Ban Moueng - Laos

Trip Start Oct 30, 2007

164

Trip End Nov 20, 2009

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Flag of Lao Peoples Dem Rep Ban Moueng, Lao Peoples Dem Rep
Friday, January 11, 2008

When we met up with Lae the next morning, what we didn't realise was that his village was in fact 2 1/2 hours by local truck and a further 2 hours on a small motorised boat from the road, and that the village had been there since the 13th century and had only 40 families. Even more special for us.

The boat trip started peacefully

but got hairy at the rapids

As the first foreigners to visit the village in over 5 years, there followed 3 days of "special treatment". The people were so incredibly hospitable and couldn't stop plying us with local food and homemade whisky.

First drink of the morning

We arrived the day before the wedding and were traipsed around the village, a little bit like a show and tell, it was great.

Early morning in the village

We also walked to the next Hmong minority village (about an hour away) where most of the villagers hadn't seen a white person in a very long time (or ever).

With the Hmong village kids

They were incredibly shy and we felt very invasive trying to take photos, but once we'd taken a few and some video footage (and showed it back to them), they were very intrigued and thought it was great.

So our top 10 memories of our time at the village:

#1 Having a "DJ" from another village ie: someone with a PA, 7 Laos songs, a love of Karaoke and the sound of his own voice (all you need for 3 days of constant 24/7 LOUD partying) - we can now recite the words to all 7 Laos hits, and we don't even speak Laos!

#2 The requirement to drink Laos Laos (that's the whiskey) and warm Beer Laos at any time of the day, especially at breakfast when we stupidly thought they were pouring us shots of water!

#3 The cast iron stomach and nasal passages required to endure freshly slaughtered buffalo, which Brad got up to see at 5am (and a delicacy apparently) in every meal for 3 solid days!

Butchering the buffalo at 5am

Full marks to the 2 foreigners who were given all the choice cuts such as arteries, liver, heart, cold fat and congealed blood!

#4 Being summoned by the Chief of the village and sub committee to act as Project Consultants to help them think of ways to raise funding for their new school. (Not an easy task when no-one speaks a scrap of English, and our knowledge of charities and fund raising is when it just gets deducted out of your pay each week!)

At the school

#5 Carving it up on the dance floor morning, noon and night! Gotta say we weren't pullin our best moves at 8am, but it didn't stop them from dragging us up for every one of the 7 songs! They thought we had the moves of John Travolta, we thought we were dancing like Kel out of Kath and Kim!

With Lae at the wedding

#6 Being asked by a Hmong villager via sign language, gestures and nods if we were dentists and we could pull out her sons rotten tooth. Brad was up for a full extraction, but we settled on giving them a couple of Panadol!

#7 Having knee sockets the size of footballs and inflamed pelvic joints from sitting cross legged on wooden floors for what seemed like 23 hours out of a 24 hour day! Changing our cramped positions every 2 minutes we're sure made us look like we had bad haemhorroids, but they thought it was hilarious!

#8 Being a pretty basic village, they had no toilets, so it was quite difficult to stop the dogs sniffing at your poo before it was out of your bum!

#9 The village was called Ban Moueng, and it seemed the only way we could remember it was by preceding it with "Whoah Black Betty...........!

#10 Seriously though, one of, if not the, highlight of our time so far. Their genuine happiness to share what little they have and to include us in their special occasion was very humbling, a very rare and generous thing in today's world.