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Published: March 1st 2007
An eerie orb of light cast over the tarmac is our only lifeline as we race through the night in hot pursuit. The moped’s momentum whips smoke from village fires into surreal meteor showers riddled with mosquitoes which shoot up through the headlamp and into our faces like tracer fire. With no crash hat or visor, the only option is to angle my head down, squint my eyes, and keep a constant vigil for the shadowy signs of roving beasts.
The tarmac comes to an end with a jolt, replaced by a tightly packed and deeply rutted dirt road, signaling the dreaded home stretch. We stop to take stock of the new terrain, scanning it with our headlamp. Black shadows lie like oil in the ruts and potholes, paradoxically giving them more prominence than if in the full glare of sunlight - making them easier to spot and navigate - focusing my mind into a hypnotic trance as we bump and weave our way home the last 20kms by the seat of our pants, past sleepy tribal villages suspended in darkness and time.
Arriving home our elation is quickly replaced by worry and confusion. Is it possible we passed
them on the way? Maybe they’ve stopped somewhere for the night instead of continuing in the darkness? Maybe they’ve broken down?
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Situated on The Mekong’s 4,000 islands chain, Don Det is an ideal location for a bit of R&R after a trip through Laos. Though having just set foot in the country I was full of verve for exploration, and with only ten days in which to do so I felt antsy. On our second night, whilst watching the sunset over the Mekong and supping on the obligatory Beer Lao, I convinced myself that Laos’s intricacies, stories and secrets didn’t lie here in this insulated little comfort zone, but out there beyond its banks.
Early the next morning, we bussed, begged and hitched as far as we could up into the Bolaven Plateau. By late afternoon the transport had dried up leaving us well short of our intended target and no option but to aim for the more accessible Tad Lo, where we rented huts by the river, dined the evening away in a restaurant overlooking the waterfall, and planned our 200km roundtrip to Katamtok falls.
We set off in high spirits the following day,
two to a bike, happy to be back in the saddle and out in the back country under our own steam. The accessibility of our mopeds allowed for affable contact as we passed tribal villages punctuated with smiles and friendly waves, leaving a warm and welcoming feeling along the entire route. We’d all become quite familiar with mopeds after our time in northern Cambodia and didn’t anticipate Laos posing more of a challenge than the quagmire of Ratanakari. And out on the tarmac roads we were able to push the bikes to their 100km/h limits, weaving and overtaking as we went; no crash hats, no trousers and no chance in the inevitable mismatch of tourist v tarmac.
After more off-road antics high up in the plateau we had our first glimpse of what we’d come for; plunging out of the lush forest into a deep chasm was Katamtok waterfall. In an attempt to get closer, we set off on a crazy jungle hike down the mountain, ankle deep in a muddy stream, but were inevitably thwarted by the forest’s density and sheerness of the terrain.
Heading home, Stu and I stopped for a few Hollywood style moped/jungle snapshots,
Fill er up!
Gas station Laos style.safe in the knowledge we’d catch up with the ‘puppies’ in no time at all. And as we came out of the jungle and back onto tarmac, we saw Tim and Karen parked by a gas station/shed taking the opportunity to re-stock on fuel. We sped straight past them with a little wave and disappeared up the road in an attempt to gain some time for a little detour to another waterfall. After which we rejoined the main road and attempted to catch them before nightfall descended....
Unbeknown to us at the time, as they’d attempted to catch us, a tire had blown on their bike, causing them to lose control at high speed.
An excerpt from Stu’s blog:
Waterfalls, jungles and hospitals!! In the morning they still hadn’t returned and at around 10 or 11 we (me especially) began to panic. The panic came in the form of silence as we realised that the only reason they hadn’t made it back by now was that they had had an accident … I really thought they were dead. It really wouldn’t have taken much considering the speed we were going without helmets on those flimsy bikes!
We explained the situation to our guesthouse owner, who took off somewhere, I guess to ask around the local town. At around lunch time a local woman came and found me saying "your friend, your friend" I asked "is he ok?" to which she just shook her head..... Not what I wanted to see her do! I approached the entrance and saw an ambulance and many locals standing around just staring at it and me. It might sound dramatic but I was completely convinced I was about to see a dead body and I found it very difficult to approach. Unbelievable relief then filled me as I saw Tim sitting in the front seat! When he saw me the tears came, he'd been holding it back for 24 hours. He honestly looked like he'd been in a blender; Bandages everywhere, cuts and more bandages on his face, clothes torn and covered with splatters of blood. But I didn’t care because he was alive.
The stares Tim received from curious and concerned onlookers clearly weren’t helping his emotional state so we moved him into the restaurant away from prying eyes. After gathering up everyone’s stuff, Stu and I jumped into the back of the Ambulance whilst Tim rode in the front with the medics. We began searching through Tim’s bag at his request to see if everything was in order. I fished out his camera, which like almost
Hitching
Tim looking a little more optimistic than me;-) everything else in his bag was covered with suntan lotion from a bottle broken in the crash. I turned it on to see if it still functioned and was confronted by a spine-chilling black and white image of both Karen and Tim laying battered and bleeding on the side of the road. If I hadn’t just seen Tim alive I would have sworn the next time we saw both him and Karen they’d be laying on cold steel slabs, waiting for their autopsies. I showed the picture to Stu. We both sat in silence, confronted with the gravity of the situation and fearful of what we might find at the hospital.
Travelling along the very same route we had taken the previous day in such high spirits was a profoundly sobering experience; as we drove by villages there were no waves or smiles from us, and the looks returned only served to embody our mood. I began to ponder the purpose of our hedonistic approach to life which had ultimately led to the accident. Was our naivety in disregarding death due to our privileged isolation from its specter? And how offensive is that ignorance in a region where 50%
detail
Wat Phou of children don’t live beyond their 5th birthday?
Living as deeply and fully as I can leaves me with little fear of death. However what hit me hardest was the sheer ordinariness of death and the pointlessness of dying in such an obtuse manner after having learned so much, and yet having never put any of that knowledge into fruition serving the world… I guess I’m not afraid of death as long as it leaves me alone. I took out my cigarette packet which doubtless had ‘SMOKING KILLS’ in Laotian emblazoned across the front, slid open the window and had a sneaky smoke to calm my nerves… death won’t get me right?
Arriving at the hospital in Sekong, Karen teetered on the edge of tears as she searched our reactions to her state. On the surface she had come off a lot worse than Tim. But having seen Tim’s response to the attention he’d received earlier, I opted for the stiff upper lip approach. Her body was a lot less tattered than Tim’s owing to the clothing she wore at the time of the accident - and if she were wearing a helmet she would have likely walked away
- as it were her forehead and face had clearly come into contact with the road. I told her she looked great, all things considered.
Karen lay on her metal bed in sullied clothes sporting bandages and a drip, now joined by an exhausted Tim who crawled back onto his blood stained mattress just two feet away. The morbid scene it painted made it clear we’d all probably be better off relocating to a nice air-conditioned hotel room. Karen immediately perked up to this idea and within minutes Stu and I had informed the nurses of our departure, squeezed through the crowd of inquisitive onlookers who hung outside the door and hailed a taxi in an effort to find the most appropriate hotel in this most unlikely of destinations.
The following morning after convincing a bus to come by and pick us up from the hotel, we were on our way back to Pakse, with its banks, internet cafes and travel agents. After running errands and safely installing both Karen and Tim in a new hotel, our sense of achievement left Stu and me with bags of energy and a sun-drenched afternoon to contend with.”How about we hire
a moped and go take a look around?” I offered to Stu almost mischievously (As I was the only one not to have suffered a crash over the previous week I was either a capable driver or riding for a fall). Stu looked at me with a wry smile, we both felt a little apprehensive about the idea, but living by the maxim of quashing a phobia by confronting it, we banished fear as well as the main danger by pledging to wear helmets this time - whether riding or not!
It is said that Wat Phou is the most impressive Khmer ruin outside of Cambodia. However the unfathomable gulf in grandeur between Angkor Wat and the little tumbledown pavilions of Wat Phou leaves any comparisons senseless for all but the most avid archaeologist. After clambering around the ruins in our crash hats and having enjoyed the sweeping views over the Mekong, we concluded it was - archaeological splendor aside - well worth the effort.
The following day we said our goodbyes. Stu and Tim flew Phnom Penh-Bangkok-Scotland and Karen traveled north to meet her mother in Vientiane. I headed for the Vietnam border, traveling as far as
I could on the northbound night bus, sleeping a couple of hours at a bus station hotel, and taking a taxi at 5am into a nondescript town in order to catch the daily bus up to the border.
Entering what appeared to be a rather modern yet very empty immigration building I was lured down a long corridor and into a room by the sounds of a TV, the location of which also revealed an immigration official hard at work lounging in his chair, hat over his face, snoozing the day away. After a little nudge he jumped to attention and escorted me back to the entrance where he proceeded to stamp my passport and demand a dollar for his labor. Anticipating as much I pointed to the large sign by the door which stated in plain English that no payment was required or indeed should be given to any immigration official whatsoever. To this he scoffed, proudly placed my passport in a drawer and rocked back in his chair with a little smile.
After it was clarified I wouldn’t be getting my passport back until I paid him a dollar, I informed him in the air of
Jungle shot
Bolaven Plateau someone who wasn’t interested in buying another keychain that he could, to his surprise, keep it. At which point I left the building and proceeded to cross the border.
As I stood speaking to a bus driver out in the parking lot the immigration official appeared, apparently feeling a little overburdened with his new British Passport. He called me back into the building where he again restated the terms of the deal; a dollar for my passport, though this time he did seem a little more eager to make the sale.
Out in the car park a mini-bus sat waiting to be filled with passengers. At present it appeared I was the only one, so knowing I’d have to wait for others to cross before I could be on my way anyway, I called his bluff; after all, I could either wait in here, or out there in the tropical sun, and besides, this silly game was a matter of principle.
After about five minutes of inactivity on both our parts he broke the silence by irritably informing me that my resting against the counter with my back to him was actually quite disrespectful to a man of
his stature. I apologized profusely for my lack of manners, and then informed him I believed it was disrespectful for a man of his stature to hold my passport ransom for a dollar, and angled my body to the side. Then to my surprise after some further pondering on both our parts I heard my passport slapped on the counter. As I turned to offer my adversary a genuine sportsmanlike thank you he was already up out of his seat and leaving in a huff. I attempted to call him back, but in his effort to save face he never looked back.
To be honest I was completely amazed at the ability of a one dollar bill - which after all had never even left my wallet - to raise my mood so profoundly, and flush with cash I paid the bus driver for a private ride to the next town.
As the bus weaved through the mountains and descended into Vietnam, I started feeling a little guilty at my petty triumph in light of what had happened over the past few days. Was the cold realization that you cannot cheat death somehow thawed by the reality you can
US bombs, Sekong
It's an ongoing process to recover the millions of bombs dropped in this isolated region during the Vietnam War cheat another of life’s certainties; taxes?
I felt happy because I’d beaten the system, but had I? To the Vietnamese border official, I was probably the personification of western decadence. While for me, he was the personification of third world corruption. But as our game played out I didn’t play into his stereotype and he didn’t play into mine; I was polite and courteous in my protest at his actions and even respected his mirage of power. And by handing me back my passport in such a self conscious manner he had somehow become an honorable man.
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Tim S.
non-member comment
Wow!!!
You write so descriptively that by reading the intro one can almost be deceived into thinking that they're reading a novel, whereas the reality is that this is your experience. This journey of yours seems more inwards than outwards, unlike alot of blogs I read that seem to talk more about what someone did, rather than what they thought and felt about what they just did...and as I heard someone say, if you haven't reflected, then you haven't lived. Keep writing!!