I'm just curious , how many type of tribes you guys think there are in Laos ?

Buk Nut wrote on 3^rd Jul, 2016 at 3:21am:


I hate western culture that's ruining the traditional Laos way of life

Let's take a look at Japan and Korea. Both are slowly dying due to birth rates being below the replacement rate. Young people are not having kids, mostly due to the economy. Most Japanese women focus on their careers and don't care about having kids, as the culture makes it very hard for them to do both. Korea is similar. Also a corporate culture where you are basically a slave for the company you work for. Japanese men these days are too into trading cards and video games to even man up and start talking to women.

You could say traditional Japanese/Korean culture is pretty much dead and replaced by a western corporate culture. The life of an average Japanese man is extremely stressful with mostly work and little fun, except for those who have the most wealth.

Traditonal Lao culture is only planting rice and growing vegetables, and gathering plants/animals to eat in the countryside. This still very much exists, even in Northeastern Thailand, though it's just the style of dress that has changed, and some of the young people don't follow that lifestyle, but most do. What's the point of getting more for your family if they aren't even going to exist down the line? What if they become so absorbed into corporate culture that they forget to live their lives and your lineage just dies? It's not worth it, but there's no real solution.

Lao culture is more under threat from the commie Vietnamese and Chinese than the west. They're the ones buying all the land and leaving Lao people with none.

You guys can say all the down side you like cause your
belly full and you have a 401k waiting for you when you retire. What about the future of the Laos children ? I'm
pretty sure they wanna have opportunity just like yall.
I would like to see the childrens have access to a good
education and health care. There's a group call Jai Lao
that goes around Laos and give kids like school materials
and stuff. I thinking about donating to that cause.

The economy of Laos is growing currently, but its natural resources are being pretty much destroyed, so life is actually getting worse for a lot of people in Laos while getting better for a select few.

The only people you can blame for the problems in Laos is the communist Ho Chi Minh- Kaew government.

I'm not saying Lao kids shouldn't pursue opportunities for their future, you can do that without losing your culture, it's just that teenagers often see no value in their culture and always think something else is better.

You could be an engineer and still act like your own race, pretty much.

Anyway, I don't see much of a future for Laos, or most of Southeast Asia sadly.

According to studies global warming along with rapid deforestation will devastate the mostly rural economies, and poverty will increase.

Vietnam does well because of its culture. Vietnamese people are hardworking like the Chinese. You don't see a lot of lazy Vietnamese people and they're also intelligent.

Vietnamese come to the USA and become engineers and professors and succeed. Many Lao and Khmer people are still impoverished and living in the hood and in gangs in the USA.

I don't want to speak badly about Lao people, but they just don't have the ambition or work ethic to succeed in the way that the Vietnamese and Chinese do. The culture of Lao people is just different, and I would say many Lao people could be considered lazy and unmotivated. The same goes for a lot of Thai people. Their country had years of foreign investment and development but the culture of the people didn't change. If Vietnam had that it would be way ahead of Thailand. Now Thailand is losing a lot of Japanese investment to Vietnam, and it's moving backwards economically.

Another factor is the geography of Laos. It has no access to ocean and it doesn't have a lot of land. Combine that with a low population and you get a very small economy. Laos as a country isn't very viable because of that.

ba dac wrote on 12^th Jul, 2016 at 10:37am:

Fair enough.  But perhaps Lao people are not receiving as much education.

And before you dismiss my comments about western corporate culture out of hand, try experiencing it.  All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.  Laos is poor due to lack of access to the ocean, as you said.

The government doesn't even build schools in the poorest areas because they don't want them to think too much or they might realize they're being taken advantage of and left out of the development process. Simple as that.