2/12 - Barking Deer, Fried or Dried
We've arrived in Laos, after a fairly smooth trip, and in this internet cafe there's a Russian woman screaming into a phone directly behind me. 70% of the time on this trip, the keyboards I've worked on have been terrible, and this one is no exception. It's as much of a rattler as the Malaysian local bus was. I'll take this time, therefore, to note that any spelling or grammatical mistakes, heretofore and now, must be seen as the product of speed of typing (I'm always on the clock) and/or the keyboard either disregarding me entirely, or otherwise limiting me in general.
Today's title comes from a post-it note placed in the guidebook by Aubrie. It's available up north, supposedly.
And before moving on, I should indeed apologize for the singling out of balding men as prostitute-takers in The Land of Smiles (they said it, not me). You're correct, Father, that there is no truly established link between the two and that plenty of full-heads-of-hair-wearing men do support the trade. Nor do I claim to be somehow superior to those balding and seeking out hookers. In writing that, I was merely hoping to give a sense of what I've tended to witness--that many of the men were indeed balding. For the record, though I personally wouldn't want to go bald because I don't think it would suit me at all, I think that balding can actually make a person look cooler than they did previously. In my father's case, he has remained steadily cool throughout the E.H.L.H. (Era of Having Less Hair), though he might not believe it.
Laos lies across the Mekong from Thailand here, and the Friendship Bridge, built sometime in the 90s with the help of the Australians, is the main way of getting across in this area. To reach it, we drove through the night on our VIP double-decker bus (Aubrie and I in the front seat on top, which gave us panoramic views) and arrived in Nong Khai, the border town on the Thai side, quite early, at about 5 a.m. The border didn't open until about 8 I believe, so we sat around for a couple of hours and watched the sunrise. The logical question here is: why don't they leave a couple of hours later so there's no sitting around by the border? But we've learned not to ask those sorts of questions around these parts.
The drive up was a little strange. Town after town along the road looked exactly the same--a messy strip of auto parts stores and small food stalls in plain concrete buildings, all closed of course because it was the middle of the night, and all the more depressing as a result. Periodically I would wake up (the Thais have not heard of the Malaysian concept of large recliner-like seats on buses and so my sleep was not very sound) and watch as the driver barrelled through red lights, sounding the horn to ward off any traffic that might be coming. At bigger intersections he employed a tactic in which he would slow down as he approached the red light, then make it appear as if he was turning left (we're driving on the left-hand side of the road, mind you). When he was about halfway into the turn, having confirmed that no cars were coming, he would step on the gas and right the bus back onto the main road and continue on. Not really an ingenious trick by any account. The only real low-point of the trip was when we stopped at Nong Khai at 5 a.m. and the guy sitting across from us took it upon himself to start singing loudly and badly. Why would someone think that this was acceptable? Luckily he stopped after about 5 minutes, but still, he made a point of conversing loudly with his friends for the next hour or so.
Crossing the border into Laos, there's an immediate difference in the feeling of the place. Everything on the Lao side seems a bit more haphazard, including the people. We had to switch to a minibus to go the 25km to Vientiane, and the road there was total traffic chaos, with no lines in the road and a mess of cars, tuk-tuks, and motorcycles taking up about three lanes worth of space across. The rule seemed to be that there were three loosely defined, invisible lanes, all of which could be used for traffic in either direction provided there weren't any vehicles coming in the opposite direction. So sometimes it would appear that we were on a one-way road, other times, I don't know, one of those things where all the shitty cars get into a ring and smash the hell out of each other? This look was enhanced by the number of aging vehicles which looked on the verge of complete collapse. Still, there wasn't much in the way of speeding. It was chaotic but also oddly relaxed. This, I've gathered, is the Laos vibe in general.
The roadside was as you might expect it--shacks made of corrugated metal, wood, and concrete; people, dogs, and chickens lying, sitting, or walking around at various points, listlessly. Why is it that man-made materials always turn into a complete mess when allowed to deteriorate? I've been thinking about it this way: anything that people make themselves ages awfully. Metal rusts, concrete crumbles, and even if the thing was built well at first (which is rare) the overall effect is inevitably that it looks terrible. That is, unless the money is available to keep it painted, sealed, and generally maintained. If a tree dies and begins to decay, or something like that, it still looks beautiful. There's a natural progression to it, and a sense of harmony with the surroundings because of that. I guess when people build things, especially cheaply, that natural harmony isn't considered, and understandably so. If I lacked such a basic need as shelter, I would want to obtain it as quickly and cheaply as possible. It's just sad to think that at some point, before materials like plastic and steel came onto the scene, buildings would have been made solely out of materials directly gathered from the surroundings.
Vientiane is a tiny, laid-back place. It's the capital city, but you'd never really know it by the looks. Most signs are in Lao and French here (the French colonial influence is huge), with English and Japanese sometimes making an appearance. We found a place along the road closest to the Mekong, the Orchid Guest House, which is a little more expensive than it should be, but decent. We had to take a $15 air-con room last night but switched to a $10 fan room this morning. I definitely like this town, though there's not all that much of a reason to stick around here. It's decidedly laid back, and has the feeling of a sea-side city, though it's just the Mekong (currently at low levels) snaking past on the western edge. There are a surprising number of great French restaurants and other cosmopolitan eating establishmentse here. We get BBC World in the guest house and there are foreigners all over the place, many of them elderly. It's a lot more tapped into the world than I expected it to be. My hope is that it'll feel a little less so when we head north, but I'm not overly optimistic. Then again, I had a delicious waffle this morning with real coffee (not the super-sweetened kind) and read an English language newspaper over it. It cost under $3. Is it bad that it's possible to have a proper Belgian waffle in Laos? Is it bad to like having a waffle in Laos? In some sense, having all (or most) Western comforts available goes completely against the idea of having a travelling adventure in Southeast Asia, but then again, sometimes I really enjoy them. So the only thing I can hope to do is to partake in them with moderation. But it's something I struggle with on a conceptual level. The evidence of globalization is alarming to me, especially in a country like Laos. But am I overly wary of it? Perhaps it's not such a bad thing. As Aubrie and I discussed this morning, it's a problem only if it's overrunning and eclipsing the local culture. So far it seems like it's doing exactly that in all the places we've been. It's not obvious whether that's the case here in Laos. It does seem like a unique and special place still, which is encouraging. And Beer Lao, the local beer, is delicious. Reminds me of the quality of beer in Prague. I've heard that 1% of the produced Beer Lao makes it out to the US and other countries. If you can find it out there, go and pick some up. At 8,000 Kip for a 650mL bottle, it's a bargain and makes me glad my visa's good for longer than 15 days. For the record, I'm no beer-crazed backpacker, though I may become one during my stay here.
A peculiarity of Laos is that most things can be paid for in Thai Baht and US Dollars, in addition to Lao Kip. I changed $60 into kip yesterday and was given a massive wad of bills about two inches thick. It's quite comical--I have to keep it in a plastic bag in my day pack. They were out of 10,000 kip notes (value of about $1) and had to give me 617,000 kip in a combination of 5000s and 2000s.
Today's title comes from a post-it note placed in the guidebook by Aubrie. It's available up north, supposedly.
And before moving on, I should indeed apologize for the singling out of balding men as prostitute-takers in The Land of Smiles (they said it, not me). You're correct, Father, that there is no truly established link between the two and that plenty of full-heads-of-hair-wearing men do support the trade. Nor do I claim to be somehow superior to those balding and seeking out hookers. In writing that, I was merely hoping to give a sense of what I've tended to witness--that many of the men were indeed balding. For the record, though I personally wouldn't want to go bald because I don't think it would suit me at all, I think that balding can actually make a person look cooler than they did previously. In my father's case, he has remained steadily cool throughout the E.H.L.H. (Era of Having Less Hair), though he might not believe it.
Laos lies across the Mekong from Thailand here, and the Friendship Bridge, built sometime in the 90s with the help of the Australians, is the main way of getting across in this area. To reach it, we drove through the night on our VIP double-decker bus (Aubrie and I in the front seat on top, which gave us panoramic views) and arrived in Nong Khai, the border town on the Thai side, quite early, at about 5 a.m. The border didn't open until about 8 I believe, so we sat around for a couple of hours and watched the sunrise. The logical question here is: why don't they leave a couple of hours later so there's no sitting around by the border? But we've learned not to ask those sorts of questions around these parts.
The drive up was a little strange. Town after town along the road looked exactly the same--a messy strip of auto parts stores and small food stalls in plain concrete buildings, all closed of course because it was the middle of the night, and all the more depressing as a result. Periodically I would wake up (the Thais have not heard of the Malaysian concept of large recliner-like seats on buses and so my sleep was not very sound) and watch as the driver barrelled through red lights, sounding the horn to ward off any traffic that might be coming. At bigger intersections he employed a tactic in which he would slow down as he approached the red light, then make it appear as if he was turning left (we're driving on the left-hand side of the road, mind you). When he was about halfway into the turn, having confirmed that no cars were coming, he would step on the gas and right the bus back onto the main road and continue on. Not really an ingenious trick by any account. The only real low-point of the trip was when we stopped at Nong Khai at 5 a.m. and the guy sitting across from us took it upon himself to start singing loudly and badly. Why would someone think that this was acceptable? Luckily he stopped after about 5 minutes, but still, he made a point of conversing loudly with his friends for the next hour or so.
Crossing the border into Laos, there's an immediate difference in the feeling of the place. Everything on the Lao side seems a bit more haphazard, including the people. We had to switch to a minibus to go the 25km to Vientiane, and the road there was total traffic chaos, with no lines in the road and a mess of cars, tuk-tuks, and motorcycles taking up about three lanes worth of space across. The rule seemed to be that there were three loosely defined, invisible lanes, all of which could be used for traffic in either direction provided there weren't any vehicles coming in the opposite direction. So sometimes it would appear that we were on a one-way road, other times, I don't know, one of those things where all the shitty cars get into a ring and smash the hell out of each other? This look was enhanced by the number of aging vehicles which looked on the verge of complete collapse. Still, there wasn't much in the way of speeding. It was chaotic but also oddly relaxed. This, I've gathered, is the Laos vibe in general.
The roadside was as you might expect it--shacks made of corrugated metal, wood, and concrete; people, dogs, and chickens lying, sitting, or walking around at various points, listlessly. Why is it that man-made materials always turn into a complete mess when allowed to deteriorate? I've been thinking about it this way: anything that people make themselves ages awfully. Metal rusts, concrete crumbles, and even if the thing was built well at first (which is rare) the overall effect is inevitably that it looks terrible. That is, unless the money is available to keep it painted, sealed, and generally maintained. If a tree dies and begins to decay, or something like that, it still looks beautiful. There's a natural progression to it, and a sense of harmony with the surroundings because of that. I guess when people build things, especially cheaply, that natural harmony isn't considered, and understandably so. If I lacked such a basic need as shelter, I would want to obtain it as quickly and cheaply as possible. It's just sad to think that at some point, before materials like plastic and steel came onto the scene, buildings would have been made solely out of materials directly gathered from the surroundings.
Vientiane is a tiny, laid-back place. It's the capital city, but you'd never really know it by the looks. Most signs are in Lao and French here (the French colonial influence is huge), with English and Japanese sometimes making an appearance. We found a place along the road closest to the Mekong, the Orchid Guest House, which is a little more expensive than it should be, but decent. We had to take a $15 air-con room last night but switched to a $10 fan room this morning. I definitely like this town, though there's not all that much of a reason to stick around here. It's decidedly laid back, and has the feeling of a sea-side city, though it's just the Mekong (currently at low levels) snaking past on the western edge. There are a surprising number of great French restaurants and other cosmopolitan eating establishmentse here. We get BBC World in the guest house and there are foreigners all over the place, many of them elderly. It's a lot more tapped into the world than I expected it to be. My hope is that it'll feel a little less so when we head north, but I'm not overly optimistic. Then again, I had a delicious waffle this morning with real coffee (not the super-sweetened kind) and read an English language newspaper over it. It cost under $3. Is it bad that it's possible to have a proper Belgian waffle in Laos? Is it bad to like having a waffle in Laos? In some sense, having all (or most) Western comforts available goes completely against the idea of having a travelling adventure in Southeast Asia, but then again, sometimes I really enjoy them. So the only thing I can hope to do is to partake in them with moderation. But it's something I struggle with on a conceptual level. The evidence of globalization is alarming to me, especially in a country like Laos. But am I overly wary of it? Perhaps it's not such a bad thing. As Aubrie and I discussed this morning, it's a problem only if it's overrunning and eclipsing the local culture. So far it seems like it's doing exactly that in all the places we've been. It's not obvious whether that's the case here in Laos. It does seem like a unique and special place still, which is encouraging. And Beer Lao, the local beer, is delicious. Reminds me of the quality of beer in Prague. I've heard that 1% of the produced Beer Lao makes it out to the US and other countries. If you can find it out there, go and pick some up. At 8,000 Kip for a 650mL bottle, it's a bargain and makes me glad my visa's good for longer than 15 days. For the record, I'm no beer-crazed backpacker, though I may become one during my stay here.
A peculiarity of Laos is that most things can be paid for in Thai Baht and US Dollars, in addition to Lao Kip. I changed $60 into kip yesterday and was given a massive wad of bills about two inches thick. It's quite comical--I have to keep it in a plastic bag in my day pack. They were out of 10,000 kip notes (value of about $1) and had to give me 617,000 kip in a combination of 5000s and 2000s.
posted by Gabriel Leigh at 4:12 PM
4 Comments:
Hard to imagine you in Laos. Hard to imagine Laos, for that matter. As they say, "When in Lao, be like a cow." Which I guess means something along the lines of 'live in the moment and don't ask too many questions.' Except for the beer (and Barking Deer), which reminds us that being human occasionally has its up-side.
I also like the idea of being able to pay for something in something called Kip. I may have to start calling the dog across the street Kip, instead of Skip.
Also very happy to learn that the swarms of foreigners in Vientiane were not necessarily balding.
It's a fine line between comfort and out of control anxiety. Globalization is probably the worst idea since organized religion, but nonetheless inevitable.
Once places like Laos fully accept their status as little more than giant theme parks for affluent, elderly, balding tourists, all will be well.
cdlb/
Hmmm, a new commenting format. Let's give it a go. I must've missed the bloodclot bandit. I'll have to revisit the comments pages of yore. What's a tuk-tuk? I imagine a motorcycle with a sidecar. And what's wrong with rusty metal? I rather like it. Natural things in states of decay smell a whole lot worse than manmade things. Is Aubrie ignoring my request for a public comment? Happy Valentine's Day to you both. Do they have that there? I got your postcards. Straighter lines could not be asked for, Gabe. And your handwriting is not small at all, Aubrie. The equatorial sun must be warping your perception. It's off to bed for me now. Sleep deprived I remain, respectfully yours, Randall Leigh
I can't help but wonder if the balding men in your family contributed to your associating the lack of morality with baldness. An association that was perhaps subconscious until Thailand. I know there is a saying that goes "life is about the journey, not the destination" but it seems like your comings and goings have dominated your blog time and space. Yes, I know that you are travel buffs whether by sea, rail, air or road but I'm wondering what happens when you actually get to a place. Who do you talk to? What are your days like? It seems like so much is about getting to the next place that I wonder if you can really enjoy where you are. I can understnad the tendency. I want to see the dessert menu before I've even finished my meal. I have two requests. A blog entry with no mention of money and one devoid of complaints. I'm just curious what an entry might be like if you spent a day surrendering to where you are instead of placing it on a scale next to other things. Hope this is taken as it's meant with the best of intentions and lots of love and longing for the both of you. More soon. MCF
I thought it was the Year of the Rooster. Apparently, it's in fact the Year of Dumping on Balding Men in the Quasi-Leigh Family. Could turn into an ominous trend. I'd just like to reply by saying, Hey, Babe, plenty of hair on this head, and I've got the magnifying glass to prove it, if you'd care to take a gander?
This notwithstanding, MCF does make several valid points:
1) It's certainly possible that the stigma of baldness is God's reply to the contemptible behavior of men vis-a-vis women. Only wish MCF had mentioned this earlier.
2) Yes, stop talking about money. The fact that you have virtually none should not be a factor.
3) Who do you talk to when you get to the places you're always on the way to? Hopefully, no one. But if you do feel the need to speak to the locals, do not talk about money. And don't mention the war!
4) Surrender! But don't, under any circumstances, hand over my camera as part of the deal.
MCF: Nice to hear from you again on this site. We definitely need more of your insights. Keep them coming.
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