Happy Laos

Sorry it's been a while since my last post. The past 10 days have included a 3-day boat journey, a 28hour bus journey, a mountain minibus journey from hell and a brief encounter with the funny little country that is Laos. So needless to say we are very tired. We've met lots of great new people and already bumped into many of our acquaintances from Thailand, it's nice to see a friendly face.

Laos is 'happy' in various ways, not just because of the range of drugs on offer on pretty much every menu in Vang Vieng (the tubing capital of the world). As soon as we stepped off the slow-boat for our over-night in a tiny village called Pakbeng we knew this country was pretty care-free when about 20 of us got shoved in the back of a pick-up truck standing with our backpacks to be taken up the very steep hill to our guesthouse. We had a lovely evening in the restaurant over the river with our fellow sailors and the cutest little girl who liked to high-five alot! That's another thing that makes Laos such an enjoyable place - the children sat at every market stall with their mothers or rushing down to the river edge to greet the boat by hurling themselves headfirst into the water. The happiness continues as you are offered 'happy' tea, meaning free not spiked, and then find homemade cakes on offer including pineapple, banana and coconut. The endless episodes of Friends playing in the Vang Vieng restaurants also made me very happy - a little bit of home comfort to help me recover from tubing, kayaking and caving. Even the language has a joyous ring to it. 'Kawp jalalai' meaning thankyou very much and 'sabaidee' meaning hello were always nice to hear, especially when followed by 'pancake, sandwich?' from street food ladies.

However, not every experience in this country has been so delightful, starting with the horrific journey from Louang Prabang to Vang Vieng. I have never been more scared in my life - the only thing I can equate the experience to would be a 6 hour rollercoaster ride with a very dubious seat which you have to cling on to for dear life. There are no rules on the roads in Laos it seems, only potholes strategically placed next to cliff edges. We thought the journey had atleast introduced us to some funny guys who we attempted to go tubing with the next day. We then made the mistake of going with only one tube between the 5 of us as no one had enough money for one each due to a power cut that rendered all ATMs useless. The day ended in alot of Scottish agression, from some friends from Bangkok, being used to stick up for me and Louise and a battle to retrieve our room key from the guy we had given it to for 'safe-keeping'. I have found out that there is a definite downside to my attraction to bargains, especially when they involve alcohol. The 'happy' (free) Lao whisky may make you happy for afew hours but once you have spent the next 24hours watching and worrying as Louise throws up you begin to think that forking out for a can of coke that night, like you did earlier in the week, would have been well worth the money.

I am now in Hanoi (Vietnam), after the longest bus journey so far on which we were introduced to the Vietnamese customs of clearing your throat and spitting out the contents wherever you wish, driving like absolute lunatics, and generally being annoyed with any Westerner you come across. It's certainly different from laid-back Laos but I'm hoping a trip to Halong Bay might calm things down again.

As I'm hearing that you might be having difficulties viewing my picasa photos so here is a link to my latest facebook album (alhtough I'm very behind)!

http://www.facebook.com/media/albums/?id=698710300#!/media/set/?set=a.10150941688820301.759470.698710300&type=1