Vientiane

I arrived in Vientiane (the capital of Laos) after a short 3 hour journey from Vang Vieng. There was nothing to note about the journey other than for the first time I was in a bus completely full of westerners – not a local to be seen. They did have appalling bladder control now I come to think of it. We had to stop after a mere 40 mins for an emergency toilet break and

then again just 20 minutes later. We ended up with 4 stops in 3 hours – what is wrong with these people? I got off the bus and started the search for a bed. Capital cities are always more expensive than anywhere else but the cost and the standard of the rooms here took me by surprise. The cost of an air-con room was a minimum $20 – I didn’t want air-con but if the rooms only had fans – then they did not have bathrooms, only shared bathrooms. Even so, these shared bathroom rooms were the same price as I had been paying for all my other en suite accommodation elsewhere. I looked at a few of these rooms. They were cell-like, they didn’t even have windows. Just a single bed and a hook in the wall to hang a towel. The beds were not even comfortable – the mattresses were so bad I walked out. After trawling the streets for some time I came across a sign promising reasonable prices. The place looked very run-down, The Lao Youth Inn, in fact there was a flood in reception as I walked in. But they did have fan rooms with en-suite bathrooms. I looked, spacious rooms with bathroom but the bathroom was very damp. Although the floor was obviously cleaned frequently the fan and light fittings were coated with dust. Nevermind – I’m desperate – I’ll take it. The mattress was just about passable and to be fair the hot water shower was amazing. Even when the shower wasn’t on, the ceiling dripped water on you anyway. It was an experience, plus I had a window looking directly over the Mixay Temple. The wats (temples) here in S.E. Asia are not like mosques. You do not want to be too near a mosque because the call to prayer will definitely rob you of sleep at dawn but the Wat’s do not make any noise, so proximity is not a problem. After finding shoddy digs, the next thing I had to do was investigate the immediate surroundings.

Vientiane was a mess. I arrived on Monday, the day after their 3 day boat festival holiday had finished. The long riverside road was a hive of activity as hundreds of market type stalls were being dismantled. It was noisy and crowded but it was the rubbish that was the problem. Laos has a big problem with rubbish and waste. Litter is dumped everywhere, streets are strewn with discarded plastic, cans, food waste. It is not just in towns, in rural villages houses are surrounded by crisp packets and plastic bags. When driving, people will wind down the window and throw their discarded plastic bag into the middle of the road. Lao people do not seem to mind the unsightly mess. The riverside street was ankle deep in debris all the way along, you could sort off pick your way through the garbage but the stench was unavoidable. Food waste (and lots of it) which had been sitting in the 30 degree heat for the last few days was really beginning to ferment. Originally most of the food had been wrapped in plastic bags but the local dog population had made short work of the plastic bags so most was now rotting in the open. This was my first impression of Vientiane. To make matters worse I could not find anything to eat. I found loads of Vietnamese, Chinese, Korean and French restaurants but not one of them had anything veggie on the menu. Eventually I saw a sign saying Laotian Goats Cheese Pizza. I sat down and ordered it, my mouth already watering with anticipation... only to be told they did not have any goats cheese. Disgruntled I found an overpriced restaurant with one veggie item – a margharita pizza.

The next day I was hoping I would warm more to the city. I had been really looking forward to visiting and using a traditional herbal sauna and massage that was situated in an old temple on the outskirts of town. I had been told it was one of the best in the country. Before setting off I checked that my directions were correct, only to be told that the sauna had burnt down in August and it was not going to be rebuilt – gutted. How was I going to spend my time now? I enquired about the cost of a sightseeing trip, to be told it was $55. Who on earth pays these ridiculous kind of prices? This was just a trip around the city. I hired a bicycle for $1 and visited all the sights (bar one) within 3 hours. The furthest away was 3km. I visited the Wat Si Sisket, the oldest temple in Vientiane and home to the most amount of Buddha’s. I climbed to the top of Patuxai, Vientiane’s homage to the Arc de Triomphe and I went to the golden stupa known as Pha That Luang. It is the most important monument in Laos – Buddha’s breastbone was supposedly entombed on this site in the 3rd century B.C. It was certainly an impressive structure – it literally dazzled in the afternoon sun. After more disappointing food – aimed at tourists with no spicing what-so-ever, I treated myself to a 2 hour massage. Eventually after 5 months of massages I may get enough flexibility to touch my toes but then again, probably not!

My final full day in the capital was spent visiting the tourist attraction I missed out yesterday. Xieng Khuan or Buddha Park is located outside the city and requires a bus to get to it (or a tuk-tuk for $25). I spent $1 each way on the bus that took me to the Thai-Laos Friendship bridge. It had never dawned on me up until this point that Thailand was literally over the river. Hence the wildly inflated prices, tourists have usually just flown into the city or crossed the bridge from Thailand. The ones coming in off a plane are usually willing to pay anything. From the bridge I climbed in a shared tuk-tuk and paid another $1 each way for the tuk-tuk to drive us down the very rutted, dirty, dusty road to the park. Out of the mud and the dirt and the dust, an oasis of greenery appeared, looking as out of place in the barren landscape as I had done on the local bus. The park occupies a small site – you could walk around the perimeter in 10 minutes but is crammed pack full of statues, many of them massive – taller than a house. The sculptures are based on both Buddhist and Hindu mythology or a merger of the two. The place really has to be seen to be believed. Although a small site,

you could quite happily spend 2-3 hours there (as I did), even more if you brought a book or a picnic. The place was built in 1958 by a shaman called Luang Pu but I could not find out if he merely collected the statues and designed the layout, or sculpted the statues himself or a combination of the two. Some of them did seem alot older than the others. At each end was a monument you could climb up, one resembled a Mayan pyramid (and brought back vivid memories of me being scared to death whilst climbing the dreaded pyramid no 5 in Tikkal) and the other looked like a giant orange with a gargoyle face, in which you climbed through the mouth (memories of Blackgang Chime here), climbed the steps inside the dome and came out on the roof, where there was another mouth and what looked like a huge tv aerial mast. Parts of this park were very surreal.
After wandering round the sculptures two or three times and finding something different to see each time - even the back of each statue was richly decorated, it was finally time for me to head back. Buddha Park had enabled me to enjoy some of my time in Vientiane and making my day even better was the fact the restaurant I had visited a couple of days earlier had replenished its supply of local goats cheese and I was able to enjoy a pizza that evening.