Buffalo girl

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Please take your time... and enjoy it large on black

I have travelled all my life but never before have I been in a country where the principal characteristic of the people seems to be their smile. Despite Laos poverty and isolation, its people were some of the kindest and most outgoing we've ever met. Its delightful old world charm has not been despoiled by the slow but steady pace of modernization. A number of kids played along the paddy fields greeted us. This sweet girl were taken care of her water buffalo while her parent working in the pdaddy fields. This is Laos, a land of ethnically diverse inhabitants but where gentle, open, beaming smiles surround you wherever you go. And never since my school days have I heard so much giggling, both in cities and in the countryside, as both young and old go about their daily activities. A naturally sweet nature seems to have survived centuries of fighting and turbulent change, while the results of the intense barrage of bombs and Agent Orange dropped on Laos during the Vietnam war still affects, in some way, almost every family in the country. To Westerners, with our grumbles and grouses about the slightest inconveniences to our lives, it is a revelation. Until recently Laos was an Asian backwater. When it opened its doors again to foreign visitors in the Nineties there were few modern amenities and no tourist infrastructure. Now this sleepy, rural land is waking up to tourism

Photo of a lovely girl taken on the island Don Det - Laos. The little island located in the Mekong river. While her father is ploughing in the rice fields and her mother transplanting rice seedlings this young girl taking care of her water buffalo. A great place to explore some of the lesser-known areas of the southern region of Laos. A place to meet the friendly Lao people despite their poverty and isolation. A place to meet Beauty and the Beast.