Me, myself I always have a good feeling whenever I heard the word “Lao” or “Laos”. The people and this country were at first come to my mind during my country fell into what a so-called communist rule in 1979-1991. Kampuchea, Vietnam, Laos were the three words that was educated to students at that time by the Kampuchean Communist Party at that time that we were the three brotherhood countries, good or bad we hands in hands, shoulder and shoulder fighting the imperialist, USA. This was just a series of communist ideology and in fact I didn’t know where is the Laos actually located in this world and what this country looks like.

Since Cambodia then Kampuchea, turned away from a one party rules in 1993, Laos was than seemed to be far away from Cambodia areas and not many development being heard from this country anymore. I was always wondering and really wanted to know and see this country very much. The first heard of “Laos” came again to my mind when Nouhak Phoumsavanh, then the President of Laos paid a state visit to Cambodia in 1994 (?). A series of Lao song have been played in FM103MHz radio station during the visit and I that time tried to record them in a cassette and keep listen until today. I was that time my first Laos song I love “Kolap Paxsan”.

My dream of Laos came in real when I started my first visit to this country in 2004. Amazing scenery of Laos, rich of resources and gentle people of Laos really touch my spirit and of course I have quite a number of Lao friends, read and speak some Lao and this country everyday stay besides me through websites I visited and books I read.

It was a funny, to my thought, when I saw a lot of complaints happened in a website called Samakomlao, (a website I visit minimum 3 times everyday, but I didn’t make any action so far as I see a lot of people from this website not that welcome foreigners), related to Cambodia posts. There were quite a number of posts related to Cambodia at the web-board of this website and I think not all the posts were posted by Cambodian but the Lao themselves.

Something that I noticed through the posts was that a lot of people tried to compare Cambodia and Laos in term of development in their own country and it seems like most of the Cambodia posts are trying to show off how Cambodia is developed than Laos. It was then came to an angry of some Lao people in the web board and claimed for a no more posts on Cambodia and asked for a Lao post only in a so-called Lao Association “Samakom Lao”.

In a one hand if we notice some of the post, by think positively if they were all posted by the Cambodian, it was a sign that Cambodian people started to see more beyond their country and to bring a positive change they should share to the people of the world good experiences and lessons, not to boast, exaggerate or downgrade any nation or people. On the other hand, if the posted were posted by the Lao, then they should think more and should learn why the posts happened. If the posts are about good think that we can learn why don’t we accept them? Or they were ashamed posts and disturbance or is it because of individual’s closed minded?   

It was funny enough when they debated each other over the posts whether should the posts allowed. The world of internet is the world in which difficult to control. People have freedom to say things they want and it was a good place enough for them to share and exchange their thought for the benefit of their country and their people. However, it came to a question that, whether Lao should only focus on their country without seeing other countries of the world and especially her neighbors and yes a faithful brotherhood and former comrade?

Me, myself I have never had any filthy attention to Laos and Lao, to the website I visited to get my knowledge more of the country and people I am always admire of. Being a Cambodian I called for my people not to post anymore article on Cambodia in samakomlao, if some of the post before used to post by Cambodian, so that we can maintain good relation with Lao people more and especially to the website. Learning from our neighbors is an excellent lesson besides classroom and maintain good friend is the greatest essence that we should continue as our old saying that only our neighbors that could help us better and faster than others far away!