Brouwer on the booze

Drinking lao-lao rice whisky in Luang Namtha

This is a rare picture of yours truly drinking alcohol. And it was deadly stuff too, the local lao-lao rice whisky which burned through my throat and chest as it sank lower! I've never been much of a drinker and effectively quit alcohol (except for very occasional lapses) more than a decade ago. It was never something I particularly enjoyed, so wasn't a difficult choice to make. In these pictures Tim and I were on one of regular forays into the rice fields of Laos when a group of men sitting under umbrellas invited us over for a snifter. It would've been rude not to have joined in but boy, that stuff is strong. Tim, an experienced drinker, had no problem and downed a whole mug full of the fire-water under the watchful eye of our guide, Tid and our new friends. The paddy fields were in the shadow of a small hillock housing a large broken stupa by the name of That Phum Phuk, just a few kilometres west of Luang Namtha in northern Laos.

Tim found the ordeal much easier than me

Women in their conical hats planting rice stalks in the next door field

Getting the field ready to plant the rice stalks