Four years after its opening, Bida Manda continues to embrace change while sticking to its roots.

The Laotian restaurant — the only in North Carolina — has received praise from Forbes, The News & Observer and Huffington Post. However, its reception doesn’t come as a surprise to those familiar with its owners, a brother and sister duo. Vansana and Vanvisa Nolintha established Bida Manda through a singular vision: to share their food, their culture and their story with their community.

Vansana Nolintha moved to the United States with his sister in 1998. He graduated from NC State in 2009 after studying art and design. Through the Caldwell Fellows, he participated in service learning trips, developing an appreciation of both his community and activism in general.  

“He’s internalized the values of the program … having humility, joy in life … and being a good person to the world,” said Janice Odom, head of the Caldwell Fellows program. “Vansana is a great embodiment of that.”

He completed his graduate program in Dublin through Trinity College, where he studied international peace and conflict studies. After graduating, he returned to Raleigh in the peak of the recession. Despite his degrees and leadership experiences, he struggled to find a job.

He traveled back to Laos that year, reconnecting with family.

“The trip reignited a passion for my culture and my own narrative,” Nolintha said. “I realized that food has been a thread that stitched my entire life.”

When he returned to North Carolina, those sentiments began to take shape. He planned to open a restaurant downtown, where the definition of “Laotian cuisine” had yet to have been addressed. It was an opportunity to introduce a new culture to Raleigh, and at the same time, synthesize the two places Nolintha called home. While the concept may have come to Nolintha easily, the execution proved otherwise.

“We started everything from scratch,” Nolintha said. “In the planning phase, even the idea of writing a business plan was challenging. [From the] challenge of finding the right real estate, especially when you don’t have a long portfolio of professional experiences in the business industry, to designing an experience that’s centered in our family’s cooking: there [were] a lot of real tangible challenges, but we were young enough and passionate enough to be able to look at each challenge one at a time.”

The Nolinthas also turned to their teachers, mentors and community for support in addressing these challenges.

“Really the reason why Bida Manda is what it is today is because it is an extension of the NC State community that we are so fortunate to have,” Nolintha said. “We are constantly overwhelmed by the generosity and the support of our friends and our community.”

With a background far from the food industry, Nolintha credits NC State for providing him with the tools to address these challenges, developing work ethic, problem solving skills and passion.

“And the belief in creating something that’s meaningful,” Nolintha said. “And discovering the tools to deal with all challenges proactively and [to] trust in relationships.”

That trust has gone a long way for Bida Manda. The restaurant’s success is founded on strong, unique relationships; for one, the relationship between Vanvisa and Vansana.

The connection between the siblings is central to Bida Manda’s prosperity, but more importantly, its identity.

“[Vanvisa] and I have been a team since we came to America, just her and me,” Nolintha said. “We had the kind of challenges to force us to become partners really early in our lives. She’s a complementary soul to everything that I do.”

Naturally, skeptics in Bida Manda’s early stages were hesitant to support a project headed by siblings. Despite this, Vansana and Vanvisa’s harmonious nature was evident. Vansana stands out as the project’s visionary, responsible for the storytelling and the dreaming. Vanvisa’s role is different; she studied restaurant and hotel management at UNC-Greensboro and has a knack for business.

“She makes things happen,” Nolintha said.

In terms of relationships, the camaraderie Bida Manda fosters among its team also stands out. While it’s the nature of the industry to expect high employee turnover within restaurants, Vansana’s perspective shows why Bida Manda’s staff is so strong.

“We take pride in the fact that Bida Manda acts as a transitional stage in people’s lives, and hope that by providing a healthy and supportive and creative community, they will have the courage to fly and to move on to something else … that’s aligned in their life,” Nolintha said. “It’s important to us, we are committing to the whole development of a person … People want to feel like what they do is meaningful and positive, when we can create that kind of culture, people are transparent, open, about their timeline so we can plan for change.”

As Bida Manda looks toward the future, it is undoubtedly established deeply in the Nolinthas’ past. Its name alone is a nod to their familial ties in Laos, “bida” and “manda” translating to “father” and “mother.” Upon entering the restaurant, one is greeted by Vansana and Vanvisa’s parents’ wedding photo.

“It shows the reverence and love of parents who sacrificed a lot … so we could have better lives, so we can dream and be free,” Nolintha said.

Their parents recently visited the United States for the first time, nearly two decades after Vansana and Vanvisa left for North Carolina. They’d tried to visit before, but their visas had always never been accepted.

“[For them to] witness the complexities and nuances of our lives has been really rewarding, but also challenging,” Nolintha said. “We have a lot of foundation to build and gaps to fill, but we’re definitely on that road of construction.”

Neither Bida Manda’s widespread recognition nor the enthusiasm behind its mission is unlikely to stem soon.

“The generous awards and recognitions are byproducts … not something we intentionally went after in terms of what success means to us,” Nolintha said. “We are so fortunate to have humble beginnings and the love and support of our community … and while we want to remain popular and require two-week reservations, [we want to] make sure the intimacy and beautiful small moments of magic continue to happen in the restaurant, despite its popularity.”

Bida Manda is located on S Blount Street in downtown Raleigh.

A version of this article appeared in print on Sept. 29, 2016, on page 11 with the headline: “Bida Manda serves up tasty roots.”