Beginnings

Sun setting over the bridge on that day a decade and a half ago

Laos began for me the way lots of things do, as a visa run.

It was the late in the dry season 1995 when I found myself sitting in a nearly empty restaurant in Thailand, the place was set out over the Mekong. I was waiting for time to pass. My visa was for the next day. I had no book. Internet wasn’t yet, and there were no other people to while away the time. I did as many others have done before and since. I stared at the river mesmerized by it’s endless twistings and turnings as it slid by the front of my view. I nursed a beer or two for several hours.

Before dusk is a quiet time. Motors and air conditioners cease, people take their evening bucket showers and quietly gather for dinner. The Mekong is wide at Nong Khai yet when a fisherman cut his motor a mile out I could hear every scrape of his movements as he put out a line and moved a paddle in the bottom of the boat, he might well of been ten feet away the sound carried so well.

Quickly dark came and the lights of the luxury hotel up by the bridge came on as well as every little restaurant and house up and down the shoreline and in the town behind me. The number of lights was doubled by their reflection in the water.

It was when I looked across the river for the first glimpse of the lights of the country I was to visit that I noticed the difference. Laos was dark, lights out. Not the glow of one bulb from one single restaurant or house. No lit up half built construction sites, no hotels, nothing. The contrast was stark, on the Thai side was the shimmering gaudy beginnings of another night of the dazzling, lit restaurants, hotels, and sing song bars.

Across the river dark and silent trees.

I had one of those non immigrant double entry visas to Thailand which were the semi official long stay visas for people the authorities for whatever reason were ok with. All I needed to do was leave Thailand and do a U turn at the border, get stamped out, get stamped back in, and I’m good for three more months.

The usual routine was the multi day train ride to Malasia and back, but of late there were rumors of not only tourist visas to Laos but also available in 24 hours at the border close to the capital. I was living between Lam Sak and Petchabune on the edge of Isaan, Laos was close.. My employer was understanding and I was making a small vacation of the whole thing.

Laos wasn’t so much a step back in time, but a different ending to the same story. The currency had too many zeros, the roads weren’t paved, a lot of people lived in bamboo houses, hardly any traffic. People walking, too poor to buy a bike or take a bus. No traffic lights. No advertising signs, lotta dust.

The language was different, more tone range. The people laughed easier and louder. Women wore the long traditional skirt called a sihn and wore their hair long. Commerce was at the market, people raised chickens and grew vegetables in the city center. The men had hair cuts and clothes of two generations ago. The light filtered through the ubiquitous red dust gave everything the sepia tone of old photos, I was smitten.

Laos was a country just emerging from a long self imposed exile from the family of nations and after a quarter century of slumber it was slow to shake off the sleep. A Rip Van Winkle of South East Asia with a Ho Chi Mihn countenance.

This is actually from the time of our first trip back in 01

The Tao of Travel (a book by Paul Theroux)

This book is not yet available (4/2/11) But who knows, it soon might well be.

I'm not quite sure what Paul's last book was about, seems like it must have been a while ago. At least Mr Theroux wrote a nice article for the travel section of the Sunday NYT. I usually don't go in much for travel articles in the Times, usually they seem like the meanderings of a gap year backpacker with an expense account and an editor. Paul Theroux must be a little better than the normal as I read long enough to reach the bottom of the page.

Read the original here.

http://travel.nytimes.com/2011/04/03/travel/03Cover.html

I guess I've read most things Paul Theroux has written, at least most of the travel writing. I'm not big on the fiction.

The article in the Times is pretty good. It's about going places people say not to go to because they are dangerous. He rules out places like present day Afganistan, Iraq, Pakistan, etc. but will and did go to other places people say not to. 

I'll make a point of reading the book. Strange coming across Paul Threroux in the Times, bet they wouldn't print him if he weren't already a famous writer, not their style at all.

My Short Career as a Professional Writer

                                           Abandoned Mansion on Mekong 2001


A couple of months ago I was contacted by an online media specializing in news and info on East Asia. They wanted me to write somthing, AND THEY WERE WILLING TO PAY ME!!!!!!!

Ok, it wasn't much. $50 for around five or six hundred words. The idea is what grabbed me, Pico Iyer, Paul Theroux, and VS Naipaul, Somchai, writers.

They said they'd actually read my stuff! I should have known better. They did tactfully mention that they were prepared to edit for spelling and what not. They were starting a new website and needed someone to write about Laos. That should have been another tell. I, ahem, am hardly a very knowledgeable person about Laos, I just blog about it, one after all hardly needs to know about something to blog about it, the internet is replete with examples of clueless bloviaters.


I responded.


They wanted a few hundred words about Vientiane, like what are "must do" things, and sights to see during a typical one day stay, a short tour guide to the town. Might as well ask me to write about nightlife, I went to a nightclub for one drink fifteen years ago. Transportation, eating, tourist junk. Ok ok I'm a tourist too, and I freely admit it, postcards in pocket, camera, bermuda shorts and flowery shirt, but good grief I'm about the last person to ask where to go in Vientiane, took me ten years before I stopped by Tat Luang, and most people go there first day. I've stayed in a guest house which closed a dozen years ago and a hotel that most say is slightly dingy, otherwise know nothing about lodging. Have never eaten at any of the places mentioned in guides that I'm aware of.


So I wrote it. Not great, not horrid, but typical. You know, about how Vientiane is half about expats NGO workers and the other half is doing the obligatory one day in the capital city to tick the sights on the way to the plane. And I also mentioned the visa runners. If you've been to Vientiane since the changed rules in Thailand or driven past the Thai embassy you have to realize that 200 people a day cycle through Vientiane to renew visas. I did give a general layout of the town, old part near river, little China town, markets, and so on.


Spell checked it, made sure most sentences had a noun and at least the suggestion of a verb and pushed send.


My best line, "Vientiane, a town that rises late, sleeps early, and is lethargic in between". I made that up, really. They kept that line but I'm not sure how much else. They asked for a photo so I sent that one from years ago when I was like 50 years younger and ok looking, with a bolo tie no less, doesn't get much more western than that.


It took a long long time for someone to completely rewrite it. Starts out with something about the "mighty Mekong", ewh!. My mind immediately leaps to never ending dry sand stretching out away from those riverside restaurants. Photos of monks, description of Bhuda park where I've never been. I've done the same for a Chinese Government Tour company only without having someone else's writing as a beginning point. Just crack open a guidebook, read it, then write down all you can remember so it's in your own words of a place you haven't been.


Worst thing is it's posted under my real name. What if an old girlfriend googles my name or the alumni association from that boarding school I've tried to hide from for 35 some odd years reads it! I'm a bad enough writer, I certainly don't need someone adding cliches or describing places I'd never be caught dead in. I didn't save the original so I've no idea how much to blame on some poor fellow who re wrote.


I wrote a short, not snarky at all, email saying we probably weren't meant to be. Never did open a paypall account for them to send money too. I'm keeping my day job.

Là-haut (Yonder) - Outside the tourist bubble in Northern Laos

Yonder

Above the blogger Marine Richard, a French woman who travels through Laos alone. The  name of her blog la-haut translates into Yonder when I enter it into Google translater,  who knows if this is correct. I'd urge you to go to either language and take a look, read for a while. Better to just go and  read for yourself than to read what I think of it.

I found this blog by happenstance as I do many things on the net, I followed an incoming hit to my blog to see where it came from. I scrolled through the blog looking for a link, on the way I saw many intriguing photos. Intriguing in that they showed a keen eye for what is Lao, especially rural upland northern Lao. The blog was also in french. I have my eye out now for blogs in French showing very off the track type things.

A while ago I read an interesting account of a couple of French guys heading down by boat from Muang Khua to Luang Prabang, complete with capsizing, near drownings, and all kinds of other adventures.

And then there was that google translation I posted about xxxxxx-xxxxxxx-trek-in-phongsali where the guy walks the length and breadth of Phongsali off road.

I was beginning to think maybe the French have some sort of monopoly on remote travel in northern Laos. Imagine my consternation when I plugged the whole thing into Google Translator and found out this blog was by a woman. Not only a woman but a youngish woman, in Lao they'd say sao.

Ms. Richard carries with her the basic tools with which to take an in depth sojourn through the north.

1. A very basic familiarity with the language, not fluency, but a definite ability to speak some Lao.

2. A familiarity with the peoples and cultures. Enough to know the ethicities of those she sees and to eat sticky rice. Enough familiarity, to inform her observations which brings us to number three.

3. The ability to observe. So often we are caught up in our own desire to say or be seen that we fail to listen and watch. Ms. Richard can do both and she also thinks about what she has seen.

4. Lastly Ms Richard is not naive.

I'm almost done with my second reading. The blog isn't really a blog in the sense that it's not an updated entity, the story starts at the beginning and goes to the end. I'd urge anyone who can read French to go to the original web site and read. I suspect that it is much better that way. The address is http://www.la-haut.blogspot.com/

Below is another photo from Ms. Richard's blog. The photos she has posted on the left side somehow don't fit in the space provided, and so when I looked at the picture I could only see the left half of the picture. But it seemed familiar. In my mind I started ticking off the possibilities and eliminating them as soon as they crossed my mind. It came to me later while I was reading. Do you know where the photo is from? You should.

Ban Ha Sip Song

Tree in front of Wat Song Buay on the way there

To kill time waiting to leave Laos I took my rental bike and drove up to the Hmong town at kilometer 52 on the road to Luang Prabang, named Lak Ha Sip Song, appropriately enough.

I stopped at Lak Ha Sip Song once before when riding up to Vang Vien with my in laws. I'd always wanted to spend a little time again looking the town over. For many Hmong in America the town is their best known destination in Laos. It's a Hmong town, but being so close to Vientiane it's accessible.


Market from the south west corner.

The bike was some old clunker I rented for four dollars a day from the guy who has a sign on a tree across from Kap Jai Duh. Both brakes weren't so great, rear ones sounded like metal on metal and they're the ones I like to use first. My usual technique for a quick stop is to lock up the rear tire then pump the front brakes letting off on them only long enough to keep the thing off the ground. It's worked so far. On this bike I had to use the front breaks a lot more than I like, oh well, just go slow and drive defensively right?

It was Saturday morning and traffic was light. The road is fairly straight and flat. The road passes through mostly rural areas but of course being the main road stores and businesses are frequent.

Alley on north side of market


Shophouses in Ban Ha Sip Song

For quite a while I followed a truck hauling an old D-7 cat on a lowboy. He was moving right along and used his air horn gently but often to clear the road of motorbikes and pedestrians. There's something about the idea of fifty thousand pounds of steel hurtling down the narrow two lane road that clears the way. He was moving faster than all the local traffic and the rich folks in SUVs and pickups were reluctant to get in front of him.

My biggest worries on the motorcycle are people entering traffic from the side blindly and others driving down the shoulder on the wrong side. Following the lowboy all I had to do to be safe was to tuck up right behind his rear tires until the road cleared out again.


Maykue Guest House next to market

Actually being there wasn't so thrilling, I was glad I hadn't wasted time actually getting off a bus and getting a room there. Just another Lao town. Ok, the people have longer faces, they are Hmong. But they wear Lao clothes and listen to Thai pop music. The market is alright but then so are the markets in a lot of towns. It's supposed to have a lot of food from the forests, I didn't see any endangered dolphins strung up to make jerky or anything. Maybe there's more to the place and I was just in a cynical, "been there done that" kind of mood.

There is a guest house, and the owner claimed they had rooms with hot water. Hot water is my new standard for hotel rooms. Place has hot water it's ok with me. If there were internet in town it would probably be a nicer place to hang out than Vientiane. Damning with faint praise.

When the charger broke

My camera uses rechargeable batteries. Mostly I like it, one charge lasts a long time, no batteries to throw away. I keep everything charged up as much as I can. Never know when there might be no electricity for a while.

So I was sitting in my hotel room minding my own business and my camera battery charger starts doing one of those sparking smoking type things that you just know aren't going to end up well. By the time I unplugged it whatever was happening had finished doing it's thing.

I was concerned but not despondent. Three fully charged batteries might well last quite a while. No reviewing and deleting photos, just turn it on, snap, then off it goes. More than likely the geniuses down at the market could fix it.

So down the the big market in Pakse I trotted, or scooted to be more exact. I walked through the phone section until I found a store that not only worked on phones but had a few cameras and video cams lying around in various states of repair. I told him it was sick, figured that was close enough, and he peeled it apart stuck the ohm meter on it. Ten seconds later he speed dialed someone, hung up and said, "Lao no have" then looking at me and using the probe from the ohm meter to point at one of those tiny cylinders with wires coming out the end said emphatically, "this, this, this, no have in Lao"

Yes he was speaking English, doggone kids. Probably Vietnamese or Chinese or something. No doubt hated English in school but aced it anyway to go to the good college. And that third language without even trying he speaks it a lot better than I speak the language of the market. I thanked him heavily, he smiled, shrugged his shoulders and said, "maybe Thailand". I still had one possibility.

As soon as I got to Vientiane I got myself on down to the morning market. They are tearing it up and it's hard to find your way around now. Huge pieces are construction zones. Shame really it used to be pretty easy, all the stores that sold similar stuff in one place, many ways to enter or leave each section.

The gold repair used to be along the east side back in the day, adjacent to the street across from the bus station but a little further down. Now it's just off the corner on the east side and no parking on the street. The turn in is where they take away all the trash too so it's not always pleasant.






He's the guy behind the counter

I found the gold repair places and sure enough that same guy was there who fixed my telephoto back thirteen years ago. We spoke Lao. I told him I didn't think it could be fixed in Laos. He did the same thing with the call on the cell phone but told me it would be 300,000 kip and the part would come from Udon Thani on the bus. I said great. Then he asked me if I understood and started to write it out so I repeated it slowly and said I understood. Some electronics store in Udon Thani would have to ship it on the bus, it would get left across the street, and he'd go get it and probably pay the money which would then reverse the same route. I thought the charge reasonable.

Lots of love for old TV repair men who have evolved with the times and also young smart Asian techies no matter thier country of orgin.

Pantip Plaza

I wandered over to Pantip Plaza to buy an extra battery for my camera. The local Circuit City back home didn’t carry them. I figured if it’s hardware for a piece of electronics they must have it there, and they did. The first floor seemed to be inhabited by hawkers selling pirated computer gaming software. There must be a lot of falangs buying because on site of me they seemed to get whipped up into a selling frenzy. Sharks reacting to blood in the water.



I looked for a Panasonic sign and sure enough up on the third floor I spotted one. Pantip is renowned for pirated software. The store didn’t have a battery but they found one for me in about 90 seconds. Cost slightly less than at home.



13 45 0 N 100 32 15 E



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantip_Plaza

Sex Tourists Not Welcome

Entrance to the Atlanta Hotel


I first stayed at the Atlanta about thirteen years ago in the middle of the wet season 1996.

My mom in law, my soon to be wife, and I were coming from Vientiane. We were sick of guest houses and wanted to stay someplace a little nice without breaking the bank. A taxi driver recommended the Atlanta. It was a perfect choice.

The Atlanta in it's time was probably one of, if not the, finest hotel in Bangkok. The place had retained it's charm even if a modern metropolis had grown up around it. The lobby isn't air conditioned as indeed probably no buildings at the time had central air. Instead it sits lower than the street and is shaded from the sun. Ceiling fans turn slowly and you don't get that sealed from the real world, feeling that comes from central air. I remember no windows on the street side of the lobby and towards the rear open doorways leading to the shady garden and the swimming pool. The feeling was of being hushed and at ease, a place to relax from the rat race of modern Bangkok.

The lobby itself had deep leather chairs and nice wooden writing desks with hotel stationary supplied free. Potted plants, and old photographs. There was a restaurant with high booths. We ate those club sandwiches cut diagonally twice, toasted, and with the crust cut off, even had those tooth picks through them. The restaurant only played jazz music pre selected by the German owner.

A great rumor had it that the owner was somehow connected with the CIA, love rumors even if based on nothing. I think while we were there the embassy was using the Atlanta to warehouse a citizen waiting to be repatriated. I'm not sure what his story was but they were picking up the tab for his room and board. Maybe he ran into bad circumstances in Bangkok.

We stayed there a week or ten days while I figured out how in the heck we were going to get my wife to America. I can think of worse places to spend a week. Mostly we swam in the pool during the day and hung out watching TV or talking at night. There were street stalls on the soi for the construction gangs building across the street. No lack of sticky rice to be had. Often my Maetou (mom in law) would gamble for small amounts with the guys staying at the hotel, and kid them without mercy for losing.

I think they were playing for coins only, and this was before the ten baht coin. I did have to buy a lunch once so maetou didn't win every time, but almost. She loves to gamble. The guys were mostly middle aged Europeans in Bangkok to chase the girls. They'd usually appear at the pool around noon exchanging gossip from the night before, who ended up with who or what old girlfriend had gotten angry or whatever. My mom in law would kid them accusing them of being taken advantage of, or being too old anyway. She's a great kidder.

There was also a young American guy who had lost an arm to the shoulder, some kind of accident I think. He loved to swim even though one armed. He ended up meeting and then going out with an attractive Canadian girl who was staying at the Atlanta. She had just finished writing for the Vientiane Times for a couple of years. She spoke great Lao. Two months later we met them at the airport when we were headed out with our visa. I think they were also headed back to North America... together.

I went back to the Atlanta late last year. I needed to go to the hospital on the other side of Sukumvit and I figured it would be close. I read the web site and I'd seen warnings online. They have all kinds of anti sex tourist notices. I wasn't headed to Bangkok for women anyway so I figured it wouldn't matter, it did.








Big Bad Bangkok

View from my window, skyscraping hotels and apartment buildings seem to have sprung up everywhere


The elderly Thai woman who used to run the place is no longer to be seen. I think her son is running it in her stead. Perhaps he has an issue with sex tourists. Maybe I would too if I lived in Thailand and was the product of a mixed marriage. In any case the effort to exclude sex tourists has exceeded what is called for. It crosses the boundary of being rude and even racist. The hotel has also gone to seed somewhat. Dingy and tattered. The night guys are no longer awake. The many services that come with a full service hotel are no longer there.

A couple weeks ago I met my mom in law at a Vientiane fern bar and we had a glass of wine together. I told her I'd stayed at the Atlanta, hoping she'd remembered the good times we'd had there so long ago.

Turns out she'd tried to go to the Atlanta herself. My Maetou went to Bangkok with a couple of her girlfriends to go shopping and so she could brag to her other friends back in Vientiane about it. Maetou no longer gambles for baht coins but for Vientiane real estate which has skyrocketed.

The Atlanta wouldn't let her in. Said "we don't let Thai women stay here", she said, "I'm Lao not Thai", they said "you still can't stay here". She wasn't happy. She had been all excited to show her buddies the little gem that the Atlanta used to be. She had remembered the Thai owner who so warmly welcomed her and chatted about the weaving on the sinh my mom in law wore.

Maybe the changes have something to do with the changes on Sukumvit itself. There always used to be a little baby Patpong on soi 4 called Nana Plaza. The beer bars have spilled out of the plaza and onto the soi itself. Lots of drunk guys at noon, lots of women of leisure.

If anyone knows of a decent clean hotel in the area or across Sukumvit in the soi 3 area for four of five hundred baht I'd love to hear of it, chances are I'm going to be headed back to Bunrungrad hospital again over the coming years.

Motorcycle Accidents

I love these outlines in the road. Somehow they seem to trace the edges of a life, well maybe a wrecked motorcycle anyway. I took this up at Xiengkok. How a motorcycle could get in an accident on this road I don't know. I mean he'd have to like run into himself, there is no traffic. I've waited on this road for hours to see anything moving at all. There was the outline of the other bike too.

On Thursday evening my nephew got sideswiped by another motorcycle, T-boned to be more exact. Ran right into him from ninety degrees. Of course maybe my nephew jumped out in front of him too but in Laos the one who does the running into is at fault. Broke his leg into pieces above the ankle. The guy driving the other motorcycle was drunk, and also had his own kid on the bike in front of him. That kid fared worse, probably crushed between the driver and the bike. You know how it is, if the kid is little you like to keep him in front of you so he doesn't fall off. I don't know how many miles I've ridden holding my oldest on with my knees while he nods off to sleep.

If you get in an accident don't go here.




They call this an international clinic but it's always been empty when I've gone. I had an infection in my jaw from an abscessed tooth and it took them 3 hours to round up a dentist. Good dentist mind you but he probably had to leave his paying practice just to treat me. Between buying the xray film and trying to find some antibiotics it took quite a while. If I'd of known I would have just gone to one of those dentists across from Dalat Sii Kahm or whatever it's called.



Ooops! another fender bender during rush hour. Everyone in Laos just leaves the bikes where they lay until the police get there and do their investigation thing. Pretty impressive I think. In Thailand when I was there the way seemed to be first you pick yourself up, then apologise, then make sure the other person is able to drive away, then you both skedaddle before the police come and start demanding money.



This is around the other side of Mahasot. Mahosot is down by the river just down from the tourist part of town and it's the only hospital I know of.

My nephew went to the place called Loi hasip Dieng. Something about the fact that it has 150 beds. His room costs 7$ a night, they think the surgery to put the plates in his leg will cost $300. The ambulance to Udon Thani would have cost $200, they can come get you right through customs. The cost there would have started at around $1000. My brother in law has never been across the border and they are more comfortable in Laos anyway. A woman I rented a house from who is a GP said the orthopedic guys are pretty practiced at putting legs together, lots of practice.

The Asian Development Bank estimated that in 05 the cost of traffic accidents cost Laos 4% of GDP. That's just about four times the rate in most of Asia. All of a sudden everyone can afford to buy a bike and get liqueured up too. Deadly combo.

Just remember if you get in an accident of any kind, as a foreigner it's your fault. Best get some of that insurance everyone carries.

Sok Dee

Thatdam (Black Stupa)

I like the Black Stupa in that it is a historical Tat that is simply in the middle of a roundabout in the middle of a busy town. No one selling postcards or pictures. You don’t have to make a special trip, you pass by it on your daily travels. It hasn’t been plated with gold or in any other way refurbished to buff up it’s appearance. It just is.

There is now a kind of upmarket boutique guesthouse on one side of the circle, a sign of things to come?, but much of the neighbourhood remains the unchanged. On the East down a soi is the entrance to the US embassy, no parking anywhere close by. The guards will direct you elsewhere, and at the entrance to the soi a dilapidated old colonial house.

I like the grass and bushes growing out of the cracks, lends that “lost in the jungle” type feel. It’s on Chanta Khooumane just north of the mini mart on Thanon Samsethai. I took this photo from well back by the school so to include as many wires as possible.


Top Centre

Adrift on the River (or why make clay figurines)

Looking North from Boyee Sang Mai.

After fifty miles or so there is the place where the Nam Ou curves back to the west, then after another long way it goes to the border of China, then after who knows how far there is a road.


Ban Wa Tai

Above is a photo of the Nam Ou in Ban Wa Tai above Hat Sa. The river is quieter up here, it sees a lot less traffic, everyone headed for Phongsali jumps out at Hat Sa. At the time I took this photo I was very happy to be headed downstream, in retrospect I should have been headed up, ever further up the river as Kurtz would have it. I was on the last day of a 5 day walk in the mountains drained by the Nam Ngam, Nam Long, and Nam Ngay, the last of which I had been crossing back and forth the day before. The thought of hot showers and clean sheets filled my mind. I was also looking forward to Chinese food and fresh coffee at the Phongsali Hotel.

How quickly we grow to miss our creature comforts. A few days in some windy hills and I go rushing back to the relative comforts of a remote Lao provincial capital. I had been spending the nights on the ridges, so it was nice and warm to be in a valley.

The Nam Ou I was leaving winds many miles upstream without a guest house, English language menu, or bus schedule in sight. Also no roads or cars or busses. Electricity, what there is of it, is by small generator. The river first heads north through the Phou Den Din NBCA a place I’ve never heard anyone talk about. It’s not as if the Den Din NBCA backs up against any population centres either, just Lai Chau province Vietnam. After the Ou leaves the Conservation Area it curves west and then north again to Ou Tai then straight north another hundred or so kilometres to Bosao and the border with China. China just stretches on and on forever with even bigger mountains and valleys and more mountains that no one has ever heard of. It’s Yunnan province, without the hype.

I should have turned around and headed on upstream. There are boats, it is a river, I can communicate after a fashion. Heck I can even talk more easily to the folks in Ou Tai than in Phongsali. Ou Tai people are Thai Lu. I should say most the townspeople are Thai Lu, I saw plenty of ethnics I didn’t recognise. Phongsali people are Phou Noi. Pasa Thai Lu is plenty close enough to Lao or Thai, Pasa Phou Noi is like no language I’ve ever learned to howdy in.

I started out this posting thinking about Thai Lu, and Thai Lu culture, (more later), my thoughts just kind of drifted on up to Ou Tai. I’m fascinated by the town. I know some other people that have been there, but I don't know anyone who has gone for a walk. A police man and a career army guy (party members?) offered to take me around, but by the time I got there I just wanted to go home and hang out with my wife and kids. It was the end of a trip not the beginning.


Crags across the river Ma, Muang Long

What started me thinking about the Thai Lu was I found some notes I took from my second trip north last winter. The notes were about a kind of religious offering I wandered into while going for a walk outside of Muang Long, another Thai Lu town, on the other side of northern Laos, over by the Mekong.

I had to kill a day while waiting to go for a guided walk, so I walked across the river to the crag. I crossed the Nam Ma and then a narrow, but almost deep enough, tributary. I was happy to keep my flip flops from being washed away. I wanted to get a view of the good sized hill above town I would be walking up the next day, and also I just wanted to get out of town for a while.


The Raft

There was an irrigation ditch close up alongside the crag and I found the little woven mat below with the figurine made of clay. I knew immediately that I was looking at some kind of folk religion type thing. I was unsure how it had gotten there. Surely it couldn’t have floated down the irrigation ditch. The woven matt looked like a small raft and the woven horse with rider and figures made of clay had been carefully crafted. It seemed as if the clay figure even had a bed or blanket to lie on.


Are we too originaly of clay.

I of course touched nothing but saw no harm in taking a photo. I have my eyes open when walking and hadn’t seen anyone. When I got back to town I showed Tdui, the tourism official, my photos. He was very excited to see what I’d found, and explained that when someone is sick or has troubles they make the figures and the raft as I call it, to draw away the bad spirits. A shaman is consulted and he says words and tells them where to leave the raft. The figures are kind of sacrifices to the bad spirits.


Update 6/16/07
laomeow asked some Thai Lu monks she knows. They confirmed that the figurines are used to draw away bad spirits. The name for the figurines is “Sataong”
I believe the “transferring” of bad spirits away from oneself into the body of a third thing is a common theme throughout cultures.

Road Dangers

This is a bus Guard at the Kasi Lunch stop

Nothing like a picture of a folding AK strapped to someone’s back to grab the readers attention. Actually the most dangerous part of this bus journey was about to unfold fifty feet away. As I walked around the other side of the bus I saw the driver and door guy at the back table being fed shots by the restaurant proprietor who was hanging out drinking with his buddies. Shots of hard liqueur in Laos are looked upon as elsewhere as a measure of ones manhood. The driver in his mid thirties was being fed booze by the restaurant guy who was in his fifties.
I was taking a direct bus Vientiane to Luang Namtha. Scheduled for twenty three hours, they usually do it in twenty. The easy part of the driving was over, the next sixteen hours are twisty mountain roads on a good surface, a lot less bumps but the speeds are a lot faster, they don’t drive those busses like they love them, they put them through their paces. Before lunch the driver had been adjusting up the brake pads, I’d bet they go through a set every other trip.
The restaurant owner had no work to do, his wife ran the restaurant. The driver needed all his facilities intact. My sincere hope was that he was also doing amphetamines, otherwise I’d be scared of him falling asleep. Twenty hours of mountain roads is too much for anyone. At the end of the ride I asked him how he felt and he said great, looked wide awake to me.
Don’t think me a prude, I too have driven long drives in the mountains while drunk and on meth, just not lately and definitely not with 33 people on board. I counted just for fun.
I was on my second trip to Laos in 1996 when I first heard of a problem on the road. I’d been sitting in the same noodle restaurant in Vang Vien all morning with a Lao policeman, a girl who was then my then fiancé, and her mom. We saw a bus roll in from Luang Prabang, it had taken 26 hours thus far, (rainy season delays), sounded like fun and my suggestion to go there got an enthusiastic reaction. Except from the policeman. Don’t do it he said, bad people in Kasi, lots of problems. OK,, policeman advises against it, ok with me I thought. Maybe that long bus ride isn’t worth it.
My mom in law went back three weeks later anyway. It was the new cool place to have been for Vientiane Laotians. The cloth for the skirts is distinctive and it shows you’ve traveled. A resident Frenchman in a minivan fifteen minuets ahead of my Mae Thaou, and everyone in the van got shot to death. Oops.
Ever since then over the years there have been other “incidents” I lose track of when and the particulars. Truth be told I don’t pay that close attention. Seems like every couple or three years something happens. If there is a foreigner of necessity it’s known, if only Lao people it’s hushed up if possible.
I noticed the last time I came to Laos a presence of government police for the entire trip to Luang Prabang as well as lots of regular army guards who got on and off at random places along the most troublesome part of the road.
This winter I’ve traveled the road many times back and fourth to the north while going for little walk-abouts. There seemed to be a lot less of an army presence, I saw none on regular bus duty, and the federal police seemed to be making an effort to be inconspicuous, often wearing a coat over their gun and wrapping up the gun while eating. Often I don’t even spot a police man on the bus until maybe the end of the trip, or like here when he got off for lunch. I liked the way this guy was watching the back of the bus while we ate, no bombs.
I had assumed that the guards would be removed from the busses soon altogether. They scare tourists and cause tongues to wag. I’d say that they’ve done a pretty good job of pushing the whole story under the rug. Most tourists I’ve talked to are unaware that there is a low level counter government insurgency going on. Insurgency sounds too organized a word for scattered groups of Hmong including their women and children trying to hide and keep from getting shot.
Lately with the good coverage of cell phones and the ready availability of digital video cameras more news is starting to leak out of what’s called the Xaysambon Special Zone. Most famously there was a video taken of the raped and disembowelled bodies of young Hmong teens and the interviews with the survivors of a government attack. Gruesome stuff. Often there are desperate calls for help to relatives in America relayed to their small sympathetic press, the Huntington News, of being encircled and out of ammunition complete with starving children and so on, then nothing.
I guess the Lao government probably knows better if the guards on the busses are superfluous or not. Five days after I took the photo all heck broke loose with the regular dry season offensive somehow making it’s way into the daily rumour mill, and even worse onto the road north of Vang Vieng, but most importantly not the press.
The following is from the Travelfish website which must have very good sources indeed. I suspect an off the record report from someone at the US embassy. It seems too well informed and factual to be a guest house owner or tour operator. My only reservations are due to the use of the term bandit, usually used by the propaganda arm of the Lao government to classify the insurgents as common criminals. For the record armed robbery of foreigners is extremely rare in Laos, and robbery with firearms unheard of.

Link to Travelfish site

"Sources who were in Vang Vieng on the weekend of 10th / 11th Feb, reported they had seen very large numbers of Lao troops to the north of Vang Vieng. The most obvious area of activity on R13 North is understood to be around 15km north of Vang Vieng. It's not clear what precisely took place, but some locals believe it may be Lao Govt "attack" on people in nearby Hmong villages connected to the Hmong refugees in Nong Khai who are scheduled to be returned to Vientiane. February through April are known to be the months of highest bandit - Lao Govt conflicts.Vang Vieng Town itself is considered safe, but travellers should exercise caution on R13N, and for the time being - should probably avoid cycling and/or trekking too far north of Vang Vieng.The "troubles" do appear to have spread south of Vang Vieng as well, with arrests being made as far south as Phonhong (around 70km north of Vientiane) and skirmishes taking place south of Vang Vieng over the past few days. Partly as a result of this there remains a high profile troop presence throughout Vang Vieng District. The risk to tourists is still very low indeed. The bandits are not a competent, aggressive fighting unit looking to blow up bridges and kill tourists -- they are really just "on the run" and only fight back when they have to. Having said that, as a tourist, it is probably not the best time to be in Vang Vieng right now simply because there are restrictions on what you can do. Certainly doesn't sound like time to try the Happy Pizzas anyway!"

I was out trekking in the mountains in the north of the country which might as well be on a different planet. I got a text message from my wife when I re entered an area covered by cell phone. “They have a war going on in kahsii vangvien right now I want u to take arplan back” She had been getting calls from folks we know in the Lao army who know I often take the bus. Of course if you are in the army and people are getting killed you tend to look upon it as serious.
Searching for a good excuse to give my wife for taking the bus I asked a friend who might well be a party member. He reported that the situation was way overblown. Just a case of a few drunk soldiers shooting each other up. I think the misinformation came directly from the top, when repeated many times it’s a great way to dispel concerns over safety.
After reading a warning from the US embassy I took the bus, plane was full. It took me a whole extra day, oh well. I realize that the road carries some risk. So far the insurgency isn’t over and there is always the possibility. It’s trying to asses the likelihood of that possibility that becomes problematic.
When I used to climb we would asses risk all the time. If there is a one in one thousand chance of a piece ripping out of an anchor we consider it to be very poor odds, do something a hundred times and you’ve brought the likelihood down to one out of ten. Put in another piece of equal quality and the odds are back up to ten thousand to one, add another and you are up to ten million, back in the realm of acceptable odds.
If there are bus attacks on average once every three years with three hundred sixty five days in a year your chances of being on the road that day are one out of eleven hundred. Ride the bus six times in that time span and it’s one out of a hundred and eighty. Mind you we are talking about being on the road that day, not in the actual bus. As I remember they have attacked only passenger transport, not cargo or individual vehicles. Sixty busses and mini vans per day? Your odds just went up to around one out of eleven thousand. Significant enough to make me think about it.
I know and accept that amount of risk. It’s interesting to hear some deride it as being non existent or similar to the chance of getting hit by a meteor, or safer than walking city streets in America.
It’s also interesting how people perceive risk. If something appears scary the risk is assumed to be much higher. The chance of being in a plane or building attacked by Al Qaeda are infinitesimally small, in the millions, yet for years after the World Trade Centre in New York was attacked all people could think about was being the victim of a terrorist attack. I think it has a lot to do with those images of planes hitting buildings and buildings falling down.
Juxtapose those images with ones of forty hot tourists falling asleep on a long bus ride and you can see where the insouciance comes from.

In googling around to find background for this blog entry I also found this from an old Time Magazine story called “unlucky 13” after the route number. Great name.

“Around 8:30 a.m., the gunmen as many as 30, say witnesses jumped out from behind bushes along the road. Waving their guns, they stopped a crowded public bus, several cars, a tractor and the two Europeans who were heading north on a bike trip. Survivors claim the gunmen fired M-16s and grenades from rocket launchers, then stepped over fallen bodies and executed the wounded. The two Europeans, who have yet to be identified, tried desperately to flee on their mountain bikes. One was shot repeatedly in the back.”

Ouch, “repeatedly shot in the back” now there’s some guys without a sense of humour. Of course I doubt they were shooting M-16s, the rifle would have to be thirty years old. More likely the ubiquitous AK. Makes great reading though and I think puts a date on the last bus attack at 4 years ago.

Here’s the link Time magazine

Months ago I ran across the photos by a guy named Roger Arnold who managed to get into the Special Zone, link up with the insurgents, take photos, and publish them. For most of the world it was the first glimpse of something they had heard about but sounded too otherworldly to be true. Soldiers from a war that was over thirty years ago still fighting in the jungles of Laos.
Being a taker of snapshots I liked the photos. A very wide angle and lots of natural dark light from the forest. I can hear the dew dripping of the trees. When I looked carefully at the photos I noticed that very young guys carrying soviet style rifles seemed to be doing most of the running around with guns. The M-16s look to be saved but not in use.

Link Here for photos or read the Story Here.

Hard to imagine as I sit comfortably typing on my keyboard and as my wife and kids sleep peacefully upstairs that this is all going on less than a hundred miles from here. At this very moment people are quietly waking from a nights sleep, looking around, and wondering if the day will bring government soldiers. It is an overcast day. The beginning of the end of this long dry season? Let’s hope so.

Second Trip North Headed Back

Once I turn around and start heading home trips often seem to end quickly. It’s like the horse knowing it’s headed for the barn after working all day.
I barely stopped for the night at Phongsali then rode down to Hatsa to catch the boat south on the Nam Ou. I wanted to avoid the bus Phongsali to Oudomxai if possible and I had visions of sliding down the Nam Ou three days to Luang Prabang.
The negotiations over the fare were beyond me. I was quoted eight dollar, I said ok, but there was still a lot of work to do. The conversation was going too fast for me to follow and I also had no interest. Eight bucks seemed to be pretty reasonable to me. I always try to pay “the right price” to help those who come later and so that locals don’t get the idea that the falang is some kind of walking ATM, but when I don’t know the price and it seems reasonable compared to other prices I just go with it.


Slow boat negotiations almost finished

No one was making any moves to get on the boat, so I did. Soon all the Lao people followed and with a little more haggling between the official in charge of the landing and the captain of the boat we were off.

Riding in the lap of luxury

Boat rides as a passenger tend to make me lethargic, sun reflecting off the water, steady drone of the engine, monotonous bank sliding by, the only problem was that I couldn’t lie down and go to sleep. After a couple of hours there was some excitement as a passenger spotted some fish that had floated to the surface. Soon there seemed to be more and I realized they were rising up out of the river. The boat was turned around and we floated amongst the dying fish that were rolling over on the surface and trying to gulp air. People were scooping them up with flip flops, baskets, paddles and anything else that came to hand. Mostly they were about six or eight inches long, not what I would call big, but everyone seemed excited.

Dead fish

I couldn’t figure out what would cause such a large fish kill and only on that section of river. There is no industry or towns of any size above that point on the Nam Ou. I thought maybe chemicals from some home grown mining on the tributary we had just passed? I wasn’t about to tell anyone not to eat free fish, maybe the oxygen content had radically changed on just that section of river.
The hills on both sides of the river seemed to have been cut. No big trees up both sides for quite a ways. I assume the logs were floated down the river to Luang Prabang or taken directly by boat. There was a lot of human activity also, as the valley widened there were many villages and even once in a while a road.
Sometime in the mid afternoon we made Muang Khua. Muang Khua is one of those steep river towns built because of a ferry crossing. I got a room at the first place I came to and walked up the hill to look around. Yes there was a bus that left at eight, and quite a few older buildings. Nothing ancient or classic but still an older established river town. Small but nice market. Small winding alleys leading between houses on down towards the river, houses built up against the hill, three stories in front and one in back due to the rise.

Temple carving Muang Kua

I stopped at the restaurant recommended in the guidebook and found an English language menu and hugely inflated prices. I should have known.
I asked the young owners of my own guest house if they could cook me up some Lao food for dinner and they agreed.
Large mild chilli peppers stuffed with mung bean noodles pork and spices, ( a whole plate of them)
Small green pea pods on the side with bean sprouts
Gaeng made of cabbage with tofu and bits of pork.
Steamed rice on the side
Green tea in a pot.
Three dollars

I had to excuse myself I just couldn’t finish all of green peas, I was happy enough to have even completed the stuffed chillies.

Hua Wai Muang Khua

I hadn’t had a real cup of coffee since leaving the bus station in Oudomxai so many days ago and so I got up early, found myself locked in, and ended up climbing out the balcony. At the market I met an interesting man. I should begin by saying it was probably six thirty in the morning. I get up at that time often or even earlier, seen enough monks on their morning rounds to satisfy a few tour bus loads of Luang Prabang tourists. I like markets in the mornings. Good breakfast foods to be had and lots of busy people.
There was a counter and a lady that sold soft drinks and coffee. I ordered two at once to save time. A well dressed Lao man sat down next to me and started to make conversation in English. I continued it in Lao from the get go. My horrible Lao is usually a lot better than Lao peoples more horrible English, if it isn’t things usually sort themselves out quickly.
He had stayed at the large rich seeming hotel at the top of the hill the night before and was traveling to Dien Bien Phu. These were his associates and when he introduced me to his friends one of whom said “How are you this morning?” I asked the Lao man if he was a tour guide, usually I can spot them earlier than this, not really he said but in the tourism business. I asked him if he spoke English, big smile and a “yesss” can we use English then? “certainly if you’d like”. His English was some of the best I’ve ever heard from a native Lao speaker. I felt like ten kinds of a fool.
His company is one of the old big ones that have been operating in Lao since even before they opened it up for independent tourists. Mostly they do the actual work for smaller companies that book the tours with the customers. All those large tour busses etc. They were about to open a new route through from Thailand for Thai nationals to Dien Bien Phu and he had to take the trip himself to check the condition of the road and hotels and so forth. I guess Dien Bien Phu is only a couple more hours of good road from Muang Khua. That puts it at five hours from Oudomxai, and would make it an extremely popular route once they open the border.
Because this man seemed so knowledgeable about tourism in Laos and his English reflected an understanding of western culture I asked him about the interactions between hill tribes peoples and western tourists. I even explained the things I’d found troubling, mainly that we hadn’t been properly warned about giving things away in the villages we visited and had even been given candy to distribute. Also the feeling my fellow trekkers felt that sometimes they were being disrespected often by being stared at by young men. I had felt that sometimes the children were laughing at, not with, them.

Stalking the elusive hill tribe photo at the Muang Long Market

The tour operator said that actually tourism hill tribe interaction was a big problem and mentioned villages outside of Muang Sing that not even he is safe to visit. The long history of tourists always giving things to hill tribes people has created the feeling that every tourist who stops in their village owes them as does the tour operator. When the villagers don’t get money they get angry.
And then he went on to recommend the work being done to develop in a less harmful way in the Luang Namtha area, initiated by some individuals and used by most of the operators there. He was effusive in his praise. Coming from someone who had such a long history with development here, and who works in an entirely different sector of the tourism market, I was impressed.
Normally I’m a very cynical person when I start hearing words like “sustainable development” or “eco tourism”. Usually I assume it’s another way to appeal to yuppies who consume the earths natural resources at the fastest rate in the history of the world and to make them feel good about it. It’s like calling something 100% natural. I think my next goal is to head to Luang Namtha and check it out for myself.

The remainder of my trip I took on auto pilot. The eight o’clock bus that left at 8;30 and had a battery shake loose caused us to roll into Oudomxai as the Luang Prabang bus was rolling out the front entrance. The sharp eyed driver knew exactly why some old fat falang was hurrying towards him with a determined look and they waited for me to get on. Back in the land of Falangs each guarding their spare seat with a day pack and staring out the window while listening to their ipod. The road to Luang Prabang seemed very smooth and new. The next morning on the 6:30 bus the guys driving recognised me and remembered that I get off at Nang Tang.

Bus Station Muang Khua

Pongsali

After a couple of hours the bus to Pongsali shows it’s true colours. The pavement ends and the bus fills with passengers. Leaving Oudomxia it was only half full, but as the bus seems to be one of the few things moving on the road it gets flagged down by anyone going up the road.

Besides the Chinese headed north to the border at Pakha there were also a lot of hill tribes people who didn’t speak Lao. The kid collecting the money said he could say “where you going” in five languages. The whole trip only took eight or nine hours but it seemed like forever. I think I must be getting old. Often the passengers would throw out folded notes on paper with names written on them. They were letters from people in one village to people in another one. Someone in the second village would rush out, read the name, and deliver the note to the intended recipient.


Phou Pha Hotel

I stayed at the old Chinese Consulate turned into a hotel at the Phou Pha. It was recommended by a Lao official working with a United Nations program. In Laos it seems that when they celebrate our new year they celebrate it on the day, not on the eve. The mostly empty hotel had techno music blasting at a few million decibels to an empty bar. The girls working there were hunched around a fire in the kitchen and maybe getting drunk. From what I could understand of the managers cell phone conversation he was screaming at someone to come play and what fun they were having.

The hotel was a nice old brick place but the rooms were divided in two by a thin wood wall. The guy next door was having long conversations with himself. He probably liked my snoring even less.

Chinese Shop House in the Old section of Pongsali

I like Pongsali. It seems like Yunnan without leaving Laos. The town is set high up on the side of Phou Pha probably at about 1400 meters. The people are called Phou Noi, “little mountain“, maybe because they live relatively low in the smaller mountains. All of Pongsali is mountainous, there are no broad river valleys of the type the Laotians seem to settle. The Phou Noi language borrowed numbers and counting from Lao but otherwise bears no resemblance that I could recognise. Even when speaking Lao the locals used accents and slang that I was unfamiliar with.

The Phou Noi people themselves although different linguistically from Lao, are nonetheless Theravada Buddhists. Their appearance reminded me of the Bai peoples of western Yunnan. The Phou Noi language is the one used to communicate between different hill tribes and also between hill tribes and lowlanders. Lao is taught in the schools but is only recently gaining widespread usage as many older people haven’t been to school.

Pongsali From Above

Probably the whole of Pongsali province has been a semi independent little kingdom kind of wedged between China, Laos, and Vietnam since a long time before people started noticing such things.

The tourism office seemed reluctant to book a five day walking trek. I think the difficulty lay in the fact that none of the guides wanted to go for a five day walk through the mountains in the cold season. Much better to wait for a rich tourist looking to drive to and photograph a few hill tribe ladies. I went back the second day in town and they corralled this guy named Suk who was out of town.

I’d moved my hotel after the first night down to the Pongsali Hotel. A lot closer to the market, restaurants, and everything else. Pongsali is situated on the side of a hill, everything is up or down, better to be as close to everything as possible.

While waiting there I met this guy Jaysan and his three sons as well as a couple of his friends from a neighbouring village. They were Gaugh minority but they all spoke some Lao. They had some of those large framed Chinese bikes and were headed over to China, what for I could never figure out. All were very friendly, and like a lot of young guys hanging around waiting, they liked to joke. One of them accused me of trying to chat up the single middle aged flirtatious hotel manager and I replied that I could never steal his girl friend. It became the standing joke. They were back the second night having been turned back at the border for a lack of licence plates on their bikes.


Jay San is the short guy in back, his three sons are the left two in back and the left one in front, the boyfreind of the hotel manager is front right. That's the good part about writing a blog. Last joke is on him.

That night I met my trekking guide, Suk, and also an Australian couple joined our group of two. The Australians were named Emily and Matt. And were both experienced walkers being trekking guides themselves back in the Tasmanian island in Australia. I contacted our guide directly to ask if they could come along and the fees went directly to him and the villages we stayed in, an arrangement that allowed him to increase his pay by a factor of four. Especially if you include my pre trek tip. No benefit to tipping afterward I reasoned.

Mat and Emily wading across the Nam Ngam
(Note the hat Matt is wearing. All Australian males are required by legal statute to wear these. )

Matt and Emily were both fairly PC and crunchy but pragmatic and seasoned at the same time. A good combination I thought for the close quarters and unfamiliar circumstances of a hill tribe trek. Emily is a vegetarian back in Australia but had already made up her mind to adapt her diet to conditions rather than the other way around. A very down to earth approach, reflecting her experience as a long term solo female traveler in China and Mongolia. Besides being a trekking guide, Matt had lots of off trail experience for long periods in the bush. I found out all these things over the course of the trek. I agreed to their initial request to join me just on instinct only, they seemed like nice folks to spend a few days with.

A couple days in Northern Laos

I didn’t know it but New Years is some sort of big holiday in Luang Prabang. I don’t mean Pi Mai but regular New Years. I arrived two days before at around 5:30 in the evening.

I knew something was up when a quick walk down one of the small streets headed to the Mekong revealed seven full guest houses. At the bottom of the street a tout was trying to talk two women into looking into a guest house on another side of town that might have rooms. The women were uninterested. I jumped at the chance.

It turns out that the tout only had a motorcycle to drive around with anyway, not good for three people. We headed back out towards the southern bus station. Dem layowwww, dem layowww, and dem layow. Every place was full. We circled back towards Wat Wisoun and we split up asking at alternate guest houses. I asked him how much commission he wanted assuming that he might be shy to ask a guest house owner in front of me. He said twenty thousand, and I told him thirty was fine. Didn’t want money to be an issue.

By now we were seeing a lot of people in tuk tuks doing the same thing as well as a farang couple on a dirt bike. Finally out by the airport we found a place and I gave him a fifty K note. The room was double priced for the occasion, which I paid with a genuine smile.

I certainly don’t pity the guest house owners as being impoverished Laotians, I know what land in Luang Prabang costs per meter and they had recently bought their place. I just don’t begrudge people making as much as the market will bear. I’d do the same. It was seven o’clock when I finally got that room, I was considering trying a wat, or a bench at the bus station without a blanket.

Flame style routered pickets at Luang Prabang Bus Station


The next morning I left well before daylight with intentions of getting on the very first thing moving towards Pongsali. The guidebook lists a direct bus, I’d recently bought a guidebook, but of course there are none and the connection in Udomxai doesn’t work. Takes two days.

I got this message from an anonymous commentator after posting"The direct bus to Phongsali comes from Vientiane and is caught at Luang Prabang's Southern Bus station. It probably leaves in the afternoon. " Sounds similar to the night bus from Luang Namtha. Makes a stop in the afternoon in the at the southern terminal and that's it. Sounds like a good way to get there in one push. Bet it's a 22 hr ride at least. And thank you again Anon.

I was happy enough to spend an afternoon in Udomxai, I’ve only stayed there before to make bus connections and I wondered about the town from my last trip. it’s surrounded by lots of mountains and I had a suspicion there might be more to it than what’s said in the Lonely Planet. Sure enough there quite a few guest houses and I’m not talking about Chinese short time places, but regular Lao owned but empty guest houses. There’s also a bike touring company and a travel company offering treks. More to the point until the airport at Luang Namtha is finished with it’s upgrade it has the only operating airstrip north of Luang Prabang besides Boon Neua which is in the middle of nowhere.

Market Oudomxai


I stopped by the market and bought a knit hat and logged into the slow email connection for a last online fix for a while. At the market was this sign.

Human Trafficker


“Go to work….Do you want to live in a foreign country? Very good job. Easy. High Salary. I will be responsible for everything.
Think carefully…. Your life will be safer. Don’t become food for the human trafficker.
Be careful with people who approach you. Selling women and children is against the law.”

I’m at a loss for a witty comment.


Sticky rice cooking at bus station


I woke up at my usual hour, before dawn and went out and had breakfast at one of the shacks next to the bus station. It seems as if every town in northern Laos is socked in with heavy fog for at least a couple hours every morning. Like pea soup.

Bus Station Oudomxai