Laos I

A little bummed from leaving my friends, I passed through airport customs in Vientiane, Laos. There aren't any ATMs here (Visa must change their slogan), so I exchanged a few hundred dollars into Laos kip. The teller lay four stacks of rubber-banded money onto the counter. Like some bank thief, I quickly shoved the cash into my small bag with difficulty. Who wants to be a Millionaire!

Vientiane is nothing to rave about. The city's only sight is the Pha That Luang temple from the 15th century. Guarded by a fortress wall, the sand-colored monument exhibits Laos' unique architecture: round tapered steeples. It's beautiful, but I only spent one day here before heading north to Vien Viang, the backpacker's haven. Set along the Nam Song river, Vien Viang is known for its beer accessibility and river tubing. I, and what looked like the rest of the town's backpackers, rented a tube and floated down the river for the day, stopping at the riverbank bars for refreshments and ziplines. Lazily floating down the river, I admired the scenic palm trees, bare rice paddies, and rocky hills. How did I get here? I extended my feet so they were a part of the view: my own two feet took me to Laos! It's not easy living out of a backpack in a foreign country, especially since I've been on my own for most of it. I have the occasional homesick day or nuisance day, but they floated away with the peacefulness of the Nam Song river.

At the next riverside bar, home of the famous Omega swing, I met a bunch of Israelis. We played volleyball and soaked up the sun without a care. Uh oh! The sun was setting, and we still had two more hours of floating in order to get back. Goosebumped and purple-lipped, we decided to hop out of the water and walk back to town with the tubes on our backs. We bushwhacked through a viney forest and and trekked through massive strewn rice fields. Finally, we found a road and hitchhiked back to town, throwing our eight tubes ontop of a pick-up!

The easy life is too easy here. Instead of spending another day tubing, or just reading in a hammock at the riverside bar, a new friend and I rented mountain bikes for the day. We rode to the Organic Farm for lunch (it sounds neat, although I doubt that most farmers here use chemicals) where I sipped a tart glass of starfruit wine. On the other side of the river, we pedalled across rice fields hovered by rocky hills and rode to two limestone caves. Exhausted from the sun and heat, I rode back to town and collapsed at the "Friends" Cafe. My new Israeli friends and I must have watched every episode during our four days in Vian Vieng. Seating was Japanese style; and after our Lao noodle soup or Snitzle, we sprawled out on the comfortable cushions for hours. Definitely not a good strategy for a profitable turn-over.

After four days, I was ready to push on. I only planned to spend 10 days in Laos, but I have come to love the people and their laid-back lifestyle. Now, it seems that my one-month visa won't suffice. I'm in Luang Prabang now, a french-like town that is full of Thai-styled 15th century stupas and monasteries. I spent one day walking around the town, venturing down small roads and exploring the Mekong's riverside. Another day, some new friends and I hired a boat to the Pak Ou, where thousands of Buddhist statues are collected in a riverside rock-ledged cave. All along the north side of the river, massive sheets of rock hang perpendicularly, towering at least 500 feet above our heads. We took an afternoon swim, beneath these cliffs that begged to be climbed. In the sun-heated current, I lay on my back, gazing up the rocks as the Mekong carried me down. I screamed like a tickled infant: This is the most exotic moment of my life!

Every backpacker that I've spoke to has heard this myth: in the Bokeo region of Laos, there is a metres-high resort where you play with Gibbon monkeys and take a zipline from treehouse to treehouse. It's a childhood fantasy for adults; and if it's true, only 10 hours away. Our research attempts were fruitless and I settled on heading towards Phonsavan instead. Just hours after buying my bus ticket, our backpacker group met an English couple who had actually spoken to the extraordinary hotelier. Yes, he had treehouses free in just a few days. Now, we are waiting for our confirmed reservations!

Goodnight Saigon

With our Danish friends Morten and Simon in tow, we boarded the night bus toward Hoi An with one purpose: shopping. Hoi An doesn't have much to offer tourists except their inexpensive silk and excellent tailoring. The boys imagined cashmere suits and french-cuffed shirts. For me, I dreamed of a raw-silk tuxedo or a chamousse robe. When we arrived at the silk shop, the boys bolted toward the men's section and hunted for a suitable fabric. I climbed the stairs to the second floor, overwhelmed by Asian florals, stripes, checks, raw silks, refined silks, chamousse silk, lavender, aquamarine, copper, and canary yellow. The saleswomen must have seen my wide eyes and pulled me a chair: She's a runaway! Instead of pulling my own fabrics and making a mess, as I'm sure most fashion-obsessed tourists do, they eagerly showed me anything I liked. They opened catalogues of style selections and carried over reams of fabric, all the while I sipped my Vietnamese tea. So much better than online shopping! No. Like this one, but....A little shiny. Not that shiny! Somewhat. Yes! After gathering for over an hour, I finally decided on a black raw-silk tuxedo, as planned, with added embroidery. Satisfied, I reconvened with the boys; we were all excited for our fitting that night.

After dinner, we returned to the tailor shop. We each took our labelled garment bag and anxiously headed to the dressing room. I slipped on the strapless camisole with embroidered pink flowers, the Asian-collared jacket, and the cigarette pants. My eyes were glued to the mirror, as I turned to see every angle: I am Sabrina! I pushed through the fabric curtains, and I could see the boys already strutting in front of the mirror, making Blue Steel expressions as they thought no one was watching. They did look handsome! And, judging by their expressions, I think they liked my suit as well! We put our Feel-like-a-million-Vietnamese-Dong back into the garment bags, and redressed in our comfortable backpacker attire, dirty t-shirts and forever-stained pants.

Shortly after, the Danes headed back to the sporadically sunny beaches of Nha Trang, as Gil, Jake, and I continued north to Hue and then Hanoi. We arrived just in time for New Years. The veteran college party-boy, Jake pumped us up for a night (and morning) of fun and drinking; but after dancing at the Funky Monkey until two, Gil and I were all New Year’s out. We picked up some late-night: you know, grilled cow brains and rice porridge, and headed back to the hotel. Just as Gil and I were waking up, Jake was just getting home. I think I heard him say: “That was a crazy night!” but his head hit the pillow while he was still talking.

We heard about a Hanoi delicassy; and continuing with our tradition of adventurous cuisine, cobra was right up our alley. Just a twenty minute ride outside the motorbike-polluted city of Hanoi, our cab pulled up to a small suburban home with a large sign of a killer snake. The man of the house greeted us and held the door (with only nine fingers!) as we entered his snake-shrined home. In the first room, hundreds of yellowed jars of all sized were stuffed with coiled snakes, each in an attacking pose. Every inch of the wall was line with shelves of these preserved creatures; some even held just the testicles and penis! Freaky. The man led us to the backyard where his kept his caged pets. Handling them with a burlap bag and a metal stick, he picked up each cobra and named its price. We settled on a small king cobra: a whopping forty dollars split three ways. He stuffed the animal into the sack and carried it up the dining room on the second floor, casually swinging it and knocking it against the wall. Before the snake could come to - Smack! - onto the floor. He slit the throat with a basic razor blade and drained the blood into a vat of local vodka, then scalpelled the ping-pong ball-sized heart into a shot glass. Stunned and mouths agape, we were served the blood concoction. It was already established that I, the Fear Factor Food champion, would eat the heart. But watching it splash around the bloody shot glass, still beating, I thought it would be courteous to still offer to honor to the boys. Nope. No takers. Gil, Jake, and I had our glasses to the center. We glanced around the table with nervous smiles: this was the crazy trip we begged for! Down the hatch! Our first course of snake was actually pleasant! The vodka provided a nice aftertaste, and the blood was rather sweet and thick, like syrup. Our next courses were equally tasty: spine-boiled soup with corn, fried spring rolls, puffed snakeskin, and snake meat with vegetables and chilli. Every part was eaten: even the boys took care of the eyeballs! Ssssscrumptiousssss!

We-trio headed east to Ha Long Bay for three days on a sightseeing-packed tour. We walked through enormous limestone-dripping cave, illuminated with colorful neon lights that gave a Disney-like feel. We also wandered through hidden bunkers that the Vietnamese used during “The War with America” (just look down and scratch your head in shame). Actually, a really friendly and animated retired military officer gave the tour. He tried to give us a realistic picture of what living in the cave was like back then, although he seemed a little too enthusiastic and we wondered if he got out much. The old colonel even taught us an old rile-‘em-up song; but after the eightieth time chanting “Oh, Uncle Ho Chi Min, Ho!” we all lost our pep. Off to the Cat Ba National Park, where we took a three-hour hike up one of tall green hills. Most of the trek had been under the shade of tall ferns, and we couldn’t see the renowned seascape. As we reached the top and felt sun on our faces, we turned around to view the most spectacular scenery. We were surrounded by waves of overlapping green hills and lush valleys; not a small road or hut in sight. To the east, just beyond a few ranges, we saw the glorious China Sea and jagged rocks that were scattered in the still blue water. The contrast between the two landscapes were unreal, and only separated by a narrow strip of sandy beach. I rested in a daze for some time. The sun didn’t appear to move, but time was passing and we still wanted to enjoy the harbour.

The following day, we boarded a boat for a day’s lap around Ha Long Bay. We oohed and aahed at the scenery, took some pictures, and chatted with other travellers on the roof deck. But after an hour, the boat rocked us into a settled peace and we drifted off into our own worlds. Jake plugged himself into his iPod (his favorite past-time), Gil read his book with curiosity, and I drifted off into a deep nap. I was awoken for a good reason: Kayaking? Jake teamed up with a cute German girl, while Gil and I shared a kayak of our own. We paddled between the jagged rocks, shaped like colossal flintstones, and through sea-shell covered lagoons. "It’s like we are inside a postcard," Gil smiled. Awestruck from the peaceful scenery, I didn’t have much energy for paddling: good thing I employed this Israeli soldier! Once de-lifejacketed and reboarded, fog suddenly appeared and it took quite a while to return to harbour. We were disappointed that the weather would not permit us to spend a night aboard as we had planned. We spent another night on Cat Ba Island, before heading north to our next destination.

Populated by gentle rice farmers and roaring green hills, Sapa is made of small minority villages that form a cultural patchwork, similar to that of the paddied hills. It’s winter, so the farmland is bare and muddy, and not many tourists come through for trekking around the countryside. Just as well, we decided to take a three-day trek through the villages and spend one night with a local family. Chee, our remarkable, seventeen-year-old tour guide showed us around to her neighboring villages. Somehow, we acquired another group member for the day: I briefly met an adorable little girl in town and she didn’t seem to want to let go of my hand. Little Bam followed us past Indigo-producing villages, to a beautiful waterfall, and through the local markets. She sang me folk songs from her village, and I sang old camp tunes and Cole Porter. She luckily let go so that I could eat lunch; and amusingly, found another maternal backpacker to spend her afternoon with.

While the first day’s weather had been bright and sunny, we were not as lucky with the following days. We didn’t experience as many kinds of rain as Forrest Gump, but it was just enough to make the muddy downward trek hazardous and blundersome. We bought bamboo walking sticks from the local children for 12,000 dong. Boy, do they know about supply and demand! In the end, neither walking stick nor a Tide suit could keep us clean. To keep my spirit up, I started singing Paul Simon, but it didn’t sound quite right: “Slipppp Slideeeeeeeng Aaahhhway.” Finally, we arrived at our homestay family’s house. Chee guides almost every day, so she spend more time with this homestay house than in her own village. We were happy to be staying in her pseudo-home; we had come to admire her so much. Without attending school, Chee speaks English perfectly and works hard giving tours as the only one in a six-person family to earn an income. We couldn’t believe how she skated down the mud, while we were falling all over the place; she was our beautiful little mountain goat. We were dishevelled from our battle with the mud and in a bit of a huff, but she immediately started cutting vegetables for dinner. We offered our help: Jake started to cut shallots and Gil even swept the floor: all the while, she just laughed kindly. Chee is truly a product of her environment, and Sapa is an unbelievable place.

For hours, we all sat around the fire. The women of the household would occasionally wander outside for more bamboo for the fire. They did all of the work themselves, as the men lived in other villages, earning money for hard labor. The grandmother and elder sister seemed unimpressed by us; I guess they have tourists every night. We were certainly amazed by them and their way of life. The children shoelessly played in the mud, then oddly watched satellite television in the other room. During dinner, a feast of many dishes and varieties, we could even watch BBC World. With Ariel Sharon’s condition pending, we were strangely grateful to be connected in this off-the-beaten-path travel destination. The family piled under one large blanket on one side of the house, and our family slept snugly on the other side. Our nightlight was the fire that was gently aglow from the kitchen.

The next four days seemed to be just for goodbyes. We had a goodbye evening with Chee: we treated her to dinner and a night of pool and drinks. She’s even great with a cue! The following day, she saw us off to our tiny-cabined night train back to Hanoi. Back in the bustling city, we bummed around for three days: the sad good-bye looming over us. We lazily walked around, fruitlessly shopping for cheap sweatshirts and last minute gifts, and caught a much-warned boring water puppet show. We grabbed some Bia Hoi: the local street-corner bars with plastic stools, famous for 30-cent beers and free peanuts (somehow they also tasted like beer). Those last days passed quickly, even though we didn’t seem to do much except play our favorite new card game, The River. We gave numerous toasts: over another Bia Hoi, wine at dinner, and again at a late-night bar. Jake, Gil, and I had a fabulous three weeks together.

In our dark and still hotel room, my alarm rang at 5:30 am. The boys were sleeping; their flights didn’t leave until later that day. They gently stirred in their sleep as I gave them a little hug and a kiss. I slowly got my ready-packed bag and gently closed the door behind me: Bye boys.