Charlie in Commie-land!

When I was formally admitted today to the PDR of Laos, it marked the first time I ever stepped foot in a communist country. Considering the amount of private enterprise in the country, I'm not exactly sure that the governing philosophy is a pure reflection of Marxist ideals.

Others mentioned that Laos felt like how SE Asia was 20 years ago, and I can kind of understand that--the pace here is definitely a little bit slower than in other parts of SE Asia, and, "gasp," there were actually no touts at the airport!

The only time I've heard a car honk is when I mentioned to the cab driver how quiet it seemed--that not a lot of cars were honking. He looked at me puzzled until I said beep beep, and motioned with my hand on a make believe steering wheel. His response was "oh, you mean like..." and he then proceeded to tap the horn a couple of times.

There are, however, little things that indicate to me that Laos may be catching up with the rest of the SE Asia--like the two or three tuk-tuk drivers who asked me if I want a lady. You do not want a lady in Laos, and it has nothing to do with physical appearance--it is illegal for foreigners and lao women to copulate even if it is purely consensual and no money changes hands. If you are caught, then you face a stiff fine and some jail time. As I've mentioned, I have no desire to star in my own version of "brokedown palace," but that doesn't mean that there isn't an underground industry here--anytime you see an elderly european male with a young asian lady, you definitely start to think that it probably isn't true love.

For whatever reason, both capitals for the countries comprising French Indochina (Excluding Vietnam) are both located on the Mekong river--the difference is that while Phnom Penh has a well developed riverfront and riverwalk, Vientiane is in the process of rebuilding theirs, so the riverfront looks like a giant construction site. The project should be finished in October 2010, but I'm not so sure given the state of how things looked.

Otherwise the place is definitely more relaxed with less hustle and bustle than other places in SE Asia.

The 5.5 hour bus ride from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur was probably the nicest bus ride I've been on--granted it was a first class coach with seats the equivalent in width to airline first class seats (and this was the service recommended to me by my hostel). Didn't mind it one bit.

I love Malaysia, and outside of Singapore, Kuala Lumpur is probably the most western-friendly SE Asian capital, but they really need to get better cab drivers. I'm batting .500 in getting ones that know where they are going. I told the guy the specific address of the place I was going to, and he started asking me if I knew where it was, and if I had been there before. It didn't help that traffic was bad, and he was in no mood to have me in the car any longer than necessary (i used a prepaid taxi coupon, so he couldn't charge me any extra). After driving around, he looks at me and asks if I have the phone number. I didn't--and he looked at me like I was nuts. Excuse me? You're the cab driver--you're supposed to know where the place is--or at least you sure as heck claimed to when I was booking the taxi service. Yes, I realize that the street is a one way street and that traffic is bad, but you know what that means? You should probably start at the beginning of the street and then drive towards the end.

Fortunately, even though he decided to join the street midway through, my place was literally located on the other side of the junction, so he managed to find it by pure flukiness--even though the address was squarely on the building--the same address I had been repeating to him.

BTW, any remark that I made about KL being a bit sleepy needs to be retracted--I was merely in the wrong area. It definitely has its own nightclub and bar scene, with the underground or informal industry in full operation--and you could take plenty of these bars and nightclubs and put them in any U.S. city and they'd fit in--it was like being in the West Village in Dallas.

Plane ride from KL to Vientiane was relatively smooth--given its the tropics, thunderstorms and weather systems start to build up throughout the day, so flying is always a bit bumpier in the afternoon than it is in the morning. It also helps that it was Air Asia, a reliable and dependable carrier that offers low fares, and who uses the attractiveness of its flight attendants in ads suggestive enough to make any feminist churn with rage (think nerdy guy sitting in an airplane surrounded by at least five model-esque flight attendants--the tag line "hot seats")--if they really wanted to upset the feminists, though, they'd drop the flight attendant label and use "sky candy" instead.