So Louang Phrobang has been a wonderful experience. I got to eat some good breakfasts and some okay Lao food. I found a number of nice people to hang out with, I kayaked, biked, went to a waterfall, saw a boat race, took a weaving class, bowled twice, went to a disco twice and almost finished my fourth book of the trip. It is a city filled with wats (temples). I saw a lot and sat in a few. There are monks walking around everywhere, but I never managed to get up in time to see the monks out with their bowls taking alms at 6am. I don't know why, just never thought about it before I went to sleep so I didn't set my alarm. The temples are beautiful, ornately decorated, and clearly had so much thought and effort put into every detail.
It has mostly been a low key time in Louang Phrobang, but here's a few stories about what happened.
Kayaking:
I signed up to go kayaking with a tour company. It was theoretically white water rafting with level "2 or 3" rapids, but great for beginners, so I figured they couldn't be too big. I get there at 8:30, there's about 10 of us all together. we pile into a hot mini-bus and we're off. Except we stop to get the guy with the boats. Then we stop while the driver gets his breakfast of pork on a stick. In the midst of that, we lost the boat guy and had to look for him. Then we drive about 1 1/2 hours to the put. Get a mini-lesson, I find a partner for my double kayak, a german guy named Marcel, and off we go. We kayak for a bit and realize that sometimes we've been steering around the "rapids"-more like small areas where the water is moving a bit faster. Realize we have to start hitting them head on. We stop for lunch and some local kids come down to eat our left over food. I guess that was our village visit that was part of the tour.
Then, after lunch, they tell us we'll kayak for another hour or so, but actually the stop is in twenty minutes. ah well, it was fun while it lasted. Then we went to a boat race that is a yearly festival. Different villages race against each other in long canoes wearing different colored shirts. It was insanely hot and the festival was loud and crazy, but we got to see some of the local culture. The festival was complete with second hand clothes for sale, food on a stick, and children shooting bebe guns at helium balloons for the prize of orange juice. I guess they don't make those cheap giant stuffed animals here.
The next day, some of the crew from kayaking decided to go to the waterfall. we negotiated the price in the beginning, 20,000kip per person (around $3) for there and back. I thought that was a bit low since it was kind of a far, but he agreed so, okay, we go. We get there, we have to take this little boat across a river, kind of a long tail canoe with a loud motor. Then we pay to get in the waterfall. It was amazing. REally beautiful, lots of little pools. We swam a bunch and chilled out on the deck that they had built. It was quite a bit more built up than I thought it would be. Slowly, we make our way out, go find our tuk-tuk driver. He's angry. He wants to change the price on us bc we were in there an hour longer than we had said.
I wasn't sure if we were in the right or not, but it seemed pretty shitty to me to change the price after we agreed. I actually think maybe we bargained it too hard. I mean, it is like 4 or 5 hours of their time, we could each pay $4, but whatever, he agreed. and then he says 25,000kip not 20 per person. so we hold our ground. he postures some, walks away. the entire town is kind of looking at us. I guess he badmouthed us. he takes a little monk kid to show that he's pissed and need to pick up some more money. I'm quite certain the monk child did not pay the extra 25000kip. but whatever. we give him the original agreed upon price at the end and there is just stone cold silence. we walk away. ugh. anyway, I didn't want to give him any extra money bc that condones the practice. we had said we'd be out 2-3 hours and we came back after 4. I'm not totally sure how asian time works so I don't know if we really did trangress or not.
Other than that, I saw a traditional dance performance, it was cool, but like everything else in Asia, understated. They don't move that much, mostly just their arms. But cool costumes and stories and stuff. It was incredibly hot in there, so that was unfortunate. Louang Phrobang was cool, but I spent about 5 nights there, which was a lot, but I was pretty busy. I was pretty ready to move on by the end.
Now, I'm in Vang Viang, having taken the tourist mini-bus where they go around picking everyone up, lashing their stuff to the top, but then take you to the mini-bus station, make you get out and switch mini-buses. That whole thing took about an hour, how annying. Here in Vang Viang is where you go tubing and watch friends or family guy on tv while you eat or drink. I'll probably be here a couple days and then on to Vientiane for a day or two, then I'm flying to Hanoi on Thursday afternoon. I do believe today is Labor day, so hopefully everyone is enjoying the long weekend. Its weird, I thought it would feel odd not to go back to work at the end of August, but you know, it doesn't. While traveling can have its ups and downs, I think even the lowest low is better than working.
Alright again, I apologize for no pics, but I'm paying up the wazoo for internet here (okay, its liike $2/hr, but that's a lot!) so I can't wait for them all to upload. However, there are a lot up on my picasa site, if you are interested.
Cheers!
Dina
It has mostly been a low key time in Louang Phrobang, but here's a few stories about what happened.
Kayaking:
I signed up to go kayaking with a tour company. It was theoretically white water rafting with level "2 or 3" rapids, but great for beginners, so I figured they couldn't be too big. I get there at 8:30, there's about 10 of us all together. we pile into a hot mini-bus and we're off. Except we stop to get the guy with the boats. Then we stop while the driver gets his breakfast of pork on a stick. In the midst of that, we lost the boat guy and had to look for him. Then we drive about 1 1/2 hours to the put. Get a mini-lesson, I find a partner for my double kayak, a german guy named Marcel, and off we go. We kayak for a bit and realize that sometimes we've been steering around the "rapids"-more like small areas where the water is moving a bit faster. Realize we have to start hitting them head on. We stop for lunch and some local kids come down to eat our left over food. I guess that was our village visit that was part of the tour.
Then, after lunch, they tell us we'll kayak for another hour or so, but actually the stop is in twenty minutes. ah well, it was fun while it lasted. Then we went to a boat race that is a yearly festival. Different villages race against each other in long canoes wearing different colored shirts. It was insanely hot and the festival was loud and crazy, but we got to see some of the local culture. The festival was complete with second hand clothes for sale, food on a stick, and children shooting bebe guns at helium balloons for the prize of orange juice. I guess they don't make those cheap giant stuffed animals here.
The next day, some of the crew from kayaking decided to go to the waterfall. we negotiated the price in the beginning, 20,000kip per person (around $3) for there and back. I thought that was a bit low since it was kind of a far, but he agreed so, okay, we go. We get there, we have to take this little boat across a river, kind of a long tail canoe with a loud motor. Then we pay to get in the waterfall. It was amazing. REally beautiful, lots of little pools. We swam a bunch and chilled out on the deck that they had built. It was quite a bit more built up than I thought it would be. Slowly, we make our way out, go find our tuk-tuk driver. He's angry. He wants to change the price on us bc we were in there an hour longer than we had said.
I wasn't sure if we were in the right or not, but it seemed pretty shitty to me to change the price after we agreed. I actually think maybe we bargained it too hard. I mean, it is like 4 or 5 hours of their time, we could each pay $4, but whatever, he agreed. and then he says 25,000kip not 20 per person. so we hold our ground. he postures some, walks away. the entire town is kind of looking at us. I guess he badmouthed us. he takes a little monk kid to show that he's pissed and need to pick up some more money. I'm quite certain the monk child did not pay the extra 25000kip. but whatever. we give him the original agreed upon price at the end and there is just stone cold silence. we walk away. ugh. anyway, I didn't want to give him any extra money bc that condones the practice. we had said we'd be out 2-3 hours and we came back after 4. I'm not totally sure how asian time works so I don't know if we really did trangress or not.
Other than that, I saw a traditional dance performance, it was cool, but like everything else in Asia, understated. They don't move that much, mostly just their arms. But cool costumes and stories and stuff. It was incredibly hot in there, so that was unfortunate. Louang Phrobang was cool, but I spent about 5 nights there, which was a lot, but I was pretty busy. I was pretty ready to move on by the end.
Now, I'm in Vang Viang, having taken the tourist mini-bus where they go around picking everyone up, lashing their stuff to the top, but then take you to the mini-bus station, make you get out and switch mini-buses. That whole thing took about an hour, how annying. Here in Vang Viang is where you go tubing and watch friends or family guy on tv while you eat or drink. I'll probably be here a couple days and then on to Vientiane for a day or two, then I'm flying to Hanoi on Thursday afternoon. I do believe today is Labor day, so hopefully everyone is enjoying the long weekend. Its weird, I thought it would feel odd not to go back to work at the end of August, but you know, it doesn't. While traveling can have its ups and downs, I think even the lowest low is better than working.
Alright again, I apologize for no pics, but I'm paying up the wazoo for internet here (okay, its liike $2/hr, but that's a lot!) so I can't wait for them all to upload. However, there are a lot up on my picasa site, if you are interested.
Cheers!
Dina
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