Thailand and Laos

Thailand 

For the second time in 2014 I had a flight booked to Thailand. Working permit issues prevented me from departing to Thailand in March, and some political unrest almost deterred me from visiting this elusive country in June. With assurance from a few friends living in Bangkok that everything was safe I boarded the plane and my Thailand adventure was underway!

My trip began with a few days of visiting some friends from teacher’s college, Mike and Caitlyn. Like myself they had just finished their first year of teaching abroad, in the very happening city of Bangkok.  Through them showing me around the city and discussing our schools, lifestyle and experiences, I couldn’t help but compare what living as an expat is like in Thailand compared to Indonesia.

I am very happy with my living situation in Indo but their digs were definitely a little nicer

I have been able to learn the basics in Bahasa Indonesian, at least enough to communicate through most day-to-day situations. The use of the Latin alphabet, and all disregard for tense, plural, or context definitely helps make Indonesian a relatively easy language to pick up. Thai on the other hand looks like this

Now I am no linguistic expert but I believe that is the font that is used in cartoons when they actually have just drawn lines on a page. What I would really like to know though is when do people that are speaking Thai pause to take a breath?

The most noticeable lifestyle difference between Thailand and Indo was that in Thailand the layout of the streets and the public transit system are very straightforward and could be easily learned in a few minutes. In Indonesia it looks like the road systems were designed by a child playing roller coaster typhoon for the first time.

Caitlyn’s dad (Bob) was in the country for a visit so the four of us went out for Thai BBQ.  

Bob jokingly grabbed a particularly tasty looking item for me to try. When I agreed to his challenge he stepped up and joined me and together we stomached through the treat, being sure to avoid the toenails.

Caitlyn and Mike had just returned from a trip to Laos so were quite exhausted from all their trekking. I was just beginning my adventure so while they were resting up I went out and explored the city. Bangkok is quite famous for its weekend market. Getting off the sky train I took a photo of what I thought was the weekend market.

It turns out these were just the stalls selling things outside of the market, and the many (very colourful) taxis waiting for people to leave the market. The market itself is about two city blocks. You can buy everything that you could possible think of, including many things that you probably could not possible have thought of.

Of course you can find delicious food

Healthy, fresh and delicious fruit shakes (I averaged at least 2 of these a day)

There were many massage places. I don't recommend getting the Thai massage. Thai girls have superhuman strength and seem to think pain and tears are a key the Thai massage experience

This is where things started to get very . . . imaginative?

Some shirts that made sense

And shirts that made no sense

I didn't check out this store but I'm curious as to what exactly they were selling

Everyone loves a big container of fried quail eggs! 

Out on my explorations I met a couple friends and explored china town and a river boat tour that would take you to temples and the Royal Palace. I also was reminded that Thailand was currently under martial law and there were soldiers stationed throughout the country. They were very friendly though. It was easy to go several days with forgetting that the country was experiencing a lot of political unrest. The incidences of protest (which sometimes, but rarely, escalated to violence) occurred only in the government area of the city, and had no impact on the safety of the rest of the country.

For my last night with Mike and Caitlyn before they headed off to Borneo and I headed to touristy Bangkok we went to a really cool street that has bars that are actually Volkswagens. They drive up to the curb, open up the back to serve drinks for the night, and the bar drives home at the end of the night.

They reminded me of the mystery machine from Scooby Doo

I even got a chance to try my luck as a Volkswagen bartender!

Khao San Road

Leonardo Dicaprio in The Beach famously described Khao San Road as the budget backpacker's heaven. Khao San Road might be the most one of a kind place I have ever been to. The street is about 300 meters long, never sleeps and is a chameleon. Depending on the time of day it transforms as to be almost unrecognizable from mere hours earlier. During the daytime it is packed with stalls selling souvenirs, fruit shakes, thai food and clothing. There are custom tailors, fortunetellers, masseuses and tuk tuks (3 wheeled taxis) frantically recruiting customers. By dinnertime many of the clothing shops have disappeared and the street is overflowing with food stalls. After dinner most of those are gone and all of the bars set up their patios to accommodate to the nighttime crowd. As the night dies down there are many pat Thai stalls offering a late night snack for cheap, and the masseuses are back out selling a different type of massage. At the end of my trip in Bangkok a couple friends and I stayed at a hotel on Khao San Road. The receptionist said “I have to warn you, it gets quite loud at night time.” We said that would be fine. At 2, 3, 4 and 5am, as we lay awake we laughed at our misinterpretation of just how loud the competing music of the bars below could be. We found a different place to stay the following night.

Khao San Road

This was the first trip of mine that I have travelled alone. The first night I made a couple friends from England, America and Myanmar and had a fun evening with them. The next day they all flew home. That day I made some new friends from Australia and New Zealand at lunch time, spent the day hanging out in the rooftop pool at their hotel, had a fun night with them, but then the following day they flew home. I was starting to run out of energy to constantly be meeting new people but fortunately the third day I met a group of 7 travellers who were just beginning their trips. Most of them were also solo travellers or travelling with one other friend so we were all in the same boat of looking for some adventurous people to travel with. After one night in Bangkok with them we headed North to Chiang Mai.

Travel companions! 

Left to right: Laura, Victoria, Devon, Chris, Lizzy, Dom, Izzy. (I took the photo)

Chiang Mai

After the big city of Bangkok it was refreshing to be somewhere smaller. Although Chiang Mai itself is quite busy and full of people, just short motorcycle ride away is beautiful, lush scenery with many exciting things for tourists to do.

First I went to a place called Tiger Kingdom. I met a French couple that was travelling through Asia after almost a year working and travelling in Australia. At Tiger Kingdom you could pay to pet and take pictures with one of 4 sizes of tigers. The options were babies, slightly larger tigers, medium sized tigers, or the biggest tigers.  The French girl chose to see the baby tigers (a respectable choice), but the French guy and myself obviously opted for the biggest tigers. Now, what I would like to know is why would a person choose one of the middle-sized tigers?

You could climb in this ball and hamster yourself around the water. Given how hot the inside of that ball would be on a sunny day I opted to just stick with visiting the tigers

Everyone's favourite tiger!

Modelling is tiring work!

My French friend Guillaume 

The next day I took the scooter ride out to the area with all the tourist activities and this time started my day with a visit to an orchid. I was confusing the word orchid with the word orchard and so was expecting to go apple picking. Imagine my surprise when I instead ended up in a garden of beautiful flowers.

This is the world's smallest orchid

This is the world's largest orchid

If you look closely you might see a person camouflaged by this orchid

After the orchid I visited a waterfall that a friend staying at the same hostel had recommended. The waterfall itself was a little underwhelming but the swim in the dirty water wasn’t too bad.

Smelling like dirty waterfall water I made it to my final stop of the day – the insect museum! The biologist in me found this place to be fascinating. The self-guided tour was very educational. I read about how different insects hear, taste, smell, see, touch and even how some are able to detect electrical impulses. The life cycles and adaptations of some insects are absolutely fascinating. The tour of the insect museum was taken to the next level when I asked one of the employees a question about an insect. She then guided me to every category of insect and insisted that I hold each and every one of them.

This alien is pretending to be a stick bug from Australia, but I know its really from outer space

I had no idea there was an insect called an Ant-lion! They climb into ant hills and then eat ants as the ants are returning to their homes

This guy is called a firefly. If you pet his back his tail (you can see the yellow spot) will produce light and then you can close your hands around him and look in your hands and see him glow in the dark. 

Oh yeah, did I mention I ate one of these on Khoa San Road? 

Despite all of the cool activities I just listed, my favourite part of Chaing Mai was the overnight trek.

Our group of 8 woke up painfully early, at 9, and boarded the taxi to the point where we would begin our trek.

At first I wouldn’t necessarily use the term jungle trek, as much as I might call it a walk uphill. I’ve decided that a paved or neatly cleared path does not qualify as a jungle trek.

After some time the paved road turned into a dirt path, and the city we had spent the past few nights in turned into beautiful jungle. With the humidity, sun and strenuous activity I think my body grew new sweat pores. It couldn’t have been better timed when we got to the first waterfall for some rest and a swim.

This waterfall had a natural water slide! The locals would go down the slide standing up! (Don't worry mom I didn't)

Me and Lizzy

Me and Bobo! (our guide)

Getting closer to the top

Finally made it! Could not be sweatier

After about four hours we reached the top of the mountain? huge hill? and were quite pleasantly surprised by our accommodation for the night.

Our bedroom

Our living room

Rainbow

Two rainbows

Three rain'bro's

Beautiful Chiang Mai sunset

We were allowed to explore the local village and ran into a few villagers but there was no experience of seeing how these people that are living high up in the mountain actually live their life. I am always interested in seeing the ways different people live so I was a little disappointed that there wasn’t much interaction with the people whose village we stayed in for a night.

This is what the flower of the banana plant looks like. The bananas, that you eat, are actually the ovaries of the plant. A fact I enjoy teaching my biology students each year. Most of them can never look at fruit the same way again

No jungle trek would be complete without a campfire. And no campfire would be complete without some guitar. Bobo, in his laid-back style (I think his heart rate was about 40 bpm) sang songs so slowly that is was very difficult to match his pace with our singing. His specialty was singing sad Thai songs about love and heartbreak 

The next day we found a second waterfall, went white water rafting, bamboo rafting (rafts made of bamboo that use to be used to travel down rivers), and elephant riding. Personally I think I would have preferred going to an elephant orphanage or elephant retirement home (they have many in Chiang Mai and Lao) and just washed, fed and played with the elephants there. The riding of the elephants (especially with the use of the metal seats) seemed a little too unnatural and these beautiful creatures should be appreciated for their natural behaviour, not as ponies.

Our elephant's name was Chandi!

Thanks for the trek Bobo!

Pai

About 4 hours north of Chiang Mai, down a windy, swerving, motion-sickening road is a small little town called Pai. For being so small the landscape is paradise. With a scooter rental and some lucky guesses with the directions you can get to waterfalls, high cliffs with view points, a canyon, a cave, a land split and many rice fields. Additionally Pai had some of the best food I had in Thailand. There would be food carts that specialize in and only sell one item. The lady selling pancakes was next to the lady that only sells baked potatoes, who was next to the lady who only sells burritos. The burrito lady also taught hula-hoop lessons. The burrito/hula-hoop lesson joint business plan is the biggest thing since Wendy’s and Tim Horton’s agreed to build together at all future locations.

The best food item I had in Pai though was a hamburger from a place called Queen Burger. It was so good that Dom and I both immediately ordered a second one. The next day at lunch we returned for another burger each, and again both ordered a second one after that. The only burger I’ve ever had that tasted better was the 5-napkin burger in New York. But it cost more than the 4 burgers I had in Pai combined. I am sure my housemates from Uni are drooling right now remembering the 5-napkin burger.

The man we rented the scooters from asked if we had ridden them before. I was the only one who had. He then left it up to me to teach them. Full credit for all students (with only one minor tumble) and extra marks for Dom's need for speed and Victoria's enthusiasm. 

Our accommodations came highly recommended. Spicy Pai looked like a jungle gym of bunk beds! But provided a great atmosphere for backpackers to meet lots of new friends. 

Some comfy chairs to enjoy the view of Pai in

One of several places high up in the hills with beautiful viewpoints

Laos

Grammar lesson – Country = Laos (officially it is called Lao People's Democratic republic (Lao PDR), although no one calls it that). Nationality = Lao. A person born in the country of Laos is a Lao Person. Coffee from Laos is Lao coffee. Whether or not you pronounce the "s" or leave it silent can vary depending on the country you are from. However people from Laos do not pronounce the "s". The "s" at the end actually comes from the French. In 1893 France united the three different Kingdoms of people who called themselves Lao People, and added an "s" to make it plural. France, and many Europeans and Westerners will pronounce the "s", but locals and Asians in general do not. 

History lesson – Laos is the most bombed country per capita in history. During the war in Vietnam many soldiers took refuge in the dense jungle of Laos. There were over 580 000 bombing missions on Laos from 1964-1973. This number is equivalent to one bombing mission every 8 minutes, 24 hours a day, for 9 years. 

Lifestyle – Laos is the most laidback country I’ve ever been to. I mentioned the official name of the country is Lao PDR, which essentially serves as the country’s motto – Lao - please don’t rush. The speed limit in Laos is 30 km/h. Yes I wrote that correctly. Not miles/hour, but 30 km/h. Not just in school zones, but on every road.

The second mind-blowing part is that everyone in Laos actually follows the speed limit. This is not because of traffic as the roads in Laos are quite empty. Until recently the only person I’ve ever known who actually drives the number on the speed limit sign is my dad (much to the impatience of my sister’s and I growing up (sorry dad)). But now I know one person and one whole country that stick to the speed limit.

Completely contrary to Indonesia, crossing the street in Laos was extremely easy. Basically you always have time to cross before the slowly approaching car reaches you. And I feel that if a Lao driver did hit me I would escape with nothing more than a few scrapes and bruises thanks to the low driving speed.   

All of this slow driving helped to set the tone for a very “never in a rush” mentality. All of the drivers on scooters would drive with one hand while holding an umbrella with the other hand, or if they forgot their umbrella then they would use their hand to shade their face from the sun.  I loved the slow pace, but I just couldn’t fathom that everyone actually drove 30km/h.

Nature – Laos is easily the most lush and green country I have been to so far. It is also one of the homes to my favourite river in the world, the Mekong. I know, who has a favourite river? If I had been travelling for longer I would have happily taken a daylong slow boat down the Mekong River from Thailand to Laos and enjoyed the beautiful jungle, forest, mountains and nature of the country. But instead I opted to fly from Chiang Mai to Laos, which boasted its own gorgeous views of Laos.

The huge air plane we took

The very modest Luang Prabang International Airport

Luang Prabang

Devon, Victoria and I rented scooters during the day and went to a public swimming pool, complete with restaurant, bar and volleyball net. The moment we arrived and parked our scooters my bike key snapped in half and half of it remained stuck in the ignition. I just forget how strong I am sometimes (this is the second time this has happened to me). Or more accurately, how flimsy rental scooter keys are. Fortunately Luang Prabang is quite small and the lady who owned the swimming pool knew and had the number of the guy we had rented the scooters from. So we enjoyed the pool while we waited for a spare key to be delivered.

The owner was from Canada, having grown up in British Colombia but spending most of her teen years living abroad with her family. I was very curious to hear more about how she ended up running a swimming pool in Laos, and what it was like running a business in such a laidback country. She said the biggest challenge was finding employees. About half her staff would be made up of travelers who are working for room and board, but these would rarely stay longer than a few months. The rest of her staff were Lao. I think what we talked about next will stick with me forever.

She said that Lao people will often not show up for work because it is there great uncle’s birthday. Or their niece is feeling sick so they are going to go cook for her. Or a relative from out of town is visiting. If they call at all they aren’t calling to request the time off, rather they are informing you that they are taking the time off.

My first instinct was to sympathize and so I said wow that must be vey frustrating trying to run a business if you can’t predict when your employees might not show up. She said the thing she loves about Lao culture compared to what she got away from in Canada was that here family is always first. It is such a beautiful thing that Lao people will never put their work, or anything else above their family. She said it can be frustrating when someone doesn’t show up for work but think of the alternative. Do I want them to be like us? Do I want them to choose work over family? That was the type of wrong priorities that I chose to leave Western culture and move to Asia for. Those inconveniences for my business are helping to contribute to the Lao culture that I love and knowing that helps keep me from getting frustrated by it.

This is something I have felt throughout my time in Indonesia. But I had never been able to sum it up the way she did. I often find myself in situations where I could become frustrated by the lack of efficiency, the lack of consistency or the lack of logic in so many things in Indonesia.  I have always been able to take a deep breath and remind myself I can’t pick and choose. I love the Indonesian and Asian culture, and all of these inefficiencies and inconsistencies help to contribute to the laidback culture that I enjoy being a part of. I can’t have the laidback vibe that I enjoy, and have the hyper efficient ways of western culture. And I will choose laidback over fast paced every single time. That type of thinking has saved me a lot of frustration over the past year.

After the swim and life chat we raced off to the waterfall that was just outside of town. No we didn’t race. We drove 30 km/h.

Before entering the waterfall area we took a walk around the bear sanctuary.

I am from Canada. This isn't a bear. This is a dog

The nightlife in Luang Prabang is nothing compared to say Khoa San Road, but in its own way it was like no other nightlife I’ve ever experienced. The night begins at basically the only bar in town, called Utopia. This bar/lounge is designed to maximize relaxation. With more mattresses than chairs, more candles than lights, a volleyball court and beautiful views overlooking the river, jungle, and mountains Utopia was a perfect place to relax, watch the sunset and meet fellow travellers. When Utopia closes around 11:30 or midnight everyone goes bowling. I’m talking tenth birthday style bowling. They even serve popcorn. Two hundred travellers in a bowling alley from midnight into the early hours of the morning was quite the unique, and unexpected experience.

We had met up with Izzy and Lizzy again in Laos so the 5 of us played a game. After the game a man from Laos approached us and said “On your team you have 5 people but on my team it is just me. Can I be on your team?”. When our hearts finished melting the 6 of us played another game. When he bowled a strike we all high fived him, and not a turn went past the rest of the game where he didn’t high five the bowler after their shot.

The next morning I left on another long, windy, swerving, motion-sickening road to Vang Veing. The 30km/h ride took 7 hours but the view was beautiful and our minivan had travellers from all over so there were tons of interesting experiences to hear about and conversations to be had.

On arrival I met up with two friends I had met briefly in Chiang Mai and finished out my trip travelling with them.  Giaokie (pronunciation explained with hand gestures like saying goodbye in Italian Ciao (wave) and key (turn key)) was born in Vietnam but lives in the Netherlands now. Anahita (or just Anna) was born in Iran but lives in the Netherlands as well. We stayed at this awesome guesthouse called Phongsavanh with very comfortable air-conditioned rooms and a beautiful garden covering the whole property.

Althought Vang Vieng offers kayaking, mountain biking, rock climbing, trekking and many other outdoor activities it is most famous for two things. First, there are about 5 restaurants in town that are constantly playing episodes of Friends on loop. I am not sure why this is so but it is quite nice to watch an episode or two of Friends while grabbing a bite to eat.

Final goodbye to Lizzy and Izzy. You can see Phoebe of Friends on the tv screen in the background

Secondly Vang Vieng has a famous river tubing pub-crawl. Essentially there is a several km stretch of river, and different bars along the way that you can stop in at. When you do approach the bar there are people there who will fish you out of the water, throwing you a rope and pulling you in.

It was so fun that I did this activity twice. Once with Giaokie and Anna and a big group of Dutch people that we met in the tuk tuk there, and the second day with a group of French Canadians (fortunately they were of the cool variety and didn’t exclude me from conversations by speaking French all the time).  I don’t have any pictures of this as most people chose not to bring phones or cameras.

Tubing is exhausting so it is impossible to go two days in a row. On the day between tubing Anna, Giaokie and I rented scooters and headed to a place called Blue Lagoon where you can swim and explore a cave.

The hike up to the cave was steep and treacherous. And then it got worse for the way down as it rained when we were in the cave making the path very slippery. As we were moving step-by-step using both of our hands to hold onto rocks, tree branches or anything else that we thought could help prevent us from falling, the locals were walking up and down without breaking stride. The cave itself was completely unsupervised and having only cell phones for flashlights we ventured as far in as we dared before we decided that getting lost or injured in a cave was not on our day’s to-do list and headed back.

I didn't get any clear photos of the cave as it was so dark but the view from just outside was very nice

Afterwards we met a nice Lao family that ran a restaurant there.

That night the Dutch played Mexico in the round of 16 in what would turn out to be a thrilling comeback victory for the Netherlands. We dawned our Orange and met up with our recently acquired Dutch friends to enjoy the game!

Giaokie and I (in the mirror) getting our orange ready for the Dutch game!

One unexpected bonus of travelling during world cup time was that I was able to watch so many world cup games with fans native to so many different countries. I watched England play Uruguay in Chiang Mai at a British pub. As the game was from 2-4am I was one of the only non-Brits. I got to watch Germany games, USA games, and France games with a bunch of Germans, Yanks and French people. But given that I am half Dutch, the Netherlands success this world cup, and the ability to spot one of the many Dutch fans simply by their orange clothing, it was a thrilling year to be supporting the Netherlands, and I was happy to do so cheering for them from Thailand, Laos and Indonesia. “World” cup took on a different meaning for me this year.

I absolutely loved both Thailand and Laos. What's next? I fly to Cambodia and Vietnam on July 26th!