Kou Voravong
Kou Voravong grew up in Savannakhet and pursued a primary education there. He obtained the « certificat d'études primaires complémentaire indochinois » - Certificate of Indochinese Additional Primary Studies - (CEPCI) in 1930, went afterward to Vientiane and began his first-secondary-school year at the Collège Auguste Pavie. But because of a conflict which opposed him to French Colonial administration, his adopted father was sentenced to prison that same year. As reaction to this situation, Kou Voravong left school and returned to Savannakhet. As an out-of-school teenager, he practiced sports, especially soccer.
May Song Vang
Vang was born to parents, Nhia Chou Moua and Yee Lee, on February 5, 1951, in the northern village of Phou Dou, Laos, French Indochina. She was her family's fourth of thirteen children born in the small farming village. Her father discouraged her and other girls from attending school. However, she defied his wishes and enrolled at Sisawavong Medical University in Vientiane. She completed her studies and became a midwife, nurse, and physician assistant. In 2013, the "Fresno Bee", an American newspaper in California, called her a "pioneer for women in her home country of Laos" for receiving her education.