The start of the second and last term of the school year began at the end of October after 3 weeks of glorious holidays. Even though the majority of children go to Rosario School in Viengkhuk , there are also a lot of teenagers attending different high school schools in Nongkhai. No matter what school the children attend they all got their end of term grades or exam results last month. As a reward and an inspiration for the children, Fr Ole promised a dinner out in Nongkhai for those that score 3 or over in their end of term results. The usual school results are out of a total of 4. Seventeen very happy and proud children were taken to eat out in Nongkhai with Fr Ole and Br Dtic. The choice of restaurant was open air by the Mekhong River sitting at a long table eating “suki”, or Korean BBQ . The kids love this way of dining where you cook the food yourself over a gas plate embedded in the table. A choice of meat and seafood, vegetables and noodles is selected and the meat is grilled on a dome while the vegetables and noodles are cooked in water in a sort of moat around the dome. Spicy sauce is supplied and you can go back again and again for more of everything. It’s a very communal way of eating and sitting outdoors on a balmy night by the Mekhong River is a treat by anyone’s standard.
After the meal was finished with an amazing amount of refills, the night was ended by a visit to the milk shake stop. All along the promenade by the river at Nongkhai there are small wooden tables close to the ground where teenagers sit on mats and drink all different concoctions of sweet syrupy milk with big chunks of buttered toast. The kids sat and gossiped and laughed and felt like normal kids on a night. For most of them it was the first time they had eaten out at night in Nongkhai, and to eat at a place that their school friends talk about was something very special for many of them. Next term the numbers attending “the Nongkhai night out” are expected to rise dramatically!