So, we are still striking out on uploading photos to blogger, but here are a few lucky ones from the first few days of the trip that made it on to photobucket before we turned into pumpkins:
http://s765.photobucket.com/albums/xx299/arlichristian/
Anyhow, we made it to Laos and love it here. It's beautiful, the people are friendly, and the food is even tastier, if that's possible. They have curry here!
After a harrowing 24 hour bus journey from Hanoi, which left us feeling more like cattle than humans, we made it to Vientiane - the capital city - for a day. We got over our inhumanness with a lovely dinner with Jenn, a college friend who recently moved to Laos. Buffalo stew, red curry, and sticky rice made us smile again. The next day we visited COPE - a center for orthotics and prosthetics for victims of Unexploded Ordnance (cluster bombs and other nasty stuff left behind in the countryside). They had a great visitors center with documentaries and lots of legs to play with - hopefully we'll both come back to volunteer someday. We also made friends with a monk! He asked us lots of questions, including why Sarah was dressed like a boy. He smiled a lot but like a good monk he did not shake our hands or make physical contact.
Next we hit Vang Vieng, the drunk river tubing capital of the world. We went (sober) tubing in a water cave! It was beautiful. Then we kayaked down the Nam Song river and observed beautiful karst cliffs, young children hunting prawns in the river, and the non-native drinking habits at riverside bars. We were both brave enough to try the 20 foot rope swing - and both almost lost our suits in the splash into the water. We made our first real friends of the trip, and shared a three liter Beerlao personal tap.
Now we are in Luang Prabang, soaking up the natural beauty and hitting the handicraft markets a little too hard. Tomorrow after an early start to see the monks make their rounds we will (parents, cover your ears!) rent a moto to head out to explore some caves and waterfalls.
Miss you!
PS - For those wondering who is writing the post, the 'posted by' name at the bottom of the post is the official typer, but the other is inevitable over the shoulder adding comments ;)
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Ok, so I am pretty pissed right now. I wrote you the longest comment and tried to post in like 5 minutes ago and then it asked my to sign in and then all this other rigamorole and then it completely lost my post. There's no way that I could immitate the perfection that this comment was, so I'll have to refrain from trying. But I'm sure you can imagine how amazingly poetic it must have been since you know me and all.
ReplyDeleteMaybe I will try again tomorrow :( I am glad to see that you are enjoying life at high seas. Ok, so I know you're not at high seas but it sounded cooler then just saying traveling.
Anyway, I had a kick ass weekend reliving my Smith days at Oberlin this weekend. Only this time I was a lot more attractive to the ladies. If only they knew how old I am. You and Arli actually came up at one point. I won't say why here but I will just say that it involved an infamous weekend in the gayest little midwestern city in the world and an awesome little club the cool kids call, Wall.
I miss you tremendously and we need to catch up once you settle back into normalcy. That is if you can afford your phone bill since you are no longer a contributing member of the American work force.
Don't forget to check out Angkor Thom and Ta Prohm. Cambodia and Thailand are two of the coolest places I have ever been. Can't wait to see your pictures!