So Noone Told You Laos Was Gonna Be This Waaaayyyyyyy

It was your standard bar/dance party scene; tons of drunk college-aged kids dancing to popular rock music, cute girls dancing too hard from higher-up locales like tables and benches so that they could be sure everyone knows how cute they are, sketchy frat boy/hippy guys trying to dance up on them in a vain attempt to curry favor, and me standing in the corner with my friends, drinking a beer and watching the scene unfold like I'm some sort of sociology professor (some things are far more entertaining to watch than participate in). "Livin' On A Prayer" by Bon Jovi comes on, and everyone flips out and dances harder and more drunkenly. This is taking place in a big sheltered area around a fire. Outside of the shelter is a field, the field runs along the Nam Som river located in Veng Vieng, in Northern Laos. I'm surrounded by white people dancing to Bon Jovi in the middle of a jungle in a devastatingly poor and still-Communist country.

Maybe I should back up.

Pete and I met Wednesday at the airport and caught our flight to Vientiane, the capitol of Laos. We landed in late afternoon, got a room booked, and went to check out the city. The first thing we noticed is how insanely quiet Vientiane is; people don't drive with their horns and nobody screams at us for moto rides. It was like the city had been evacuated. It was eerie, but a welcome change from the chaos of Phnom Penh. We stopped at a bar on the Mekong and had a drink. You can look across the river to Thailand, which itself is a weird concept to me. We walked around a bit more then got dinner at a French restaurant near That Dam Wat.

Early the next day we caught a "minibus" to Veng Vieng. I call it a "minibus" because the actual bus we bought a ticket for was full, so they put us in a minivan packed to the brim with people. They stuck all our bags on top, and I shared the front seat with the driver and an English/Australian girl. Every time he changed gears it would hit my leg; and I had almost nothing to brace myself against for all the sharp turns that made up this 2-3 hour ride. Not fun.

We got into Veng Vieng, got settled in a room, and set out to explore the city on a very rainy afternoon. I have to admit I enjoyed the novelty of having moisture cover my body that didn't come out of my pores. Although stunningly beautiful, Veng Vieng is a notorious backpacker haven. Very popular are the television bars, which are essentially open air bars with tables you can lounge around with several tv's blaring American television. By "American television" I mean Friends. Literally, at every single bar (save one that showed Family Guy), Friends. All day. Every day. Into the night. Friends. After our brains had been sufficiently numbed by inexpensive Beerlao and the comedy stylings of Matt LeBlanc, Pete and I called it a night.

Seriously though...Friends? Everywhere??? In Laos?!?

The next day we each went on a separate adventure tour through an ecotourism company called Green Discovery Laos. Ecotourism is based upon the principle that tourism should be sustainable (i.e. don't ruin the environment because it is a precious commodity that should be maintained for the community to benefit from) and its profits should be reaped by the people who make up the community. Many of you will hear me talk much more about this, because my capstone project for my degree is based on ecotourism. Without dragging out my soapbox, it is a very important trend and an important tool to help such crushingly impoverished countries like Laos harness the valuable assets they have to improve their lives.

Pete, the avid-rock climber, decided to spend a day climbing the ridiculously cool and vertical mountains you can see on my Picasa page. I, the avid acro-phobic, opted for a more serene and ground-friendly caving/kayaking trip. My group consisted of me and a family of seven Californians who had come to visit one of their 5 brothers/sons who was finishing up his semester abroad in Thailand. They were nice enough, and often reminded me of my brothers and I (especially when their unending movie quotes pestered the crap out of their mother). But I definitely felt like an outsider when they started talking all about college wrestling (many of them were on a scholarship), friends of theirs who got boob jobs (a conversation they casually had in front of their parents), and gossiped about friends of theirs (they apparently know a girl they call "Fat Jen" who walks with a waddle).

Despite this, the trip was quite amazing. All of the mountains were shrouded in clouds from the recent rains, and I found myself getting the theme song to "Jurassic Park" stuck in my head. I shared a kayak with our guide, and I talked to him a lot about ecotourism, the current state of Laos, and all sorts of other SE Asian affairs. We toured a couple caves which were quite cool, and even stopped off at one of the many innertubing bars along the river for a drink and to use an awesome swing they had set up over the river (which you can check out here).

I got back earlier than Pete, and waited for him by getting drunk on Beerlao and watching...that's right...Friends. We got cleaned up, then met a couple Norweigan guys Pete climbed with (Dag and Bjorn) for dinner. These guys are immensely cool; they're supposed to be coming to Cambodia soon so hopefully we'll see more of them. They were also the ones that knew about a cluster of bars in a field across the river run by a bunch of Americans, and that's where this messy story started.

The next day we got a bus (a real one) back to Vientiane. We spent another afternoon/evening walking around the city, and enjoyed a very cool sunset over the Mekong. Next day was an early flight back to Phnom Penh. It was an odd contrast to be absolutely surrounded by Westerners, but to be in such a foreign/exotic location. I found myself looking around and being disgusted, but then looking out to the horizon and being awed. I never expected I would need to use the word "juxtaposition" so much, but that's just the kind of summer this is turning out to be. I'm learning to accept that.

Still...FRIENDS?!?!?!?