| The pregnant woman
replied that the villagers were comfortable. "They have enough to eat and enough to
make ends meet.
We sell a lot of crops, but earn very little profit because the
bad trails make travel difficult." After she spoke, she descended into the rice field
on the right side of the road. She told us she had to gather plants to feed her pigs.
Bounkham took one can of condensed milk from his bag and called
out to her, "Wait, Auntie! Please take this. Please take this can of condensed
milk."
"Bless you, my son," said the pregnant woman. After
thanking him, she went off in a different direction.
We continued along the same trail as before. I praised
Bounkham’s kind heart. He had brought two cans of condensed milk especially for his
uncle but he had given one away to a complete stranger.
In Bounkham’s reply, I heard both pride and happiness.
"In my family, we were taught to do this, especially me. My mother taught us that if
we are carrying food with us when we see a pregnant woman, we must give her a share. No
matter how much or how little, we must give her some of it. It‘s our tradition. Many
people in this village do it.
"My father told me a story which my mother had told
him," Bounkham went on. "He said that when she was pregnant with me, she liked
to walk beyond the village. One day while she was walking along the side of the trail, she
came upon a group of five or six villagers who had just returned from hunting. They had
one deer with them, which they skinned, and began to divide the meat. The hunters gave a
share to my mother, the same amount handed out to most of the others. This is the right
of a pregnant woman, according to our tradition. The only person who got a larger share
was the hunter who owned the gun. He received a double portion, including the head, the
four legs, and the skin.
"That evening my family got to eat deer laap.~ Later,
near dawn, my mother gave birth to a baby boy, the same one who is now walking toward his
birthplace."
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