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Published: March 28th 2007
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LAOS VANG VIENG
Well I guess plans can definitely be altered. A few days before heading out of Bangkok Thailand, We met up with a few German friends Ingrid and Golo, with whom we had previously traveled with in parts of Indonesia. After a few reuniting beer towers, some catch up stories, and a few bad German jokes (exhale Rabbit, coming soon to Canada), They informed us of their traveling plans into Laos, Vietnam and then Cambodia. So the next morning we grabbed a tuk-tuk, which is basically a twelve-person Thai passenger bus in denial of its four-person scooter powered capacity body, And were driven all over the city to everywhere except our target destination which was the Vietnam Embassy.
In Bangkok, there is a scam plagued towards tourists involving a Tuk-Tuk; a sly and canny Thai driver, who risks his life daily in the ridiculous traffic; and yes of course one or two unsuspecting tourists. I suppose it is not so much a scam, as it is more of an irritating lie that a Tuk-Tuk driver will actually take you to your desired destination if you visit a Tourist Authority of Thailand (TAT) for 10 minutes, a
local
he thought the camera was the coolest thing. especially when he saw his own pic Suit shop for another 10 min, eat some lunch at his buddies restaurant, and so on and so forth until he has received enough free gas coupons to drive around for free for the rest of his life. Well after 10 minutes aimlessly wondering through a suit shop with no intention of buying anything we went outside and told the Tuk Tuk driver that there would be no more stopping until we had reached the Embassy, to which his response was that he had not received an infinite amount of Gas coupons and that we needed to stop at just one more TAT.
Having now choice, and in a bi-lingual argument we shared a few universal hand gestures, one towards the Tuk-Tuk driver and a much more friendly one at an official Cab driver before we were off and on our way to the embassy. Not sure of the exact location of the Vietnam embassy, we were dropped off at the U.S. embassy because it was supposed to be in close proximity. The problem however was that we didn’t realize how large the U.S. embassy actually was which by the way spans almost 3 city blocks and makes the
Vietnam Embassy look like a run down old storage shed in comparison.
So finally after some visual searching and a few uses of my very much redundant yet complex Thai phrase Kung-Phoot-Pa-Sa-Un-Grit-Dai-Mai, to which the response would be either yes I speak English or a confused non English speaking Thai shaking his head back and forth thereby symbolizing a no, Jordan spotted the Dwarfed Vietnam embassy which was hiding away in the shadows of another overgrown US creation.
So the next evening with our New Visa stamps, the four of us departed for the foreigner line up at the train station, picked up some train tickets, cleaned the cockroaches out of our train beds (yours only by the way Ingrid), tried to sleep, attempted to eat the horrid train food, and occupied the next 23 hours travel majority by train, until we reached Vang Vieng just north of Laos’s capital Vientiene.
Laos so far for me has been a remarkable addition to my adventures over here in Southeast Asia. Being here is like taking a few steps back into time. It is a very rural and underdeveloped Country, built alongside the massive and very
Soccer
These kids, their brilliant historical Mekong River. A simple journey bicycling down Vang Vieng’s dirt streets takes you past; schools, soccer fields, and over bamboo bridges where you are easily lost in the picturesque (new word) landscapes as everything including the Mekong is imposed on the most incredible mountains.
Upon arrival in Vang Vieng, we got into a great soccer game with some of the locals at the school. Despite their age, poor field condition and lack of shoes the kids here are amazingly skilled and adore soccer. I had to take a short break after about 20 minutes of playing to catch my breath and find a leatherman with which to pull out an incredibly rusty also most likely tetinatious nail from my running shoe. I got lucky since the nail went through my shoe just missing my baby toe.
Other adventures included four caves, one blue lagoon, one river, and eight rope swings, and two zip lines. Have a look at the pics like always.
I hope all is well back home, and I am getting almost anxious now to be back.
Corey Rich
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Andrew
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what up
what shakin corey looks like your havin a good time still. I can still lend you some cash for some food, you skronk donkey lol. i hope jordan liked my message i sent him i thought it was rather witty, by the way i hope you got some cloths for me to buddy summers on the way i could use another pair of versace shades or pradas. If you dont get me some your rent is going up big time. Lyle said to said hi, he fell off the wagon last night it was pretty funny. Karrah is down town right now doing her driving test (pretty scary) i ordered her a new car from quebec (A4 with an A6 engine loaded) i think she will be pretty surprised when she gets back from saskatchewan in may. keep havin fun its time for me to have a nap i just had lunch and there is nothing to do at work.