Vientiane, Lao – “Land of a Million Elephants”. 19 January 2015

DSC06546It’s Monday so I must be in Lao. Flying into Vientiane, I see the beauty of the land with its rice fields, buffaloes, the Mekong River, trees and green expanses. On the ground, I immediately notice the clean streets, lack of motor scooters (car to scooter ratio is 4:1), traffic lights are obeyed, and several ethnic restaurants from Italian to Korean. I pass many of the 150+ Buddhist temples in the city and what seems like as many automobile dealers. On foot, I no longer need to play dodge-a-scooter. There are sidewalks! Indeed, Vientiane seems a cosmopolitan city and I am enamored of it.
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