Rain - I swear it follows us English around
Trip Start
Mar 27, 2008
1
4
9
Trip End
Apr 21, 2008
Nong Khiaw,
Lao Peoples Dem Rep
Friday, April 11, 2008
Nong Khiaw is absolutely stunning - I didn't expect it! The town spills over both sides of the Nam Ou river and is connected by one bridge. The surrounding scenery is karst mountains and forest. The guesthouse is a bargain for my own room as it is clean (despite to obligatory insects) and has a lovely veranda and restaurant that looks out onto the river and the main part of the town the other side. The owner mentioned my lao skirt and pointed it out to his wife, as did the old lady I took my laundry to
Near the school
. I went for a walk around the town - at least 2 roads of interest this time - and everyone was smiling and saying hello, and again, the skirt was getting so much attention! I wandered out past the school at the end of their lunch break and there were so many children turning up (not rushing of course) by bicycle, motorbike or on foot. You could even see the 'cool lads' who waited until the end to go to class and were hanging out by their motorbikes with their shirts slightly more undone than anyone elses! One small child even pointed at me as if I was a freak - horray! Once again the sky clouded up and a storm broke out!I got dinner at the hostel which did really delicious Lao food - pork laap and sticky rice! I sat with two guys who were also staying there (Carl from Sweden and Root from Netherlands) and we then ventured across the bridge towards where we thought a movie house was. As soon as we left the guesthouse it started raining hard, and the streets aren't lit so we got very muddy and nowhere fast! We got cover in an open fronted hardware store where a lady was breastfeeding her baby and waited for a while for the rain to ease. Having negotiated with the woman over three umbrellas and not come to an agreement we made a dash for it and instead of finding the movie house, wound up in a restaurant by the river which only had the family in it drinking beer and eating sunflower seeds! Since it was still raining hard we ordered a bottle of lao lao - 10,000 kip for one litre - and the son of the owner served it to us, one after another until the bottle was empty
This was built in three days!
! They also gave us complementary fish laap and sticky rice which can only be described as spicey green slop and tried to eat some so as not to be rude, despite being full from dinner!Day 40 - Late morning I walked 2.5 km east of town to a Lao Pathet Cave, enjoying the karst and ricefield scenery on the way. There were a lot of school children cycling along the road from school and a few even stopped and talked to me for a little bit. The Cave is one of the many hideouts the Lao Government used during the Indo-China war and I found it really fascinating picturing them living there - it was quite eerie, especially as I was the only person in the viscinity! Luckily I remembered my torch but there were some points where I was basically rock climbing in a skirt! And that's another thing - health and safety is certainly not an issue in Laos - an old rickety bamboo ladder separates two parts of the cave along a 30 metre high cliff face! The problem being that all the rungs are a metre apart!
Had an amazing tuna salad for lunch at the guesthouse - featuring carrot, fresh mint leaves, cucumber, cabbage and peanuts! And I relaxed on the veranda most of the afternoon reading and watching the activity on the river! Mid afternoon all the children finish school and go swimming and there is always something to watch, be it fishing, washing, tubing or water buffallo wallowing. Had a lao speciality - Tom yam soup for dinner and uncooked spring rolls... unusual but very fresh and tasty!
