Bangkok Bound

Well, after spending 7.5 weeks specifically avoiding the City of Angels, and trying to purposely avoid a trip into Thailand, the streak will end either tonight or tmw morning, when I arrive in Bangkok.

AJ and I had a bit of a falling out--a problem that was probably inevitable given our respective personalities. She's very upfront, honest, bluntly candid, and semi-impulsive, and I am very sarcastic, somewhat stubborn, never one to back down from an opinion, and often suffer from foot in mouth disease (meaning I don't always think before I speak) . What this means is that when behavior or words are misinterpreted, there is often a jump to conclusions, which is fine when they are right, but can be disastrous when wrong. That's basically what happened, without going into too much individual detail over the specifics, which are so petty and insignificant that I'm pretty sure both of us will be laughing at it a week from now.

The general problem was that both of us were used to traveling on our own, and certain features and attributes of the other that we liked a week ago started to rub us the wrong way. Traveling with your best friend or your family for a 10 day period can be tough enough as it is, let alone when you do it with someone you just met. The good news is that we could be open and honest with each other--the bad news is that at times we were too open and too honest with each other.

So we are going our own separate ways tonight, either after the plane lands in bangkok, or she boards the plane in Udon Thani, and I take the night train/bus to Bangkok. Fortunately, I tried to smooth things over at breakfast, which initially didn't go so well, but ended up being successful, so we are going to leave on good terms (unless something drastic happens within the next 12 hours)--the way it should be, because I honestly had a lot of fun traveling with her, and I know that I definitely wouldn't have had as much fun without her company--and she feels the same way about me.

I'm thinking about extending my trip one more time--to allow me to go to Vietnam. First, I need to check my bank balance, which is impossible to do in Laos. Then I'll need to talk to the ticket office in bangkok, as well as to arrange a vietnamese visa in advance. I'll also try to squeeze in a side trip/overnighter to Kanchanaburi--three hours away and the site of the bridge made famous by the book and movie "Bridge over the River Kwai." If I'm unable to extend/change my ticket without going to singapore, then I'll just do a side trip to Kanchanaburi and then fly home as scheduled two weeks ago.

Tapdancing on a land mine

Just got off a flight from Phonsavan to Vientiane--a 35 minute hop instead of a 10 hour long bus ride on roads designed by race course architects for the super g ski race or luge track/bobsled track designers. Had a 50% shot at being on a Chinese made aircraft (which is what I was hoping for) but was on an ATR72--a plane operated by such carriers like American Eagle. Got to the airport two hours before departure--and the airport was basically a shack that only serves this one flight that is 4x weekly in the low season, 1x daily in the high season. Plane was less than half full, but as we started to take off, we started swerving back and forth, which was a little unnerving. Flew across the spine of the various mountains in Laos, allowing for some spectacular views, and the ride was surprisingly calm until we got into the Mekong flood plain near Vientiane, where we hit some turbulence, and we landed well off the runway centerline. The last five minutes weren't for the faint of the heart. But I'm alive, and that's all that matters.

I don't know why, but soft, cheesy rock from the 80s is extremely popular in Cambodia and Laos. Everywhere I've been, I've heard songs from two artists: Richard Marx and Chris Debarge (lady in red). I've even heard remakes of these songs that make the originals sound like grammy nominees. Talk about bizarre.

So, the minivan ride to Phonsavan was quite an adventure as our driver tried to set a land speed record on a winding road. The view was simply spectacular--northern laos is covered in green forested mountains and ricefields, and there is an untouched, wild quality about it. I tried to take some pictures, but most of them didn't come out.

Arrive in Phonsavan in the heaviest rain storm I've experienced since arriving in SE Asia, which makes finding a guesthouse kind of hard. Six of us (out of the 8 on the minivan) agree to stick together, and head to Lonely Planet's "our pick." The place was closed--and was off the beaten path--no surprise. After wandering around, we find a place that we initially thought was quite sketchy because of the broken glass bottles on top of the fence, but it was actually quite nice (except for some of the bugs). Of course, all of us have do three shots each of whiskey from a johnnie walker bottle that is definitely not johnnie walker whiskey, which the guesthouse owner drinks first just so we know that it wouldn't blind us or wasn't actually paint thinner.

There's not much going on in Phonsavan--its a remote, not very touristy town, and while there are plenty of restaurants along the main drag, it definitely has a frontier, dusty feel to it--its also slightly cooler, being at 3600 feet elevation. In Laos, surprisingly, the more rural the place, the faster the internet. In vientiane and luang prabang, the internet can be painfully slow, but in vang vieng and phonsavan, it was american-speed.

After drying out some of my clothes and my bag from the rain, AJ and I decide to exploring a little bit, and stumble in on the MAG center for Phonsavan. MAG is an NGO that is dedicated to clearing mines and unexploded ordinance, and the Lao that work there all speak very good english. Tipsily, we joined a group of several other westerners (the non-tipsy ones) to watch the Lonely Planet popularized "Bombies" documentary about the Secret War in Laos and the cluster bombs. It was actually a fairly decent documentary, although it was definitely biased as I would later find out according to some information provided by our tour guide the next day. Probably the most disturbing piece of information to my ears was the fact that US bombers flying from Thai air bases to Vietnam that were unable to attack their targets were simply told to dump their live ordinance over the Lao countryside to avoid the possibility of a mishap on landing with a belly full of live bombs. The reason why UXO is especially dangerous is that when the U.S. did decide to attack planned targets in Laos, they focused on the flatter areas--near the main roads, and where the best farmland was. All and all, being an American in Laos is definitely a little odd, especially when you see places that proudly display old, defused bombs and use them in all sorts of manners, and you realize that most of it was manufactured in the U.S.

BTW, MAG is definitely worth supporting--they have a website--but they should really get the word out more in the U.S. In Phonsavanh, they are taking the wise tactic in getting donations: donate $10, get a free tshirt with their name on it for some free advertising. Guess who has a new tshirt to add to his collection?

After meeting up and having dinner, and running into the australian father and daughter that were at our same guesthouse in Luang Prabang, we head back to the guesthouse, and I try to take a shower. Much to me and AJ's dismay, the water had been turned off for the night. We also saw a giant bug the size of a man's palm right next to one of our travelling party's door.

Next day, we all decide to split the cost of hiring a tour guide and driver to go around the Phonsavan area to see the Plain of Jars and some other interesting sites. We go back about 40 km on the same road where we stop at a limestone cave filled with a buddha that was only recently rediscovered, but was looted by the Chinese in the 1880s. The cave was also used by the Pathet Lao (the Lao Communist party) as a hospital during the war, and there is one leftover "bed"--which is actually a former aircraft maintenence platform manufactured in the U.S., and still has the manufacturer's serial number on it. I'm sure somewhere in a government archival warehouse, there are records of this exact platform being shipped over to Laos.

We walk about 500 yards to another nearby cave which served as the Pathet Lao infirmary, and is still littered with old glass medical containers and syringes--to which I remarked that it was probably a bad idea that all of us wore open toed shoes that day. The guide gave us a general background on the history, and what he said that contradicted some of the information presented in the Bombies documentary is that while the U.S. is indeed responsible for the majority of the UXO, the Xieng Khouang province, where Phonsavan was located, was occupied by as many as three different armies during the lao civil war, including by the North Vietnamese, the Pathet Lao, and the Lao Royalist army. Meaning that while it is easy to blame the U.S. for all the UXO, there is plenty of it that was leftover by the other three parties, which means that filing a lawsuit is pretty difficult since you could only do so post-explosion, which would eliminate all pieces of evidence of the bomb in question.

Xieng Khouang was one of the most heavily bombed provinces in Laos because it was traditionally the Pathet Lao headquarters and homebase, as well as being a thoroughfare of the Ho Chi Minh trail.

We drive a little ways back towards town when we stop at a random turnoff along the side of the road. The semi-straight dirt road we were looking at and that is now lined with various houses and shacks, and grazed upon by cows and chickens, was once the site of a CIA airstrip and Lao Royalist encampment. While little evidence remains, you can tell by the flattened and straightened dirt path that it could have easily served as an airbase for some prop planes. We dodge the various cows and water buffalo alongside the road while having our ears decimated by the sounds of our driver's poor musical taste--some really obscure soft rock songs, get back to town, and break for lunch. The scenery is pretty, though--picture a hybrid between the Big Island's paniolo country near waimea and the foothills of the rocky mountains--green rolling hills whose valleys are populated by ricefields. Though not necessarily obvious, you can clearly make out patches of dirt or depressions in generally flat or grassy areas--those are bomb craters, or remnants of land hit by them.

AJ and I try to book air tickets for the next day, but are unsuccesful in finding a place. Hop on the van and drive farther down route 7, and then we hit a dirt road turn off and head uphill. Looking outside the window, we find ourselves on some sort of high plains--a wide valley/basin with rich farmland dotted with rolling hills as far as the eye can see and surrounded by high, tree covered mountains.

The guide decides to first stop at the whiskey village--which all of us politely decline and decide to continue on down the road (the whole concept sounded like disneyland for drinkers--just a manufactured tourist trap). We buy our tickets, and climb up a hill dotted with a wooden stairs and stumble upon Site 2 of the Plain of Jars.

The Plain of Jars are the premier tourist attraction in Phonsavan. The Plain of Jars is a collection of four sites with a cluster giant stone jars, most about the same height as your average person. People aren't sure what their purpose was--various theories abound--but the most likely theory is that they served as funerary urns--which makes sense, when you realize that other cemeteries in the area are also perched on top of hills. The Jars were cool, but the main attraction was the panorama view of the surrounding countryside, which was spectacular to look at.

Though they are well-known, and people think that the Jars are a UNESCO World Heritage site, they aren't for one major reason: the Plain of Jars is one of the most heavily UXO contaminated archaelogical sites in the world, and their application for "World Heritage" status will only be approved once the areas can be certified to be entirely free of UXO. Right now, the sites have only been visually cleared by MAG--and only subsurface cleared beneath a clearly lined path. This is one place where you definitely do not want to go off the beaten path--since you could easily come home in a bodybag.

For whatever reason, US bombers targeted the areas of these sites, with some of the bombs destroying some of the jars. You can still see the flattened depressed bomb craters just yards away from the main jar sites, and it is a wonder how these sites managed to avoid being entirely obliterated. The bomb craters may now be filled with vegetation and trees, but they are unmistakeable to the naked eye. The whole scene--archaeological treasures, rural farmland and the pastoral lifestyle, and war remnants--makes for an interesting, if chaotic contrast, as you try to wrestle with all of these different images and incidents.

There are several sites, and we visited 3 of 4--the 3 which coincidentally provided the best views, and all of us were astounded and awestruck by what we were seeing. Then, we returned to a village where bomb material is used as building material, and returned back to Phonsavan while being serenaded by the sounds of Celine Dion in our ears.

Of course, this wouldn't be a proper end to a post unless I engaged in some Lonely Planet bashing. I reread their descriptions of the various sites, and saw where they stated that the 3 sites we visited were only accessible via steep trails, and one of the three was a strenuous 2km walk. I could have done all three of those climbs in my sleep--they were no different than walking up any other hill in any city. If you can walk on New York's streets, than you can do the Plain of Jars. Plain of Jars "strenuous" while Merapi easily done by people in okay physical shape? Bravo, LP, good job.

Walking away over 40 cents

My travelling party of three was cut down by one when one of the party left to join some other travellers bound to locations farther north, and AJ and I weren't ready to leave Luang Prabang (rhymes with gong).

The Australian couple told us of a museum that they visited, a museum so new it wasn't mentioned in any guidebooks, and it sounded like an interesting place, so after grabbing food, we strolled over there, passing the Luang Prabang Provincial Police HQs along the way, which looked like a decaying cold war relic with a wall covered with a massive faded red background and faded yellow hammer and sickle next to the faded red white and blue of the Lao flag.

The museum was the visitor's center for Lao UXO, a government organization backed by the U.N. and other non-profits that is dedicated to clearing the unexploded ordinance (UXO) that still litters the Lao countryside and is still maiming and killing people 30+years after it was dropped, as well as educating the populace and schoolchildren to avoid such sites and to not play with any unknown metal or items that you find.

It was a small museum, but very well done, and covered with defused bombs so you know what they look like. (I'll discuss the U.S. involvement in Laos in another post, since it is much more relevant to my activities in Phonsavan.) There are several reasons why UXO is still a problem for Laos--one, there is simply so much of it, and lots of it is buried just underneath the surface, and there are countless of examples of farmers or people digging in their yards striking a metal object and it subsequently exploding; two, the majority of the uxo are small "bombies"--the tennis ball sized mini bombs dropped by cluster bombs and released in midair and scattered over a wide area, which means they aren't as readily noticeable, and are the perfect size and shape to attract the attention of local kids (mainly boys) who then use them as toys; three, Laos is one of the poorest countries on earth, and the scrap metal trade, though illegal, is one way to make extra money to feed your family, so people are sometimes so desperate that they try to break apart a bomb, knowing full well of the risk of doing so; four, clearing the fields of UXO is a time-consuming, labor intensive process, and there simply aren't enough teams/groups of people out there to get to every site and clear it immediately; finally, though they know the general area that the bombs were dropped, it is impossible to pinpoint the exact location of where the materiel landed, so you have to rely on villagers who accidentally run into or discover relics and scrap to inform you.

As a lighter note, they showed a documentary ending with JFK, with his irish bostonian accent, butchering the pronounciation of Laos (his version rhymed with "chaos"--it actually should be said similar to the word "louse").

I then decided to rent a bike, which made for all sorts of interesting adventures, as it was next to impossible to control, and had brakes that squealed like little pigs. After finally getting the hang of it, I rode down the Mekong, boarded a local barge, and crossed the river to try to explore the other side. Unfortunately, most of the roads over there were dirt roads, and I had no desire to pay the full replacement cost for the bike, so I headed back over. Just as I get on board the barge, accompanied on board by a minivan and a pickup truck with two water buffalo in the back (there aren't any bridges over the mekong near Luang Prabang), it starts to rain. Hard. You could see it coming down river, looking like a wall of white. I was shielded for a little while, but after the successful crossing, I was immediately exposed to the rain, and retreated to my guest house which was thankfully nearby to wait out the storm.

After the rain had fallen (thanks Sting!), I kept exploring, stashing my bag in my room, to avoid it getting soaked. While riding, I realized there is in fact something tweaky about my left knee, and that six weeks of travelling has left me a little out of shape--there is a noticeable crown to Luang Prabang, so while riding downhill and coasting was quite fun, getting back uphill wasn't necessary as fun. Of course, it started raining again. Hard. I was forced to seek shelter underneath a gas station before finally resuming my travels.

There's a wooden bridge only accessible to motorbikes and bikes, and I was feeling adventurous, so I decided to cross it and ride for a little while in the Laos countryside just outside of town. Because my front tire had a mind of its own, keeping it on the level two by fours that formed a slightly elevated path/balance beam over the wooden planks of the bridge proved to be an exercise in wrestling.

As I'm riding just outside of town, a teenager wearing a green shirt riding up ahead looks back, slows down, and starts riding beside me. Because I'm an American, I start to get a little bit suspicious, and am thankful for my bag being back at my place--he could have only stolen my hat, sunglasses, and a bottle of water. There was nothing to be concerned about, though. He was simply riding to the hospital up the road, and just wanted to have a friendly conversation and practice his english. When he reached his turn, he said goodbye, and went on his way.

By sheer coincidence, I managed to pick the road that led out and ended at the airport terminal, just 4kms outside of town. After getting there, I turned around and headed back, returning the bike, and rested at my guesthouse for a while.

I wanted to do two things that night--arrange onward transportation to Phonsavan (coincidentally, an australian man and his twenty something daughter, and their former neighbor who were staying at our guesthouse headed there early that morning. I wish I could have had a sound recorder to record the two men's voices, because they had some of the greatest Australian accents I have ever heard--a slow drawl that sounded like their mouths were full of gravel), and do some souvenir shopping at the night market.

In markets in SE Asia, bargaining is a must. As a tourist, I know that getting the local price will be impossible. That doesn't mean, though, that I can't get a fair price--which is usually amounts to paying your original starting price, plus about 1/3 of the original difference between your price and the seller's price. By "fair" price, I mean a price that I don't mind paying so that i don't feel like i'm getting ripped off, and a price that the seller is perfectly happy with.

For whatever reason, bargaining works a little bit different in Laos than in the rest of SE Asia--usually, if the only difference between your price and the seller's asking price amounts to less than a U.S. dollar, you can walk away, and the seller will then agree to that price. In Laos, they don't chase you.

I was looking into buying two tshirts--AJ had already bought a tshirt earlier, paying 15,000 kip for it, so we knew that 15,000 kip (a little less than two bucks) was a fair, market price to pay for a tshirt. Indeed, I bought one tshirt for that price after starting at 10,000, and the seller started at 25,000. I was looking around for another place to buy another tshirt, but several sellers refused to budge from 18,000 (about 40 cents) and agree to 15,000, even after I told them that I just paid that amount a couple of stalls down. They looked at me like I was crazy, and I walked off. It was their loss. Just a couple of more stalls down, after the seller started at 25,000, I told her that I had just bought a tshirt for 15,000, and she quickly agreed to the price, and the deal was done.

Some might find it petty that I would refuse to pay 40 more cents, especially in a place with so much poverty, but my argument is that by paying that extra money, I take business away from some of the vendors who are perfectly willing to settle for that price--and who could also use the money. I'm not driving the price down by any means--I'm just paying what I and the seller both feel is a fair price.

Anyway, off to Vientiane shortly via air from Phonsavan--AJ and I were not about to go on a 10 hour bus ride using the same route we took to Phonsavan, and it just so happens that two people on our minivan to Phonsavan are on the flight as well.

My knee still has a nice greenish/brownish bruise from being jammed against the seat in front of me for six hours.

Pictures are of me at the plain of Jars, and me with the owner of the guesthouse that insisted on pouring us liquor at checkin.

"Why don't you try to ruin some Led Zeppelin?"

Here are a couple of photos of me in Luang Prabang. Top one the mekong is behind me, the middle is next to an elephant statue at a buddhist temple, and the bottom is a panorama from the top of Phu Si--the tallest hill in Luang Prabang that overlooks the main area and is a must climb.

After returning from the waterfall, we all decide to meet up at this beautiful bar/restaurant overlooking the Nam Pha river--it definitely lived up to its name of "utopia"--and people start to talking. One of the guys mentions that a friend of a friend of a travelling buddy is going to be playing live music at a local bar tonight. Considering there really isn't much activity in Luang Prabang at night (other than the night market), we decide to head there after having dinner and meeting up with more people.

Knowing the traveller stereotype, I'm afraid of what I am going to witness. After going to this outdoor bar and drinking a lao lao cocktail--it was the cheapest thing available, and it was 2 for 1--it also tasted like sour stale lemonade, which was glad that I used my extra one on another person, the american female journalist (AJ from here on out).

We sit through a breakdancing performance by some local Lao teenagers, and though I realize that they are honestly trying to do a good job, after having lived in New York for a year and seen breakdancers on the subway, in subway stations, and in parks, I have to say that it was a bit of a let down, and they needed a wee bit more practice. After knowing what I know now, though, I would have gladly watched them perform the entire night if it meant that the main act never took the stage.

I have no musical talent whatsoever. I was probably responsible for several of my violin teacher's heart attacks, can't sing to save my life, and have a musical taste that some people find abhorrent and vomit inducing. And those people are the nice ones. That said, I know I have no talent, and do not put myself up on stage and act like I have talent when I clearly do not. I also have no desire to add to excedrin or tylenol's bottom line, which is why I do not even try to perform.

The guy walks on stage. I am already dreading the experience simply by looking at the guy. He has shaggy black hair and a full beard. Strike one. He is carrying an acoustic guitar case. Strike two. He is accompanied by several of his "Vang Vieng" tanktop wearing backpacking buddies (more on that in a moment). Strike three.

So, I generally ignore the guy and keep talking with AJ and several of the other people, as he appears to be playing either original stuff or Jack Johnson/indie songs fitting a guitar. AJ and I head to the other bar, just a block away, to see if there is anything else going on. It is filled with tank top wearing british gap year backpackers, as well as curiously being the site for a Lao child's birthday party--talk about a bizarre site, a children's birthday party next to some drunken backpackers. We make a beeline back to the original bar.

We get a pitcher or two of beer and are soon joined by an Australian couple. On this trip I've encountered plenty of Australians, and discovered that from 18-25, Aussies tend to be the stereotypical fun loving immature, over the top, drunks. After about 25 or so, they start to mellow out and are truly fun to hang out and have a beer or two with. They were on the good side of 25, and were great to hang out with.

AJ and I are having fun just talking and shooting the breeze with them, generally ignoring the musical trainwreck occurring on the stage about 10 yards from us. That's when I hear "knock, knock, knockin on heaven's door." I listen more closely, and my worst fear is confirmed. The guy is covering guns and roses' "knocking on heaven's door," and doing so horribly. Notice to any aspiring musicians out there: do not, under any circumstances, try or pretend to try to cover Guns n Roses. It is an abominable sin. You cannot replicate the unique screeching tone of Axl Rose's voice. The only thing worse than doing it on an acoustic guitar is doing it a cappella.

I am ticked off--and slightly tipsy--and AJ and the australian couple start paying even closer attention to the guy. Next up on horrendous cover list: "Leaving on a Jet Plane."

This is going to make me sound like a jerk, but this guy was really bad--and he didn't know it either. His idiot backpacker friends were all encouraging him to sing more and were shouting out requests. Meanwhile, AJ and the australians start throwing ideas of what to yell at him.

Yes, I was that guy. I was a heckler. In all fairness, though, the guy deserved it. I was about ready to vomit when he started to cover Outkast's "Hey Ya." Buddy, just so you know, memorizing various songs and strumming your acousting guitar to the tune of it doesn't make you an artist. It makes you a junior high student trying to learn the guitar.

So, we start tossing out ideas as the covers get any worse. I hate putting myself out there sometimes, so its nice to have some back up--two australians certainly qualify as backup, especially when one has informed us that the worst insult to an aussie is taking their beer. I start off with "you are giving my dead grandmother a headache," and it continues to other lines.

He promises that it will be his last song, to which all of us are grateful for, but with the encouragement of his backup crew, he decides to play a couple of encores. We all start screaming, "No" "You promised it would be your last song" "Get off the stage." People are shooting us dirty looks and giving us "WTF?" stares. I respond with the same. It's not my fault I don't believe in lying to someone and telling them that they are great when they all they do is remind me of the stereotypical guitar player in your college dorm that sits in the entry way and jams all day.

Out of nowhere, when there is a dead silence, AJ shouts "Why don't you try to ruin some Led Zeppelin?" I start laughing so hard I nearly spit out my beer and have to sit down my beer. If there had been any room on the floor, I would have hit the floor I was laughing so hard. The sheer timing was impeccable.

Thankfully, the guy heads off, and we leave, exchanging contact info with the aussies.

Next posts (probably later tonight or a couple tmw morning)--my letter to all gap year backpackers, luang prabang day 3--charlie goes shopping at the market!, bus ride to Phonsavanh and my day in phonsavanh.

Ignoring TLC's advice

Apologies if this post isn't as professionally done as my other posts. I just took a 6 hour minivan ride from Luang Prabang to Phonsavanh, which was like going down a bobsled track for six straight hours, and drank three shots of Lao Lao rice whisky with the owner of my guesthouse (what can I say, its a social obligation)--a 64 year old Lao man that could be the Laos version of Poppi, considering how much he was flirting with the 20 something western girls in our group. According to a former bobsledding Canadian in the van with us, though, bobsleds are much more stable than the van we were in.

Phonsavanh is like a wild west town, with dust in the air, and not as cleaned up or put together as some of the other Lao towns, with two story buildings lining the streets how they once did in western mining towns.

I have to ask, was it really necessary for the Lao government to put up "sharp curve" and the snake-turn signs every so often? When the road you are on hasn't had a straightaway longer than 50 yards since you started, I think its pretty safe to say that we know the road will be curvy up ahead. Maybe it would be better to put that money (and metal) into the erection of more guardrails along the road. It was easily a much tougher ride than the trip from Vang Vieng to Luang Prabang, and the american journalist and I are almost positively going to fly from Phonsavanh to Vientiane (30 minutes) instead of taking the 10 hour bus ride. I was ready to puke at certain stages.

When one is in Luang Prabang, it is best to ignore the advice of TLC's infamous hit song that reminds us to not "go chasing waterfalls." Do it--there's a waterfall and park area about 30kms away that is simply spectacular. Ever watch Saved by the Bell Hawaiian Style intro, with the giant waterfall? That's what it reminded me of. I could literally hear Will Smith's "summertime" playing in the background. Split a tuk-tuk ride with six other people, three of which I had met either days before, or the night before, and the other three just met on the tuk tuk, which was fine. The water was crystal clear, with a bluish tint, and it was refreshingly cool. It also had nice pools where you could go to swim if you were interested. Edenesque is the adjective I would use to describe it.

On the way, you pass an Asiatic black bear sanctuary. These bears have been rescued from the bile and animal part trade, and are now in enclosures, just hanging out. They even have hammocks made of old tires for the bears to relax in, and there is nothing more bizarre/hilarious than seeing a bear lay back in a hammock, just enjoying themselves.

Of course, I also managed to make a major faux pas while watching from the observation deck. I hear an asian language being spoken by some people next to me, and so I naturally assume that it is japanese, and say "sugoi"--meaning, great!--to which the guy responds, "Korean, not Japanese." Confusing Japanese with Korean may sound like an innocent mistake, but if you know history like I do, there is few worse things that you can say to a Korean, north or south, than calling them Japanese. South Korea and Japan might be allies now, but it is purely out of geopolitical necessity. The Koreans hate the Japanese (and have some justification for that position)--look up the term "comfort woman/women" and you will see why. My face turned beet red, and I immediately started apologizing, as I truly felt horrible. All was fine, though, and they were actually nice to talk to, and some wanted their pictures taken with me--they asked me where I went to school, and I said "Yale" and they all were very well aware of it.

I will fill in the rest of the details of the day/night/day later on, but I have to meet some people for dinner to talk about our plans for TMW. A teaser to entertain you for the next couple of hours? Figure out this quote: "Why don't you try to ruin some Led Zeppelin?"

Also, when you watch the travel channel, do so with a certain level of skepticism. Three nights before I left for Laos, the singapore hostel was showing the travel channel, and there was a program on Laos. The host was taking us on a tour of Laos, and decided to go to Phonsavanh, a place that he claimed was unreachable by road, and only reachable by air. My experience today gives me the right to say "bullshit" to that--yes the road is windy, but it is paved--its not my fault that you, Mr. Travel Channel host, were too much of a wimp to drive it.

Going to Phonsavanh

Will update my blog more fully when I get the chance (hint: when in Laos, ignore TLC's advice), but I will be heading to Phonsavanh tmw, a 7-8 hour ride to go see the plain of jars and some UXO.

Luang Prabang

I thought Vang Vieng was "unbelievable" for all the wrong reasons. Luang Prabang, a 7 hour bus ride away, is "unbelievable" for all the right reasons. I've been in SE Asia for 6.5 weeks now, and I have to say that if you are ever in the area, a trip here is simply a must do.

The town is the former, and traditional Lao capital--similar to how Siem Reap once was for the Khmers. It is perched on a peninsula surrounded by the Mekong on one side, and the Nam Pha on the other, and the northern tip of the peninsula is where the two rivers converge. Its also surrounded by high, forest covered mountains, giving it a very scenic setting.

It also helps that the place is loaded with well-preserved french architecture surrounded by traditional buddhist temples. It lends a very unique air to the place.

If you could compare SE Asian towns and cities to real types of people, than Luang Prabang would be an uber supermodel with a great personality and plenty of intelligence--extremely photogenic from all angles, and just a great place to be around.

There's a hilltop temple in the center of town that provides a great panorama of the place, and, unlike what the Lonely Planet guide says, you do not need to be fully covered to enter the royal palace museum. I and every other western tourist had no problem entering with tshirts and shorts. Yes, we had to take off our shoes and stow our bags, but that was understandable. The palace was unbelievable--well preserved, and recently renovated, it is probably the nicest palace i've been to in SE Asia.

Sometimes you manage to stumble across random things or people that you never expect to find in the middle of northern laos. I had two such incidents yesterday. The royal palace museum displays gifts from various nations to the people of laos, and of course, some from the U.S. are displayed. Sitting on a small trophy foundation, there is a red flag with white elephants on it, with some glass enclosed shards of rock just above it. The flag is the traditional flag of the lao monarchy, and the shards of rock are from the moon. The caption on the base of the foundation "this flag of laos was carried on board the apollo 11 moon mission by the astronauts, and these are pieces of the moon, presented to the people of Laos"--signed, President Nixon. I have to wonder what else was carried on the apollo 11 mission for political purposes, in addition to the small, shoulder patch sized lao flag.

Hours later, when I was wandering the night market directly next to the royal palace, I ran into a girl (not the indonesian teaching friend) who was Hockaday '04, and who I had not spoken to for literally six years. And we manage to run into each other in the middle of freaking Laos. Talk about it being a small world.

The night market is easily the nicest I've seen in all of SE Asia--they actually close off an active street between 530pm and 1030pm for the vendors to display their wares, and there really isn't that much "crap" for sale--yes, you can get your usual souvenir tshirt, but you can also have your pick of lots of traditional textiles and handicrafts.

The sunset is simply spectacular as well, especially when you are watching it from a bamboo shack on the other side of a river that you had to cross over via a rickety bamboo bridge.

Of course, not all news is good news. I've managed to lose my headlight/flashlight, and I had to buy baby powder to combat the possibility of prickly heat. Prickly heat is a non-infectious, non health threatening skin rash that occurs in the tropics when sweat can't leave the body--and it is starting to occur on my back, where i wear a backpack, so when I sweat, the moisture can't necessary leave it. I had it once before, in Fiji, and while it poses zero threat to my physical health, it feels like a bunch of ants are crawling all over you and biting. There's really not much you can do for it other than use baby powder, air conditioning/fans, and cold water showers. All of which I have been doing.