Friday, December 26, 2008
The lost boys
We left Luang Prabang via slow boat to the Laos-Thailand border on December 19. Our journey along the Mekong River spanned two days, with an overnight stop at the tiny, generator-powered town of Pak Beng.
Arriving finally at the Lao border town of Huay Xai past sunset, we spent our last night in Laos at a very good, and surprisingly well-priced, restaurant -- after I’d had my requisite hot shower, of course.
Early the next morning, we were ferried across the Mekong River towards Chiang Khong in Thailand. As we approached the immigration post, Jim and I caught sight of two Argentinean girls, each struggling to drag a backpack, suitcase, and duffel bag up the muddy slope. I photographed the scene to document the classic example of over-packing, but soon paid my karmic dues as my camera went missing that very afternoon in Chiang Mai.
We reached Chiang Mai after a painful five hours on an overcrowded minibus, passing an incredible number of flags, images of the King, and other such patriotic displays along the way. Once in Chiang Mai, we farewelled British backpacker Nash, who we’d met on our first day on the boat and had become a reliable card-playing sixth throughout the journey.
Nestled in the mountains of Northern Thailand, the city of Chiang Mai is home to about 1 million people. Once the capital of the 13th century Lanna kingdom, modern Chiang Mai is built around a moat and defensive wall, within which are remnants of a dilapidated old city.
While it lacks the high-rise cityscape that characterises a metropolis, Chiang Mai is a decently sized, well-developed city, complete with operational traffic rules, international restaurants and franchises, and true high-speed Internet. With life in Chiang Mai costing a fraction of what it would in comparable Western cities, I could see how it had become a modern-day Isle of Circe in Mik’s and Eli’s Odysseys.
We saw Mik for the first time in several months by Chiang Mai’s busy Sunday Market. Arriving on his ‘baby’ scooter, he packed us onto a songthaew (a taxi of sorts) and checked Max, Jim and I into the very nice Baan Chinnakarn guesthouse.
THB 250 (AUD$11) per night bought us a large double room at the guesthouse that featured a hot shower, TV, bar fridge, fan, outdoor washing area, dressing table and wardrobe. An additional THB 50 would buy us wired Internet access; however Jim and I chose to dine at the neighbouring Mexican restaurant and access its wireless network from our room instead.
It is wintertime in Chiang Mai, but we wouldn’t have known it had we not seen Eli wearing a ski jacket and two pairs of trackpants to dinner on Sunday night. I, in a knee-length skirt and loose-fitting shirt, had barely thought to bring a jacket that night, and afternoons are so warm for Jim and I that we have often sought sanctuary in air-conditioned cafes.
During the lead up to Christmas, we spent our days ten-pin bowling, bar-hopping in the Old Market, playing pool and marvelling at the numerous bar girl-Farang (white-skinned foreigner) pairings at a bar called Number One, and getting our boogie on at Spicy’s, a dodgy nightclub said to be one of the few open past 2am.
On Christmas Eve, Mik, Eli, their group of young expatriate friends and Thai girlfriends introduced us to the wonders of Mookata. Held in a warehouse bustling with no less than 300 patrons, Mookata is an all-you-can-eat hot pot-cum-barbeque. Each group of two to four diners gather around a coal-heated, steel pot in and on which food is cooked, while meat, seafood, vegetables, noodles, sauces, pre-cooked entrees and desserts are displayed buffet-style on rows and rows of tables.
We met up with the same group of people for Christmas lunch, which was on a floating restaurant in the nearby national park. After lunch, Mik led Joel, Viren, Max, Jim, myself, and his girlfriend Zuki on a fireworks-shopping expedition and three-hour-long pyromania session by the Military Hotel to herald in Boxing Day.
Joel, Viren, Max, Jim and I were spending a lot of time together, and differences in personalities and lifestyles were putting a strain on the group dynamic. On Christmas night, after a particularly polarising evening and a little too much drunken ‘banter’ from the boys, I decided that I needed a little more time alone.
Meanwhile, in a hotel room not too far away, Max had made a similar decision. And so the group split into three the very next day, with Max heading to Koh Samui with two other Australian friends he had bumped into in Chiang Mai, Mik leading Joel and Viren southwards to Bangkok, and Jim and I heading straight to our New Years destination, Lonely Beach on Koh Chang.
Arriving finally at the Lao border town of Huay Xai past sunset, we spent our last night in Laos at a very good, and surprisingly well-priced, restaurant -- after I’d had my requisite hot shower, of course.
Early the next morning, we were ferried across the Mekong River towards Chiang Khong in Thailand. As we approached the immigration post, Jim and I caught sight of two Argentinean girls, each struggling to drag a backpack, suitcase, and duffel bag up the muddy slope. I photographed the scene to document the classic example of over-packing, but soon paid my karmic dues as my camera went missing that very afternoon in Chiang Mai.
We reached Chiang Mai after a painful five hours on an overcrowded minibus, passing an incredible number of flags, images of the King, and other such patriotic displays along the way. Once in Chiang Mai, we farewelled British backpacker Nash, who we’d met on our first day on the boat and had become a reliable card-playing sixth throughout the journey.
Nestled in the mountains of Northern Thailand, the city of Chiang Mai is home to about 1 million people. Once the capital of the 13th century Lanna kingdom, modern Chiang Mai is built around a moat and defensive wall, within which are remnants of a dilapidated old city.
While it lacks the high-rise cityscape that characterises a metropolis, Chiang Mai is a decently sized, well-developed city, complete with operational traffic rules, international restaurants and franchises, and true high-speed Internet. With life in Chiang Mai costing a fraction of what it would in comparable Western cities, I could see how it had become a modern-day Isle of Circe in Mik’s and Eli’s Odysseys.
We saw Mik for the first time in several months by Chiang Mai’s busy Sunday Market. Arriving on his ‘baby’ scooter, he packed us onto a songthaew (a taxi of sorts) and checked Max, Jim and I into the very nice Baan Chinnakarn guesthouse.
THB 250 (AUD$11) per night bought us a large double room at the guesthouse that featured a hot shower, TV, bar fridge, fan, outdoor washing area, dressing table and wardrobe. An additional THB 50 would buy us wired Internet access; however Jim and I chose to dine at the neighbouring Mexican restaurant and access its wireless network from our room instead.
It is wintertime in Chiang Mai, but we wouldn’t have known it had we not seen Eli wearing a ski jacket and two pairs of trackpants to dinner on Sunday night. I, in a knee-length skirt and loose-fitting shirt, had barely thought to bring a jacket that night, and afternoons are so warm for Jim and I that we have often sought sanctuary in air-conditioned cafes.
During the lead up to Christmas, we spent our days ten-pin bowling, bar-hopping in the Old Market, playing pool and marvelling at the numerous bar girl-Farang (white-skinned foreigner) pairings at a bar called Number One, and getting our boogie on at Spicy’s, a dodgy nightclub said to be one of the few open past 2am.
On Christmas Eve, Mik, Eli, their group of young expatriate friends and Thai girlfriends introduced us to the wonders of Mookata. Held in a warehouse bustling with no less than 300 patrons, Mookata is an all-you-can-eat hot pot-cum-barbeque. Each group of two to four diners gather around a coal-heated, steel pot in and on which food is cooked, while meat, seafood, vegetables, noodles, sauces, pre-cooked entrees and desserts are displayed buffet-style on rows and rows of tables.
We met up with the same group of people for Christmas lunch, which was on a floating restaurant in the nearby national park. After lunch, Mik led Joel, Viren, Max, Jim, myself, and his girlfriend Zuki on a fireworks-shopping expedition and three-hour-long pyromania session by the Military Hotel to herald in Boxing Day.
Joel, Viren, Max, Jim and I were spending a lot of time together, and differences in personalities and lifestyles were putting a strain on the group dynamic. On Christmas night, after a particularly polarising evening and a little too much drunken ‘banter’ from the boys, I decided that I needed a little more time alone.
Meanwhile, in a hotel room not too far away, Max had made a similar decision. And so the group split into three the very next day, with Max heading to Koh Samui with two other Australian friends he had bumped into in Chiang Mai, Mik leading Joel and Viren southwards to Bangkok, and Jim and I heading straight to our New Years destination, Lonely Beach on Koh Chang.
Monday, December 8, 2008
Buy the ticket, take the ride
Some of my most memorable moments while on the road have been accidental. A week-long cargo boat ride from Brazil to Colombia because any other means of transport would have been too expensive. A frenzied exit from a near-rioting crowd at the Champs D'Elysses on New Years Eve. Driving through a pedestrian-only street market in the wee hours of the morning in La Paz, because the locals we were with didn’t know how else to get us back to our hotel.
These are moments when each decision goes beyond the everyday what to eat and where to drink, and each choice could either help or hinder the cause, with no in-betweens. Moments when senses feel just that little bit more attuned to risks, adventure and a bargain.
Crossing the Vietnam-Laos border was another one of those precious moments for me.
Max, Jim and I had decided to cross overland on a whim while in Hoi An, and had little planned besides our destination, Vientiane. Driven by a desire to leave the fast-paced, overly aggressive Vietnam as quickly as possible, we set our sights on the closest convenient border town, Lao Bao.
Said to be the most popular overland crossing between Vietnam and Laos, Lao Bao is located in Vietnam’s Quang Tri Province, some 150 kilometres North-West of Hue and 300 kilometres from Hoi An. Arriving at Lao Bao and crossing the border is achieved via Highway 9, which once served as a tributary of the historic Ho Chi Minh Trail.
Our adventure began in the early afternoon of December 6 with a bus ride to the Quang Tri provincial capital, Dong Ha. We had planned to spend one or two nights in Dong Ha, visiting the nearby DMZ before crossing the border to Laos. As soon as our bus set us down in the seedy-looking town that evening, however, I became anxious to leave.
Bypassing a very persistent and somewhat creepy tour agent, we found the Lonely Planet-recommended DMZ Cafe for advice on visiting the DMZ and crossing the border. DMZ Cafe's proprietor, Mr Tinh, is an elderly, personable, proficient English-speaking man who ably sold us a government-endorsed tour of the DMZ for the next morning.
As per Mr Tinh’s advice, we toured the DMZ and the Vinh Moc tunnels, where North Vietnamese troops and their families lived from 1966 to 1972. The tunnels housed 500 people during the six-year period, and include designated caverns for ‘family rooms’, a meeting room, a hospital, and a maternity ward where 17 babies were successfully birthed.
The tour then took us down the Ho Chi Minh trail to Khe Sanh (yes, we hummed the song, quietly), where we visited a museum filled with anti-American propaganda. We farewelled the tour group at the tiny town of Khe Sanh to catch a local minivan to the border -- a ride that was an experience in itself for the friendliness and quirkiness of the 17 locals who were crammed in with us in the 12-seater van.
We arrived at the Lao Bao bus station at 3.45pm, and walked to the border under an optimistic blanket of sunshine. Thanks to the relatively late hour of the day, the border crossing was entirely devoid of queues or crowds, and our visas were processed with great efficiency and lots of smiles.
The Vietnam-Laos cultural difference was apparent the instant we crossed over onto Laotian soil. We were approached by motorcycle taxi drivers as soon as we entered Laos and were surprised and somewhat humbled to find that they took our usual ‘no, thank you’ at face value. Our lesson came in the form of a two-kilometre-long hike to the Laotian border town of Daen Sawan.
And the walk was one to remember. We walked past leafy green valleys, witnessing village life as locals lit cooking fires for the evening. We walked past children who swarmed around us yelling the Laotian greeting, ‘Sabaidee’. We walked with no knowledge of our destination, into a warm, pink sunset.
These are moments when each decision goes beyond the everyday what to eat and where to drink, and each choice could either help or hinder the cause, with no in-betweens. Moments when senses feel just that little bit more attuned to risks, adventure and a bargain.
Crossing the Vietnam-Laos border was another one of those precious moments for me.
Max, Jim and I had decided to cross overland on a whim while in Hoi An, and had little planned besides our destination, Vientiane. Driven by a desire to leave the fast-paced, overly aggressive Vietnam as quickly as possible, we set our sights on the closest convenient border town, Lao Bao.
Said to be the most popular overland crossing between Vietnam and Laos, Lao Bao is located in Vietnam’s Quang Tri Province, some 150 kilometres North-West of Hue and 300 kilometres from Hoi An. Arriving at Lao Bao and crossing the border is achieved via Highway 9, which once served as a tributary of the historic Ho Chi Minh Trail.
Our adventure began in the early afternoon of December 6 with a bus ride to the Quang Tri provincial capital, Dong Ha. We had planned to spend one or two nights in Dong Ha, visiting the nearby DMZ before crossing the border to Laos. As soon as our bus set us down in the seedy-looking town that evening, however, I became anxious to leave.
Bypassing a very persistent and somewhat creepy tour agent, we found the Lonely Planet-recommended DMZ Cafe for advice on visiting the DMZ and crossing the border. DMZ Cafe's proprietor, Mr Tinh, is an elderly, personable, proficient English-speaking man who ably sold us a government-endorsed tour of the DMZ for the next morning.
As per Mr Tinh’s advice, we toured the DMZ and the Vinh Moc tunnels, where North Vietnamese troops and their families lived from 1966 to 1972. The tunnels housed 500 people during the six-year period, and include designated caverns for ‘family rooms’, a meeting room, a hospital, and a maternity ward where 17 babies were successfully birthed.
The tour then took us down the Ho Chi Minh trail to Khe Sanh (yes, we hummed the song, quietly), where we visited a museum filled with anti-American propaganda. We farewelled the tour group at the tiny town of Khe Sanh to catch a local minivan to the border -- a ride that was an experience in itself for the friendliness and quirkiness of the 17 locals who were crammed in with us in the 12-seater van.
We arrived at the Lao Bao bus station at 3.45pm, and walked to the border under an optimistic blanket of sunshine. Thanks to the relatively late hour of the day, the border crossing was entirely devoid of queues or crowds, and our visas were processed with great efficiency and lots of smiles.
The Vietnam-Laos cultural difference was apparent the instant we crossed over onto Laotian soil. We were approached by motorcycle taxi drivers as soon as we entered Laos and were surprised and somewhat humbled to find that they took our usual ‘no, thank you’ at face value. Our lesson came in the form of a two-kilometre-long hike to the Laotian border town of Daen Sawan.
And the walk was one to remember. We walked past leafy green valleys, witnessing village life as locals lit cooking fires for the evening. We walked past children who swarmed around us yelling the Laotian greeting, ‘Sabaidee’. We walked with no knowledge of our destination, into a warm, pink sunset.
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Chasing phantoms
It's been two and a half years since my friends left.
I remember the day the three set out on what was slated to be a year-long trip that would take them from east to west, beginning in Singapore and ending with the quintessential Australian pilgrimage to the U.K.
The trip was some twelve months in the making and Mik, Jim and Eli were raring to go. We celebrated their departure at the Sydney airport with an embarrassing display of custom-designed boxer shorts, which each bore a little inside joke to remind them of uni days.
As the rest of us Sydneysiders left the airport, a seemingly pessimistic Joel jokingly bet that of the fresh-faced trio only two, at best, would find their way back home.
Well. Eli made it as far as Cambodia -- 7 weeks -- before deciding to turn back and set up shop in Chiang Mai for good.
Not two months later, Mik too threw in the towel. The outlandishly tall Casanova embarked on a new life as an English teacher first in Cambodia, then Thailand.
It seems the allure of South East Asia, and especially Thailand, is no secret to our travellers' nation, with Thailand ranking alongside the U.S., U.K., Singapore and the United Arab Emirates as one of the top ten destinations for Australian emigrants in recent times.
The Australian dollar can go a long way in the region, and attractions abound -- ranging from the pristine beaches of Phi Phi island to the ancient Angkor Wat, to the delectable array of sweet, spicy, and plain old tasty.
But there's a dark side of South East Asian tourism too. Human rights groups have long battled the abuse of women and children brought about by a rampant sex industry in Thailand.
Meanwhile, Cambodia is facing increasing international pressure to combat an illegal drug industry, and has even sought U.S. assistance in a collaborative 'war on drugs'.
So there's the good, the bad, and the ugly -- as any tired backpacker setting foot among a swarm of tuktuk touts will attest. But what could have possessed two recent university graduates on the start of a round-the-world trip to scrap all plans, collect their worldly belongings, and call a previously unknown country their home?
With Joel, Viren, Max and SEA veteran Jim in tow, I'm heading to South East Asia to find out.
I remember the day the three set out on what was slated to be a year-long trip that would take them from east to west, beginning in Singapore and ending with the quintessential Australian pilgrimage to the U.K.
The trip was some twelve months in the making and Mik, Jim and Eli were raring to go. We celebrated their departure at the Sydney airport with an embarrassing display of custom-designed boxer shorts, which each bore a little inside joke to remind them of uni days.
As the rest of us Sydneysiders left the airport, a seemingly pessimistic Joel jokingly bet that of the fresh-faced trio only two, at best, would find their way back home.
Well. Eli made it as far as Cambodia -- 7 weeks -- before deciding to turn back and set up shop in Chiang Mai for good.
Not two months later, Mik too threw in the towel. The outlandishly tall Casanova embarked on a new life as an English teacher first in Cambodia, then Thailand.
It seems the allure of South East Asia, and especially Thailand, is no secret to our travellers' nation, with Thailand ranking alongside the U.S., U.K., Singapore and the United Arab Emirates as one of the top ten destinations for Australian emigrants in recent times.
The Australian dollar can go a long way in the region, and attractions abound -- ranging from the pristine beaches of Phi Phi island to the ancient Angkor Wat, to the delectable array of sweet, spicy, and plain old tasty.
But there's a dark side of South East Asian tourism too. Human rights groups have long battled the abuse of women and children brought about by a rampant sex industry in Thailand.
Meanwhile, Cambodia is facing increasing international pressure to combat an illegal drug industry, and has even sought U.S. assistance in a collaborative 'war on drugs'.
So there's the good, the bad, and the ugly -- as any tired backpacker setting foot among a swarm of tuktuk touts will attest. But what could have possessed two recent university graduates on the start of a round-the-world trip to scrap all plans, collect their worldly belongings, and call a previously unknown country their home?
With Joel, Viren, Max and SEA veteran Jim in tow, I'm heading to South East Asia to find out.
Labels: Plans
