A Morning Walk by the Mekong River;
A Restaurant in Laos Named After My Niece
By M.P. Prabhakaran
Luang Prabang, Laos: The Mekong River is about 3,000 miles long. It is the twelfth longest river in the world. Starting on Tibetan plateau, it flows through or borders on six countries – China, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam – before it empties into the South China Sea. In terms of biodiversity it provides to the areas it touches, it is second only to the Amazon River.
I recalled these details when I set out on an early-morning walk on the Luang Prabang road overlooking the Mekong. I recalled them to remind me that during the short walk I was going to take, I would be enjoying only a tiny part of what this wonderful river offers. I was preparing myself for possible disappointment. Very soon I realized, though, that the reminder was uncalled for. It had no effect on the elation I felt during the walk.
It was a beautiful November morning. The sun had just risen, giving a copper-color coating to the surface of the river. The water in the river was churning, and I have not yet succeeded in finding out why. The lush forests the river snaked through added to its beauty. The serenity of the morning was pleasantly disturbed by the occasional chirps of birds and footsteps of joggers. All joggers that I saw were foreigners. I could also tell from the way they responded to my “Good morning” that most of them were from Australia.
“It’s quite a treat, eh,” I said to one of them. In fact, I was speaking for myself. For a person living in New York, a morning jog on an empty road that wound its way through wooded areas overlooking a river is quite a treat.
“It is,” the man replied. He waved to me and said “Good day,” in the typical Australian fashion. By which I mean that it sounded “Gudai.”
I felt great. “I will be reminiscing this experience for a long time,” I said to myself and continued walking. Little did I know that what was going to make my morning walk by the Mekong more memorable was yet to come.
Nisha Indian Restaurant
I might have walked for another five minutes when a signboard caught my attention. ‘Nisha Indian Restaurant,’ it said, with an arrow below it pointing to a side street.
In the two days I had been in Luang Prabang, I had not met a single Indian, let alone see an Indian restaurant. What added to my excitement was the fact that it was not just any Indian restaurant. It was one named after my niece. “How did a restaurant in a Laotian city get named after my niece?” I asked myself and walked in the direction of the arrow.
The restaurant was the front of a house in which the owner and family lived. It was too early for any customer to be around. A man in a lungi, the ubiquitous loin cloth most South Indians wear at home, was playing on the veranda with a little girl. He had South Indian features and could easily pass for a cousin of mine. “He must be the owner,” I said to myself.
“Which part of South India are you from?” I asked him, at the risk of sounding presumptuous.
“Pondicherry,” he said.
Pondicherry is one of the former French colonial enclaves in India, about a hundred miles to the south of Chennai, formerly Madras. Even after the rest of India gained independence from Britain in 1947, the French and the Portuguese continued to cling to their colonial possessions. The Indian territories under Portuguese control were Goa, Daman and Diu. While the government of independent India, after protracted negotiations, persuaded the French to depart voluntarily, it had to engage in a mini military operation to get rid of the Portuguese. The French departed in 1954 and the Portuguese were expelled in 1961.
In colonial days, people from one colony could move to another with minimal travel restrictions. Laos was a French colony from 1893 until it declared independence in 1945. However, it became completely free of French control only it 1954. The Indian restaurateur appeared to be in his thirties or early forties, not old enough to have left Pondicherry and moved to Laos when both were French colonies.
“How long have you been here?” I asked him.
“Thirteen years,” he said.
Had I had more time at my disposal – I had to leave Luang Prabang by noon – I would have asked many more questions to satisfy my curiosity as to how a person from a former French colony in India ended up in a former French colony in Southeast Asia. Those with means usually went to Paris and other major cities of France. But I did make it a point to ask him the one question that brought me into his restaurant: What made him name the restaurant Nisha?
“Oh! Nisha is my daughter,” he said, pointing to the girl, about seven or eight years old, running around the place.
“My niece’s name is Nisha, too,” I told him. I had expected him to say something or, at least, smile. He didn’t.
I ordered a South Indian breakfast – dosa, sambaar and tea. The tea was from Darjeeling, India, not part of former French colony in India.
[Published on April 17, 2007.]
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