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Published: November 19th 2006
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The last city I visited in Laos was called Vang Vieng. I don't know what it translates to, but it should be something like "Backpackers' Paradise". Vang Vieng is a little boom-town on Route 13 that pretty much exists only to be a travel destination for foreigners and somewhat-wealthy Laotians. There are lovely mountains, beautiful sunsets, plentiful jungles, and a slow, winding river lined with bamboo-hut bars. The restaurants serve good western food and play American DVDs (mostly episodes of "Friends"). The bars serve a variety of Marijuana, Opium, and Magic Mushroom joints, foods, and drinks (as well as $1 Beer Lao that only comes in 22oz bottles), all of which keep the backpackers tuned-out and the town's economy booming.
We pulled into town after a very rough bus ride, so desperate to find toilets that we didn't even notice that we were one man shy of getting into some cheap double rooms. (English Mike had stayed in Luang Prabang to try some hill treks.) We found an internet cafe, though, checked our emails there and used the toilet, and then realized that we'd been joined by the young and solo and thoroughly-English Mark, who fit great as a stand-in
for Mike. Mark and I got a room together for a few days, one floor up from the Canadians, and we had a blast.
This town made it onto my map when Matt and Andy had told me to meet them there on the 20th, while we were still in Bangkok. I got in on the 20th and I spent a few days there which were incredibly enjoyable, if slightly monotonous.
High School After showers and shaves, we reconvened in town at a little restaraunt that seemed to be playing nothing but DVDs of Friends Season 10. We later discovered that this was pretty much all the place played, a monotony broken only by the occasional mid-afternoon B-grade action movie. Most of the other restaurants didn't give us a break and continued the Friends assault from open to close.
Mark and I wandered up to a couple of girls and made ourselves welcome, until we noticed that they weren't very cute close-up and started looking for an exit-plan. Luckily, we saw the Canadians sitting a few tables away and went to join them. Over the course of a couple pizzas, our group was also joined
by a few others. It seems that Matt and Andy had also made it into town on time, as I saw them walk right past us after about 20 minutes in the place!
We had a great little reunion, I introduced them to my friends and they introduced me to the half-dozen people they'd joined up with on the road. We all sat together and had a couple more pizzas before moving to the next spot.
The next spot happened to be a great little reggae bar, and there we also happened to run into the Swedish guys, who'd been joined by a couple of friends from high school (who they had just randomly stumbled upon, with no previous knowledge of each other's travels). That same spot was where we ran into Ronan and Lucy, and also a few Americans we'd befriended on the slow boats.
So that's pretty much how it went in Vang Vieng. Every day and night saw us meeting up with more people we'd met before: either at home, in Bangkok, on the boats, or in Luang Prabang. Eventually, it started to feel a lot like high school: with crushes, cliques, and even
a gossip-mill!
Activities The activities here really were a dream come true, if you were motivated enough to seek them out. A lot of people just seemed to sit around all day doing jack, probably due to the onset of drug-induced laziness. However, I was able to find a few other options.
Aside from cuddling up with great food and mind-numbing entertainment, there was also the option of spending your day floating down a beautiful river in the sun on inner tubes. Every few dozen yards, you'd find another bar with cheap Beer Lao and a few people you know. There'd also be some kind of crazy rope-swing or zip-line contraption to take you from a deck at the bar to flying out over the river and plunging in. Given the time, I might have spent my entire life in a tube.
At night, there was more of the mind-numbing Friends or the repetitive soundtrack of the Reggae bar... or you could go down to the little islands by the river and enjoy a kickass campfire party. This would pretty much consist of a few dozen foreigners hanging around the fire or chatting on mats
and hammocks in little bamboo bungalows. The parties went on until dawn each night, and if you were lucky you might get a live fire show.
Downsides This place really was great, honestly, but it's also the place where I started to get a bit jaded and depressed.
There was some great social-bonding going on, but it was the first place I encountered on my trip where there were enough people in close enough proximity to one another for long enough that they started to spawn all the ugly parts of social interaction. There were groups of people showing open disdain for one another, avoiding and excluding certain people, and even doing the "you're with us so you gotta stick with us" thing.
This was some of the most gorgeous natural splendor in the entire world, but the omnipresent drug use had reduced most of its visitors to blind slugs with no motivation to get out and enjoy it.
There was a really cool, intimate party scene, with some great conversation and nice fires and stuff. However, that party scene also brought on the whole meat-market thing with people obsessing over hooking-up, and it
brought on the party stunts and peer pressure and puking drunks and all that other crap.
The town was a great tourist attraction, much fun for foriegners and for Laotians. However, I found out that there were a few bars actively trying to segregate people. Some of the island bars, for example, would refuse service to people of Lao origin (or Southeast Asian in general), fearing that they might be police informers, prostitutes, or rival drug dealers--as all of the bars sold drugs. This led to some bars being populated only by foreigners and others almost exclusively by Laotians. The Laotians were having more fun, trust me, but even when educated about the situation a lot of the foreigners didn't care enough to switch bars... and that got me even more depressed.
They had their "Backpackers' Paradise", but it was theirs to make of it what they would. Sadly, what they made it into was not
my paradise. In the end, I was sick enough of it that I left without fanfare: short notice, few goodbyes, and no email addresses.
And then I was a loner.
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Aaron Brown
non-member comment
do you think you would have been able to get away from the other foreigners and go to more isolated places if you wanted?