Robert Durrette

It's pronounced "Wing chien," and it's the capital of Laos. A world away from the rest of the country, I'm still in a very laid-back city. About 20 kilometeres outside of town, lines, signs, and curbs begin to appear on the roads. Everyone screams in excitement. Lined roads? No way. The city itself doesn't do too badly; it has a lot of modern amenities (although no McDonalds, yet!).

Over the past week or so, we have traveled as follows: Border crossing from Thailand by boat, followed by a 2-day trip downriver stopping overnight in a place that isn't even on the map named Pak Beng. Nice place, no electricity except for 3 hours in the evening and a few in the morning. Then, we arrived in Luang Prabang, my favorite city for quite awhile that we've had the pleasure of visiting. The entire city is actually a UN World Heritage Site, and as such all the buildings are in near-perfect condition, with many more restored to former French/traditional architecture. We spent our time sightseeing, shopping at the local market, visiting a spectacular waterfall/natural pools area, and even found time to go to a nightclub as well as go bowling! Yes, I have gone bowling in Laos. Or, as it's called here, "Bao Ling." It's a very different experience...no shoes!

We then took a 7-hour drive through some of the most remote countryside I have ever encountered. For another superlative, I have never been on a more windy road (except perhaps on the way to Darjeeling from New Jalpaiguri or from Gibraltar to Ronda, Spain). But, the views were absolutely breathtaking. One picture, that I have attached, looks like another world. Those old animated movies "The Land Before Time" come to mind. Take a look at the attached picture.

After aforementioned drive, we arrived in the "backpacker mecca" known as Vang Vieng. In that town, there is not a lot to do except simply enjoy yourself. In other words, it's tourist-oriented. The town was put on the map, as I am told, because of tubing. Yes, river tubing. The karst landscape there (see another picture above) is absolutely breathtaking, and the river is very tube-friendly (not many rocks, quick current, narrow. So, of course, we had to give it a shot. I don't recall having that much fun in a very long time: there is an entire...culture...of bars that have cropped up along the river. So, every 100 meters or so, there is a huge bar parked up on the bluff of this river. Laotians wait on the side and throw you a rope, and you just get pulled right on in (if you want). Cheap Beer Lao (more about that in a minute) is yours--in addition to huge zip lines, rope swings, and slides into the water. It was so much fun. Really.

Beer Lao is the national beer of Laos. In fact, it's the only real beer you can find in Laos, save maybe a Carlsberg from time to time. To say it's popular is a major understatement: Beer Lao is everywhere. In fact, I'm convinced that it's actually controlling the government. You can't look down a street in even the smallest of towns without finding some sort of Beer Lao sign, posted, flag, etc. This stuff is everywhere. What's hilarious is that they don't have the time or money for packaging, so they simply ship the stuff around the country in big plastic crates. So, you walk into a restaurant and the wall is simply lined with crates of Beer Lao. Unbelievable. It's name in Laotian is "The Full Taste of Happiness." Beer Lao light? "Lighter, but full of emotions!" Cracks me up.

In Luang Prabang (not in sequence here), Graham and I met up with several Laotians our age and played some soccer. However, the field conditions were terrible...the grass was up to our knees, and there was mud everywhere. So, on our next to last day there, we rented a weed-eater (which was an adventure in and of itself) and cut the grass so that in the evening we'd have a good playing field for everyone. Needless to say, the Laotians could not stop saying "Kap Chai Lai Lai!!!" (Thank you very much!!!) enough. They of course proceeded to beat us badly, but we had a great time.

In Vang Vieng, I was in search of some Lao culture, so one of the trip leaders (who is a very, very goofy Cambodian of about 26 years) and I asked the girl at the front desk of our hotel, 23, to take us around and show us the "behind-the-scenes" Vang Vieng. She agreed, but her parents wouldn't let her take us around! Laotians girls cannot simply go "hang out" with boys, even if they are 23. It was quite odd that she wasn't already married; her family seemed to very conservative (you wouldn't know it from how unbelieveable nice/hospitable they were). So, she invited us to come over and have dinner with her family and hang out with her and her brother. It was very, very cool having an authentic dinner inside of a Laotian home. We brough several groceries to offer to her family as a gift for having us in their home, and everyone talked for a few hours about college in Laos, pay, girlfriends, boyfriends, and family (Laotians do not understand the concepts of being nosy/privacy, which is actually just fine when you want to learn a lot about the customs of other people). I'd write more, but it would take too long.

Today, we made a 3-hour trip by bus from Vang Vieng to the capital, Vientiane, and let me tell you: it may be a capital city, but 2 miles from our hotel, goats were lounging in the streets. Laos is good for the soul.

The government is very strict, but I don't see much enforcement. There's a lot of propoganda, but, like everywhere else in Asia that is rapidly modernizing, no one cares. To get a fill of communist kitsch, though, I visited the Military museum. Check out the picture of me with a Laotian tank. Should I ever run for public office one day, remember, I was a tourist and I was young! Speaking of offices, I visited a U.S. embassy today for the first time. With all of the visas and stamps that I've gotten (sidenote: I had to get a new Vietnamese visa because the dates on mine were off by two days!), I was fast running out of pages. FOR FREE, the helpful people at the U.S. embassy in Vientiane inserted a block of new visa/stamp pages for me, in less than 20 minutes. Go USA!

Hope everything is going well back in the U.S., and if you're reading this from somewhere else (like all of the very cool people I have encountered along the way), safe travels.

Tomorrow we fly to Hanoi, Vietnam. I'll update this again at some point in Vietnam. Best,

--RWD