Tranquil Vientiane

After five weeks of travel we arrived in our second capital city in SE Asia, Vientiane! Once the epicenter of Indochina and highly influenced by the French from their temporary imperialistic control of Laos, we were shocked upon exiting our rickety bus at how laid-back this city is for a capital. With 300,000 people Vientiane is filled with wats, boulevards, French cafes and seven-year old Mercedes.We expected to stay a day or two but got sucked into this black time hole for four days.

Seeing it was Sunday, and absolutely nothing was open, we were forced to take a day of rest. To your good fortune we spent our day at a Scandinavian cafe writing your postcards and blogging. We also visited by foot the National Palace and two wats (Buddhist temples). The Haw Pha Kaew houses antique Buddhist artifacts including sculptures and paintings. Gabi was inappropriately asked out by the on duty attendant after he followed her around the wat pretending to sweep the clean floor behind her. She was invited to a disco tech for that night and luckily he offered a friend for Lisa as well. Crossing the street we entered Wat Si Saket, the oldest temple in Vientiane, built in 1818. This wat contains more than 2,300 silver, ceramic, wooden, stone and bronze Buddha images. Many of these sculptures date back to the 15th and 16th centuries.

In the heat we continued up the road, passed the U.N. building and the post office to the Lao version of the Arc Du Triumph. The arc was built in 1969 by the Lao government using cement donated by the U.S. originally intended to build an international airport. Tragically the U.S. airport donations were not enough for the monument and the structure has yet to be completed. The park surrounding is widely used by locals for leisurely activities. We joined the crowd by taking a minute off our feet to rest on a park bench.

That night we had dinner at a street food stand along the Mekong River. We would return three nights consecutively to order the same meal, sitting at a folding table with plastic chairs. Each dinner we devoured pad thai, a deliciously spiced fried rice ball, a fresh grilled white fish from the Mekong and a plate of sauteed vegetables. mmmm... round four, Gab and Lis?

We awoke to renting cruiser bikes and navigated our way to to the U.S. Embassy.  Gabi was successful at paying $82 USD to add pages to her passport, while Lisa talked to her Lao counterpart from EducationUSA and visited the student advising center. Afterward a visit to the morning market included a view of a boar head, slabs of pure fat and  beautiful silk textiles. Biking six km we reached the Wat Phat That Luang, the most venerated Buddhist Temple in Laos. Towering 85 meters, the golden museum serves as a symbol of both the Buddhist religion and Lao sovereignty. The surrounding wats were gorgeously filled with colorful depictions of Buddhist scriptures with brightly orange robed smiling monks of all ages roaming the vicinity.
 
Exhausted and hungry we stopped by a local night market for hors d' oeuvres of homemade sausage, liver skewers and hombow rolls before making our way to our famed waterfront food market. Upon leaving the market a tragedy occurred.

Moments after opening a fresh bottle of  red wine, we headed across the street with a plastic cup of wine in hand and the bottle in Lisa's purse. As usual we crossed slowly dodging passing vehicles, as pedestrians don't have the right of way. Just as Gabi screamed "look out!" Lisa realized that two motorbikes were upon her. She stuck her right arm out, hooking the bike console and falling to the ground with the bike and driver. This caused the other bike to fall as well. The wine splashed everywhere but miraculously the bottle did not break. Instinctively Gabi shrieked  in pure terror "Lisa, get up!" and at that moment Lisa realized she was on the ground in the middle of the street. She stood up shocked as the bikes were already driving away. Her white tank top covered in red wine and ripped made her appear bloody to onlookers. She luckily only suffered a few scrapes and bruises and a cut up pinky toe.

 

Twenty-five km SE of Vientiane on a grassy field along the Mekong River, we arrived via tuk-tuk at the Xieng Khuan, meaning spirit city. This monument is a park scattered with Buddhist and Hindu sculptures built in 1958. Designed by a yogi-priest-shaman, Xieng Khuan merges Hinduism and Buddhism. Lisa limping and Gabi walking, we climbed into the mouth of a sculpture which led us up winding staircases to an expansive view of the park.

After a giant vegetarian buffet lunch, we headed to the Lao National Museum inside a run down french building from the 1920's. This is a book you can judge by it's cover. The 16 rooms exhibited a wide variety of topics from dinosaurs to national historic artifacts to wars with the French and Americans. While informative,  the museum, covered in cobwebs and typos, left much to be desired for a national archive. 

Our last stop in the capital city was the Cope National Rehabilitation Center, an organization dedicated to deactivating bombs left behind by U.S. troops and supporting victims of unexploded ordinances. Laos is the most heavily bombed country in the world. An estimated 260 million bombs were dropped on Laos between 1964 and 1973, of which 78 million failed to explode. Each bomb casing held 860 bombies, which if detonated correctly could destroy an area the size of three football fields. To date 12,000 people have become victims of these unexploded bombs.

At Cope we took advantage of free videos MAG has created to educate locals and tourists about this tragic phenomenon. With donations received, Cope provides rehabilitation and prosthetic limbs for victims of the leading causes of accidents in Lao; UXO (unexploded ordinances), motorbike accidents and leprosy. Some of their patients have gone over 20 years living with homemade limbs ingeniously made from wood or scrap metal before reaching Cope. Despite the painful topic, the Cope Center was a very enjoyable place to visit, with upbeat informative staff and jovial patients greeting visitors.

While we were not victims of UXO or leprosy during this trip, we came close to returning to the Cope Center after our second motorbike incident on our way out of Vientiane. After enjoying our favorite bowl of noodle soup to date in SE Asia (mmm.. thick homemade noodles), we boarded a tuk tuk  on the highway en route to the bus station. As usual, the driver immediately started texting while driving. Within moments he hit a parked red hatchback, whose driver was standing beside the car. The entire bumper was ripped off. Our choffer stopped in the middle of the road to asses the damage, leaving us stranded in traffic and we immediately fled to another tuk tuk. Needless to say, this is a stark reminder to NOT TEXT AND DRIVE for all you  cellphoneholics.

We hope that our next blog will feature elephants as we will be writing to you from Phu Khao Khuay National Protected Area.

Anyone willing to buy us property in Vang Vieng?

Getting dropped off at 12:30am on the side of a dark road with a Dutch girl we met at the Plain of Jars, we headed to the first guesthouse in sight. It ended up being our worst lodging thus far and double the price we expected to pay, but it was clean and safe. After sleeping in we immediately packed our bags and headed about four blocks away to a riverside bungalow. Who did we run into? Our Italian friends, just as they were leaving!

Vang Vieng is a small town alongside the Mekong River with surrounding views of ominous mountains jutting out from the valley below. For those of you in Mexico, think of a beautiful muggier Tepoztlan on a river.

The town is definitely driven by tourism, yet quickly became one of our favorite destinations. Vang Vieng embodies the epitomy of laid-back Lao culture, causing even the most high-strung westerner to take a chill pill (figuratively) and relax in surrounding hammocks. Strolling through the town it was impossible not to hear reruns of Friends and Family Guy episodes blaring from open air lounge bars filled with captivated tourists. Yes, they came to Laos to watch Friends and Family Guy. Wandering past the the many sandwich, smoothie and pancake street vendors, we could help but notice that "happy" proceeded menu items such as pancakes and pizza.

Waiting for continuous downpours to subside, we passed the afternoon in a French bakery, eating chocolate croissants and writing postcards... to you! Giving up on being dry we rented innertubes and headed to the Mekong with a tuk tuk (pickup truck taxi) full of people.

The tubing scene consisted of several informal open air bars strewn along either side of the river. The bars offered plenty of free drinks, rope swings and colossal slides. Upon renting tubes we were branded with a large number Sharpied to our forearms and by the end of the day, bracelets and a painting pinky nail. After a mojito bucket and a few new friends we floated 30 minutes down 6km of the Mekong river. We were shocked at the lack of infrastructure and safety measures for this activity. Basically, the tube companies in town rent the tubes and wish you luck to return alive while the bars are there to guide you down river. There is no sign telling you where to get out and if you do get in out in time, you're lucky to flag down a tuk tuk home. We loved it so much we hit up round two the next day.

On day one of tubing we left our clothes at the first bar in the custody of an English employee. That night in town after a delicious Aussie burger, we ran into our English friend who admitted he'd been wearing Gabi's shorts all day after his own ripped on the job. This is the second time on this trip that Gabi catches strangers wearing her clothes. This time to culprit was twice her size so his choice left us more astounded than upset. In good spirit and skeptical of his cleanliness Gabi traded him the shorts for a drink and went out to buy a new pair.

Before our first bout of tubing, we popped into the Aussie Bar for a quick cocktail. The owner, an Aussie expat of 65 years old, offered us free Lao whiskey if we promised to return for a delicious meal post tubing. We did return for the famed Aussie burgers and were infatuated, returning the next day for round two. Aside from having homemade fries and bbq sauce on hand, the burgers were perfectly crispy on the outside and medium rare on the inside. We were floored and concur that they're the best burgers we've ever had.

Itching to explore the caves in the surrounding mountains, we rented cruiser bikes and peddled down muddy bumpy roads, typical Lao style, to Tham Phu Kham cave at the Blue Lagoon. Navigating through road blocks of enormous pot holes, cows and children playing in the turquoise stream, we arrived cheerfully at our 6km away destnation one hour later covered in mud and soaked from the rain. Almost the only tourists in sight, we scrambled up a steep 200m rock staircase to the cave.  we were rewarded by a reclining golden Buddha, visible only by natural light. After descending we jumped into our own private jade clear lagoon with rope swings, so clear we could see fish swimming beneath.

Preparing to leave, Lisa took advantage of a local barber who nearly gave her a mullet. She actually had to yell "stop, bad" after a chunk of her right side had been clipped. While we tried to extend our tickets to soak up another day of Vang Vieng, we were denied and headed out on the previously booked 1:30 bus to Vientiane, the capitol of Laos.