First Impressions of Laos

The night before crossing into Laos (night of June 1st), we decided to experience the nightlife of Chiang Rai, Thailand… in 80s themed clothing! We first had dinner at the night market, where we had the opportunity to feast on fried cockroaches and crickets (unfortunately I didn’t take any photos of them… they looked super gross and not very appetizing!!).

Before heading out to a local Chiang Rai nightclub (aka disco) called The Sperm Bar, we took photos in the hotel lobby of everyone in their 80s gear. I have to admit… I wasn’t too dressed up, I didn’t have much time to prepare a costume, and I also didn’t want to buy and carry around a costume in my backpack for the next 2 months!

We were the only foreigners in the bar, but we had an awesome night.

We woke up at 6am the next morning to take the bus to the Thailand-Laos boarder crossing. It was the most interesting crossing I’ve ever seen. We arrived by bus to the Thai side, and had our passports stamped with our departure cards. Then we loaded ourselves and all our belongings on long boats to take us over the Mekong River to the Laos boarder crossing.

Our bags traveled separately:

Once over to the other side, we all had to apply for our Laos visas at the immigration office. It was a very relaxed boarder crossing! We didn’t even go through customs, or need to actually talk to anyone. We only needed to hand over the visa fee (of $42 USD),, our passports and completed visa forms, and we then received our passports back with a Laos visa pasted into them.

Laos is the only land locked country in southeast Asia, and has only been open to foreigners for about the past 10 years. Because of this, most of the local traditions have been kept. It is also not very highly populated, and has a total country population of 6 million people. Laos is still under communist rule, and there are strict curfews in place. You are not allowed to walk the streets after 11pm, so at 10:30 everyone must start making their way indoors. I’m not sure what the punishment is for being out after curfew… but I don’t really want to find out!!

We learned some pretty scary warnings for the country of Laos. If a foreigner has sex with a local Laos citizen, then the foreigner will go to jail for 3 months and have to pay a $300 USD fine. This law is to prevent prostitution. Also, drugs are highly highly illegal here! And there lots of traps, for example: a local Laos person will sell you drugs, then call the police, who will then arrest you. If you are caught with enough drugs for distribution it is punishable by death. If you only are caught with using drugs, but do not have enough to distribute then you will go to jail and pay a fine.

Apparently drugs are very easy to find here though, and are sold at a lot of restaurants… labeled as “special” products. For example, you can go to a pizza restaurant and order the “Special Mushroom Pizza”… and you will learn the hard way that these mushrooms are not normal mushrooms. Our tour manager told us to stay away from anything in restaurants labeled “Special”. Another clue to watch out for is a food product that is more expensive than the others, for example the Special Mushroom Pizza would be around $10 CAN, while a normal pizza here should only cost about $1 or so.

After crossing into Laos we spent the remainder of our day relaxing on our own private boat and cruising down the Mekong River. It was really nice to have a day to relax, listen to music, and have some down time. Every day has been so rushed and packed with activities!

Our boat is number 666:

Me with my computer writing my blog:

I had a wonderful time on the boat: relaxing, reading, listening to music and taking in some sun.

We arrived at the small village of Pakbeng in the late afternoon not entirely prepared for what was awaiting us. First when we walked off the boat we were immediately surrounded by many children, all of them offering to carry our bags up the hill to our hotel for money. It was a bit overwhelming. Most of us (including me) carried our own bags up the hill, in around 35-38 degree Celsius temperature, and were literally soaked and dripping with sweat by the time we reached the top. (which has been pretty normal here… every day I’m drenched with sweat. It’s disgusting!) All we wanted was to lie down in our air conditioned rooms, and take a shower!

Imagine our surprise when we arrived at our hotel rooms…. which were pitch black… no power… no air conditioning… no internet… just two beds and a bathroom (toilet and shower head, no curtain), and a fan on the bedroom ceiling (which was not working because there was no power). Sydne and I thought we were going to die. We were soaking wet with sweat, lying on the beds, stripped down, fanning ourselves with magazines, in a dark room with still stagnant air. It must have been 40 degrees in that room! And we couldn’t shower because the bathroom was pitch black and there was no way to get light into it! I also only had one clean shirt because our luggages were locked up and inaccessible until the following night. So I was stuck in my soaked clothing for a while…We both couldn’t stop laughing at how uncomfortable the situation was.

The village only got electricity last year, and it is only used at night, so we were told our power would go on at 7pm. We were also told that we were staying in the nicest hotel in the entire town. We decided to get out of the hot, dark, hotel room and wander through the streets of Pakbeng.

Laos one of the poorest countries in the whole world, and this is very noticeable while walking through the streets and observing the local people.

The local markets look like scraps of random items that are found and then sold for money:

Some of the local houses:

We also had to watch out for mosquitos! We are now in a malaria infested area, and will be in a malaria zone for the next 1.5 weeks, so we need to constantly wear bug spray and protect ourselves by taking malaria tablets.

The power went on at 7pm… but only for about half an hour, and then we had no power for the remainder of the night. Unfortunately I didn’t know we wouldn’t have power, so I left my flashlight in my luggage, which was locked away until the next night. So Sydne and I used our iPods and a little keychain light I had with me. No power meant no light AND no fan AND no showers! The room was hot, we were sweaty, sticky and gross, and there were bugs flying around our room. Sydne and I were so fed up with this that we drenched ourselves in bug spray, we both took sleeping pills and passed out at 9pm just hoping to get through to the morning!

It was a very interesting experience….

Waking up in the morning, the view from the hotel was beautiful. Laos is a beautiful country, filled with lush greenery and breathtaking views.

We boarded our boat and continued down the Mekong river towards our destination: Luang Probang, Laos.

I’m getting excited for my week in Laos. It seems like a very interesting country so far! I was also guaranteed by our tour manager that the night in Pakbeng was the only night of the trip where we wouldn’t have power!