... just imagine...
No cars. No roads. No hot water. No McDonalds or Starbucks (whoop for JOY!). No hot showers. No hospital. No refridgerators.
So then what DOES this little riverside village have? Well, it has an electricity curfew that allows generated power for three whole hours per day. It has one straight street complete with stone lined drainage channels. It has an abundance of chickens and chicks, dogs and puppies and cats and kittens. And like the rest of Laos it seems to have an abundant supply of condensed milk ( ugh! ).... just what you need to ease the pain of sipping a cup of dark, EVIL, syrupy Laos coffee?!
I suppose that depends on how much sugar you can consume in one cup.
Simple this community is even by urban Laos standards, perched on the bank eight high metres or so above the Ou river and the gathered long boats that have been moored up in the mud in varying states of repair. The basic, small buildings are no more than huts made of bamboo and wood. The wall panels are made by slicing bamboo stems lengthways, flattening them out and weaving the strips together, while the roofs are made of layered pieces of the opened bamboo, much like the slates of a European roof. The atmosphere is idyllic, with the mountainous jungle towering over the villiage from the fringes. Grass grows between the huts where the animals tussle and forage. The smell of cooking wafts through the humid air from the open wood burning grills in the makeshift kitchens... health and safety has not been invented in Asia as far as I can see... just imagine trying to set up a kitchen with an indoor barbeque in England! Kids playing with a puppy by the red-hot embers and steaming pans? Haha!
Charlie, Jo and I wandered through the little town on it's singular dirt street. Locals sat on the typical tiny plastic stools and chairs by their open huts where a display of goods would be on sale, from shampoo sachets and shoelaces to bottled water and wafer buiscuits. Another wooden frontage displayed several woven scarves and a peep inside the the open shutters revealed a big wooden weaving frame with coloured yarns stretched out across it and at one end the early stages of a new creation were forming. Hens clucked enthusiastically as they guided their batty little chicks into the open homes, a straggler often as not fluttering it's fluffy, youthful wings desperately as it attempted repeatedly to get to the top of the stone wall of the drainage channel for fear of being abandoned. Dogs would be dozing across the dirt road, not even a heavy step encouraging them to open an eyelid, while heart warming little doey eyed puppies skipped and stumbled around them.
Of course SOMEONE was still feeling ill. Having fallen prey to a bout of food poisoning before we crossed the border from Vietnam I was still feeling very much the worse for wear. Despite an attempt at enthusiasm I was in the grip of a mild fever and had been unable to sleep through the first night in my bamboo hut for my razor-raw throat and that little, dry feather that was caressing the inside of my trachea! Well, I am told that the Koreans believe in drinking through one's illness and rocket-fuel-worthy rum caipirinias had certainly catapaulted me on cracking form through a work leaving do when I had been bed-ridden for two days with a heady fever back in London, so I decided to join the others (Charlie, Jo and the rest of the group who had been on our bus and boat Vietnam) for drinks on a little wooden deck over the river that night. By 20.30, after a couple of beers on a wooden deck high over the river amidst an array of dive-bombing moths and bugs we found ourselves ordering food by candlelight.... and Laos Laos whisky. The food was pretty disgusting, the highlight being a piece of beef on a plate that was so black and hard that noone could do so much as sink a knife into it... if there had been a sword in it no little prince would have been able to prise it out to claim his heritage. The Laos Laos was no better. No wait, in fact it was PURE EVIL. Somehow we ended up with an entire bottle which was consumed rapidly in a series of shots, before another was promptly ordered. Unsurprisingly the bottles cost no more than a pittance. Surprisingly, it tasted more evil with every single stomach burning, brain cell battering mouthful!
Did I feel any better? No. Most definately not?!
But I do love Jo for taking care of me and slipping a lavendar oil-infused tissue under my pillow to help me sleep.
I didn't, but I felt loved...
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