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National Geographic : 1987 Jun
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All this against a background of tradition al Lao music drifting in through a window. BEHIND THE PRESENT-DAY REALITY in Laos lies the memory of postwar problems unlike those elsewhere in newly Communist Indochina. Not overpopulation and unemployment, as in Vietnam. Not bloodthirsty fanatics going berserk, as in Kampuchea. The Lao Peo ple's Democratic Republic has its own chro nology of early troubles: 1975-76: New regime stresses reconcilia tion, but students, officers, merchants flee. Tax on rice, rains poor, farmers unhappy. 1977: Drought. Farmers unhappier, some flee, some join resistance. Government ap peals for more Vietnamese troops. 1978-79: Too much rain, then floods. Resis tance pockets persist. Radicalization-gov ernment seeks to force "cooperativization." Still more farmers leave. 1980: Biggest exodus yet. Resistance fades. Some old-regime civil servants, released from reeducation camps, get jobs in minis tries. Some liberalization-a turning point. Most observers tend to agree that many things have eased. People still leave sur reptitiously, but not so many now that it's harder to go from the refugee camps in Thai land to the U. S. or Canada, to Australia or France. Chances are the daily plane to Bangkok will have an old couple aboard, off to visit their new grandchildren half a world away; they have passports, they'll be back. Then there are Laos's widely noted efforts, Laos Today 793
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