By Taichi Urabe
The University of Shimane
Do you know the country called Laos? I went to Laos last August and this activity became a special experience for me. The reason why it was a special experience is that I was able to experience something new. Originally I studied the language of Laos by myself, so I was able to speak the language of Laos with the people and play with the children of Laos. Also, I was able to understand the literacy problem facing Laos.
Laos is one of the countries of South East Asia and it is next to Vietnam, Thailand, and Cambodia. Because it is a poor country, some people can’t go to school because they don’t have money for school. It has two seasons, the rainy season and the the dry season. In Laos, when summer comes, it became the rainy season. Also, most people speak Lao, the language of Laos. The capital in laos is Vientiane. A lot of building is built, but it is smaller than Tokyo or Bangkok. There are some temple, we can watch religious mendicancy in the morning.
In Laos, I went to two libraries built by Kiyoko Yasui in Vientiane and Sivirai. Kiyoko Yasui is the leader of the NGO “The fund of library for the children in Laos”. She lives in Vientiane, Laos. She is originally interested in work involved in children’s book. And she went to a refugee camp in Thailand to do puppet show. Then she had interested in children in the Southeast Asia and came to participate in the project of children’s library in Laos. Now she do two activities, one is to protect the folk talk of Hmong tribe, another is to support of library’s management. I studied about literacy in Laos and the support from Japan and other countries. In Japan, SVA(Shanti Volunteer Association) mainly send the children’s book to Laos. When I visited the library, many children came, so I communicated with them a lot. One day, they waited for me for three hours this day because they are looking forward to us coming to the library. I read Japanese book for them in Japanese, played with Japanese toys, and danced. As Japanese toys, I introduce kendama, darumaotoshi, origami. They play with them well soon because they are skillful with their fingers. They are interested in Japanese books and Japanese toys, so I was happy. I was also able to see their smiles.
In addition, I came to understand that Laotian people don’t read books and there are not a lot of books in Laos through the talk of Kiyoko Yasui and visiting some library such as national library and the library of national university of Laos. There is not custom they read books from young in Laos. In fact, national library, library in university and two library built by Kiyoko Yasui is all small and there are not books a lot.
Through this activity, I was able to enjoy and gain more interest in Laos and its issues with literacy. I want to try to continue to study Laos. Also, I want to tell a lot of people about my experience because I want a lot of people to learn about Laos.
