang in a jet instead of a prop plane. An earlier attempt a few years ago to introduce a jet was a miserable failure, or of course if you favour that old-day Laos a failure to be cheered. That leased aircraft soon was grounded, word had it either because repairs couldn\u2019t be paid for or because of a lack of passengers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But this time around with Lao Airlines operating an Airbus and new start-up Lao Central Airlines a Boeing it seems jet travel is here to stay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Step by step Laos is being swept up by the modern, developed, faster world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Since French colonial times Laos has been known for its calm. Comparing the people to their Indochinese neighbours it was said that the Vietnamese planted rice, the Cambodians ate it and the Laotians watched it grow. Its unassuming people gave slow-paced Laos a soothing charm. That charm is not all gone. But things have changed … Continue reading “Laos, a slow country speeding up – hesitantly”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[152],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-laos-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pieterblog.rdeman.nl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pieterblog.rdeman.nl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pieterblog.rdeman.nl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pieterblog.rdeman.nl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pieterblog.rdeman.nl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=279"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pieterblog.rdeman.nl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":280,"href":"https:\/\/pieterblog.rdeman.nl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279\/revisions\/280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pieterblog.rdeman.nl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pieterblog.rdeman.nl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pieterblog.rdeman.nl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}