With a rich culture and an expansive landscape, the Southeast Asian nation of Laos has nurtured its own distinctive tradition — the lottery. As with all games of chance, the lottery draws on the human fascination with luck and fortune. But it’s more than just numbers and symbols; it’s a captivating interplay of culture and whimsy. As the results of the October 30 Laos Lottery were announced, the mystical aura of lucky animal symbols blended with numbers to create an exciting cultural spectacle.
With the jackpot hitting more than $55 million, Xia Rattanakone, who grew up in an American-adopted orphanage in the turbulent 1960s and ’70s, says she and her husband plan to donate some of the winnings back to their family in Laos. She and her husband also hope to return to search for her birth family, a task that could take years.
In addition to the state-run lottery, there are several private lotteries in Europe. Bulgaria operates a government-run lottery called TOTO 2, and there is a privately run lottery in the Czech Republic called Loteria. There are also private lotteries in the Isle of Man and Lithuania, and a European Union-wide multi-state lottery called EuroMillions.
But even as Laos’ state lottery has grown into a major revenue-generating enterprise, concerns have been raised that the system lacks transparency. On Aug. 17, the office of Prime Minister Thongloun Sisoulith sent a directive requiring the Ministry of Finance, which oversees the legal state lottery, to work with the ministry of public security to improve transparency. The directive also ordered a reduction in the number of weekly drawings and a crackdown on informal football lotteries and lottery chances purchased through short messaging services.
