Vientiane

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Vientiane (pronounced Vian Chan) is the capital city of Laos. It's basically a ghost town. It's hard to fall in love with the place, unless you're an ageing man chasing young prostitutes. Nothing really seems to be going on, everything is expensive, budget accomodation is appalling... Not the kind of place you'd want to spend too much time in. I want to say some good things - it's not like I was activelly unhappy. humm. It's right on the Mekong, so it was really beautiful to eat right at the water's edge. There are cute dogs running about everywhere. There are some really nice bakeries serving french pastries. And yet the palce is a ghost town!

On our last night, we did finally find the excitement - we found where the cool hung out, the only place in Vientiane, nay, all of Laos, where there was anything vibrant. It wasn't the restaurants (the food wasn't much to speak of). It wasn't the live music venues (the lead singer kept checking his watch throughout the performance). It was the bowling alleys. They can't get enough of them. And they're the only place open past the 11:30 curfew (illegally).

So that's Vientianne. We spent two days, only because the busses out were full on the first day. On to Tha Khaek.

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