Ban Boua, Lao PDR

The mornings started the same, there will no frills which made them any different. In the dark, she was awakened by the roosters crowing. ‘Sabaidee tawn sao’ they seem to say. She felt her husband move the mosquito net out of the way, trying to be quiet, without waking the three children asleep between them. Vanida, the youngest made a humming noise, and reached towards her breast. She briefly sucked at her breast and returned to sleep, the nipple still in her mouth. Noy heard the sound of liquid hitting the soil under the house; her husband taking a morning pee.

She closed her eyes again, thinking she might be able to sleep until he returns inside the house, but she jolted awake when she heard the screaming. She sat up and got out from under the mosquito net.

“I wish they wouldn’t do that first thing in the morning,” Noy said.

Lee laughed. “I thought you’d be used to it by now.”

“When they slaughter the pigs, their squealing sounds like a woman screaming. I wake up feeling frightened.”

Lee wrapped his arms around her. They hugged for a few moments. “Do you feel better now?”

She nodded. “I think maybe that sound scared me because of that movie we saw at the neighbor’s house.”

“Those screams were scary. Even I was scared.” She started to move around the cooking area, a porch at the back of the house. She stirred the embers that were still glowing from last night’s meal, then added kindling, which popped and sent up sparks when she added it to the flames. She boiled water for the tea for Lee’s lunch and then put the pot and the bamboo basket over the boiling water to warmup the sticky rice. The sticky rice radiated its sweet smell as it started to warm up.

“Where are you working today?”

“I’m helping Wan transplant his rice on the hill.”

“Isn’t the ground too dry. It hasn’t rained for 2 weeks.”

“He diverted some of the water from the gravity feed water pipe.” Noy shook her head and emptied the bamboo basket on to the board so it can cool.

“He knows he shouldn’t do that. The water pressure for the taps in the village is so low already.”

“I’ll talk to him about it.” He added the words, ‘again’ in his mind. He felt sorry for Wan and his family, living at the outskirts of the village with only the naked slop for planting the upland rice. “He wants to plant the seedling before they get too big.”

Noy packed some of the sticky rice in the basket for him, then put vegetables and dried meat and chili paste in another basket. “I’m glad you’re helping them. He’s not a natural farmer.”

Lee went to the post where he had hung his clothes the night before and standing on the stairs to the cooking porch, looked up at the sky while he pulled out his shorts and long sleeved shirt. The clothing gave off the scent of sweat and manure. “Looks like it’s going to be another clear and hot day today.” He sat down and made a ball of the sticky rice, made a thumb imprint in the ball and filled it with chili paste. Noy gave him a ladle full of water when he finished eating the rice.

“Well, I’m off. After I help Wan, I think I’ll fill the small field with water, and try to find our buffalo so I can plow the field tomorrow.”

“OK – but if you see the village chief, tell him to tell the neighbors to slaughter their pigs outside the village and for Wan not to cut into the water pipe.”

“Sure.” Lee went down the stairs before Noy could see his smile. He talks to the nai ban about this at least twice a week.

She could hear the voices of other neighbors going to their fields, and people filling buckets from the water taps and the sound of chopping wood. She could smell the smoke from other cooking fires.

She watched the east start to brighten and the sounds of children laughing and mothers calling to them to eat breakfast. She smiled. This was her life, her village and her life, so predictable, was also so comforting.

She heard the banging on the old cooking pot. It was time for Lee's mother to get out of bed. She stood up and prepared for her day of chores.

Later in the day, the cool of the morning was replaced with dry heat. Noy turned away from her crying children, hoping that their tears and wailing would tire them out. Their screams made her head hurt and she felt so irritated with them that she wanted to hit them. But Vanida clung to her thigh which stopped her from approaching Pheng and Wow, with her hand raised. Instead, she could feel the moisture as the toddler rubbed her tears and snot on thin fabric of the sarong covering her thigh. Noy bent down to loosen her grip on her leg and smelled that Vanida had soiled herself. She removed the loose trousers and threw them near the back door, to wash at the river when she did the other laundry, and put a dry pair of pants on her.

Once Vanida was dry, Noy laid down with the baby on the mattress to let her breast feed until she fell asleep and she drew the mosquito net around her She could hear Pheng and Wow playing with stones in the yard. Wow had a corn husk doll and was saying to the toy soldier in Pheng’s hand, “Stop your crying. When your father returns home, he’ll give you candy.” Noy sighed. She was sure that Lee would argue with her about not giving sweets to the children.

She thought about the nutrition class she attended the week before, when they discussed the problems with packaged snack foods. "Yes, they are quick and you can give them to the children when they are hungry and whining and you don't have any food to give them right away. But what are the downsides?" She had written down the problems as Noy and her neighbors told her their experiences. “My kids whine and whine until I give them what they want....if the kids eat that kind of candy, they won't want to eat dinner... my kids are starting to get tooth decay.”

Noy said, “No matter what I do about not giving the kids the snack food, my husband or neighbors give them candy."

The children were suddenly quiet and she looked out into the yard. Her neighbor, who also attended that class, was handing out candy to the children. No wonder her children were quiet. She felt her neighbor should know better – but what can we do when we have the housework to do and the children are crying?

Noy straightened the house, putting toys in a box, and placing the breakfast dishes in the metal basin. When Lee returned home from the field, he always wanted the house to be in order and to have food readied for him. She looked at the shadows outside. She still had a while. She stirred up the embers and got the fire going so she could cook the sticky rice. She'd mixed it with peanuts and a bit of sugar and see if the children would be satisfied with that snack.

The problem started when they went to house parties for the Lao New Year, and people hosting the parties distributed small bags with the sweets. The children loved the packaged food - it was sweet, salty and a bit oily. The following day, they started to whine, and now they wanted more of those snacks. "I'm not going to quibble with you about this," she told them. "These kinds of foods are for special occasions, so don't cry about this. We don't have the money to buy these treats every day."

When Pheng and Wow returned to school after the long holiday, they also wanted some money so they could buy snacks, like their friends. They usually wanted the sugary treats, especially those with different colors and those packaged with cheap plastic toys. Her husband gave them 2000 kip each morning as they went to school for buying these treats. As she swept the floor, she found the small plastic guns and dolls on the floor. The children were attracted to these things but lost interest quickly after they had finished eating the candy.

The sticky rice finished cooking and she spread it out on the wood platter to let it cool. Then she made small balls and mixed in the peanuts and sugar. She called to Pheng and Wow to come inside for a snack. They looked at the sticky rice balls but didn’t eat them. "We want the candy. It's sweeter." She sighed. "There's no junk food so you can eat this."

Each of the children took two rice balls and went outside, where she did see them eating them. They each gave one to the neighbor’s children, which pleased her. She put the rest of the rice balls on a plate and brought them to the neighbor’s house to give to the children. They were starting to talk when she heard Vanida starting to cry. She went into the house and tried to breast feed her, it seemed that she was more upset about the tension in the house. Noy sat on the front porch and rocked her. In a moment, she stopped crying and walked around, pulling a cloth off a table. Noy gave her a pot and a spoon a bowl with water, and Vanida busied herself with spooning the water into the pot.

Noy thought about what she had to do now.The house was clean, she had carried water in the morning and had watered the plants in the garden next to her house and had a meal of mustard greens, tomatoes and onions ready to stir fry when her husband returned home.

While Vanida was occupied, Noy picked up the book and notebook from the floor which had fallen when Vanida pulled the cloth off the table. Noy had convinced her husband about the importance of getting her secondary school certificate so she would go to classes three times per week through the non-formal education program. Her own education had been cut off when her parents told her to marry and she was determined to make something of her life, rather than always going through the daily routine of cleaning, laundry, taking care of the children and joining her husband for field work. She wanted to be a teacher. But seemed that her whole life, she had to obey someone - her own parents, her husband, her husband’s mother.

She completed the first question of the three of her homework, when heard the banging of the chamber pot in the small room reserved for her mother-in-law. She knew she would have to help her with it, help her out of bed and wash her. She closed her schoolbook and stood up.

She heard Lee's steps on the ladder to their cooking area. She brushed her hair behind her ears and smiled at him. His face lit up with his smile, like when he saw her on the day of their wedding.

"How was your day?" he asked.

She answered, "Oh the usual." She looked towards the yard. The kids are quiet.

"I just gave them some candy." She sighed then hugged him.