Rats' guts and perverts

Trip Start Aug 14, 2003
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Trip End Jan 15, 2004


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Flag of Lao Peoples Dem Rep  ,
Wednesday, December 3, 2003

From the cave, I took a hairy trip on the back of a truck headed for Xam Neua, a town in the far north east of Laos. What I thought would take a few hours, turned out to be more like 12, that stretched into the cold night which was unfortunate because I had only worn a t-shirt and shorts. I arrived frozen and jealous of the teenage soldiers who jumped on carrying AKs in one hand and a jar of fire water in the other. I don't know how the Laotian government expects its army to work when it's half drunk all the time!!!

Anyway, the trip up on the truck was definitely spectacular. The road wound its way through thick jungle that occasionally opened up to small villages of wooden huts surrounding a solitary concrete water pump. Kids waved madly everywhere putting a permanent grin on my face. At one point we rounded a corner and found ourselves stuck behind an old woman who decided to use her vegie cart as a go-kart down a steep hill. She jumped on squealing with glee, showing a toothless grin and absolutely stacking it at the bottom in a pile of clothes, bones and bushes. She and the entire truck were in hysterics though I bet she was seriously bruised - hope I'm doing the same when I'm 50 too!!!

Xam Neua was another tiny isolated town: the last stop for collecting fruit, river weed, ducks heads folded inside out, and a perfectly intact set of rat's guts, before continuing to Vietnam. I passed on breakfast and wandered around the outskirts of town for the rest of the day.

I continued the next day towards the West, to a town called Nong Khiaw where I took a small boat up river to an isolated village called Muong Noi. A few travellers had told me it was a secluded oasis with limited electricity but plenty of good food, beer and huts to stay in. I holed up there for a few days generally eating and taking long walks to the nearby villages. The locals weren't as friendly as other places and by the last day I was getting a strange vibe from the place. In the morning I'd gone for a walk and heard shots being fired. I had no idea what or who they were for, probably farmers shooting animals, but I decided to head back anyway. And on my way, a local young guy had asked me if I wanted to go see a Buddha statue in a cave just off the path but I'd already seen it and politely declined. A friend told me later that she'd gone with him to see it, but he'd had other intentions. Luckily most Western women are a good head taller than most Laotian men and she'd escaped unscathed. It was a nice village, and we met some nice local restauranteers, but it was time to move on.
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