Three days up the Mekong

Travelling back to Thailand from Luang Prabang I took a boat up the Mekong for three days travel. This was upstream in more than one way - the journey is long enough that on a apparently level, but flowing, river, with no locks or rapids, the boat ascended 130 metres. In doing so it passed a number of villages of the local hill tribes.

These are some of the more accessible villages in this part of Laos - they are only one or two days travel along the river to a town where they use money. There is no other means of access to these villages, though for a few close into Luang Prabang, there may be a track of sorts during the dry season. The less accessible tribes are multiple days or weeks walking away from the river through dense jungle covered hills and gullies. Even without the jungle, the hills would be very tough going, because they are very rugged and steep. As a consequence of this inaccessibility nobody really knows much about the people living in Laos. The government of Laos has no idea how large the population of Laos is - they believe they have an approximation for the number of families living in the villages - but this is extended families, where children are not really counted until they become adult enough to form a family of their own. Even the headmen of villages may not have a clear idea of how many people there are - they know about the Smith family, the Jones family, and the McTavish family - but not how many dependants each of these families have.

This does by the way, put into perspective, the American bombing raids on Laos during the Vietnam war. The US dropped, on Laos alone, a volume of bombs about equivalent to all the bombs dropped in all theatres by both sides during the Second World War. Just looking at the terrain and those villages that are accessible is enough to determine that such an attack is bound to be ineffective. Its not so much taking a sledge hammer to crack a nut, as taking one of the world's largest ever bombing campaigns to kill three people and a goat. In addition, although LeMay's famous quote about bombing them back to the stone age applied to Vietnam rather than Laos, this objective was never achievable - most of the tribes are not very far from the stone age. True they use metal implements, though not many, but in many significant ways they are living a stone age existence already.

One of the signifiers of the difficult task facing the Laos government is that life expectancy throughout Laos is about 58. Most of the reason is the mortality of the hill tribes. Again an estimate, it is believed that the life expectancy of the hill tribes is 35. Equally there is no real concept of the value of education - if male children know enough to poison a crossbow bolt and hunt a small animal; if female children know enough to remove the inedible portions of some of the jungle fruits - this is enough.

Some of the government initiatives designed to improve services and facilities available to the tribes involve some fairly standard measures. The most visible of these is the forced relocation of some of the more remote tribes into joint villages with existing tribes who live in a more accessible place. Of course such force-majeure generates its own resentment and problems. Most of the tribes have a subsistence living. They can support themselves from their traditional jungle pursuits, supplemented by a very little agriculture. If they get relocated, they will encounter the concept of a cash economy for the first time. This implies that if they want to access any of the services being made available to them - health or education they are likely to have to interact with a town and money at some stage or other. The first law of ecology, "We can never do merely one thing", rears its head at this point.To do this, they need to  produce a surplus -often for the first time. This implies a much larger commitment to agriculture, which in turn, in this part of the world, means a substantial increase in slash and burn agriculture.  This has several knock on effects. First, just for the vegetation to recover some shadow of its former self, will take 25+ years from a particular patch of ground ceasing to be in cultivation. Secondly, though jungle is astonishingly fecund - almost by definition - once the soil has been denuded of nutrients it can take centuries of no human impact to re-establish the original balance. It can be denuded easily by agriculture and the growing of cash crops. Along the river, the scars not only of current slash and burn agriculture can be seen, but also the scars from the previous five or six iterations of this practice.

The lack of a money based economy, and the perceived need to provide services to these peoples, results in many distortions and complaints. The tribe people complain that the local town takes advantage of them - the local yokels - because they don't understand money. As a result the hill tribes believe they are always being taken for a ride by the townies - particularly for education. One of the carry overs from a non-monied economy - where wealth is measured by the number of large baulks of timber stored under the house - is that the people are in fact ripped off in a major way by unscrupulous Chinese buyers coming in to purchase the proceeds of illegal logging for teak, rosewood, and mahogany. This of course encourages the trade, as logging is seen as a cash crop. Incidentally, I have absolutely no idea how such buyers extract their purchases from the houses of the hill tribes. The search is also on for cash crops. This has historically been much of the root of the drugs trade - the area I'm talking about is the edge of the golden triangle. Drugs provide high density value - lots of money (comparatively speaking) for small packages.

As an aside when I returned to Thailand, and was starting to travel from Chang Rai to Bangkok, the police as is often the case on public buses, checked the passengers. The only person questioned was a young mother evidently from one of the hill tribes, with a small baby in arms. Not only was she questioned, but was also pat searched, as was the nappy (?) of the baby.

The hotels along the tourist trail - the Mekong - are doing a very good job in many ways. They provide a source of cash for the immediately adjacent village(s). They do provide support and encouragement in all sorts of practical ways to the local tribes. At each of the hotels I stayed at 95% of the food served  came from the local village (the odd 5% being things like alcohol, and western foodstuffs). Much of the efforts of local projects has been to find a cash crop that does not have the disastrous effects of drug or hard wood logging. They have had some success with Laos coffee - it is starting to make a market for itself.

And yet, cliched though it may be, the idea of the primitive but happy natives living in the garden of Eden, there does seem to be some truth to it. The Laotian hill tribe peoples do seem to have a happy (though short)  life. Obviously they have never known any thing else, and the alternative to living such a life is to not live such a life (and usually this means not living at all).

And yet......

and Yet....

Before I came on this trip I would have said, without hesitation, that my favourite place on earth was the centre of the Tibetan Plateau. A few months into my trip, I might have changed this to say Kham,  now forms part of Sichuan Province in China. Still within what used to be called Greater Tibet, and still on the Tibetan Plateau. And yet, having visited Laos I am hard pushed not to change my mind and say Laos.

Laos has fantastic scenes of tropical beauty. Everywhere you look, especially but not exclusively outside the towns and cities there is beauty - flora, fauna, climate, geography, with the works of man a mere incidental footnote in the field of vision, if there at all. The people and the culture are gentle and pleasant, and make the visitor feel like honoured guests. And yet, I would not choose to live there, while I would live in Tibet in a heartbeat.

While Laos is not a place of contrasts, this visitor at least, was very conscious of the multiple contrasts he brought with him. The interior of Laos is incredibly remote. The town of Luang Prabang, where I was based is accessible by two means. One choice is Air Asia's journey by small, twin engined, prop driven, light plane once a day from Vientiene. Given that this flight is into an airport in the hills, which regularly have mist on them throughout the day, due to the high levels of humidity at this time of year; and given Air Asia's less than fantastic safety record, most people seem to choose the alternative. This is the overnight sleeper bus. Quite a good bus, though a little on the pricey side by the standards of transport in this part of the world. Having difficulty getting to Vientiene, more getting to Luang Prabang, all act as a filter on travellers that do make it this far. There are a (very) few backpackers, but mostly it is those with money - and sometimes lots of it - and mostly those on holiday rather than travelling for travelling sake. Like the family I travelled with on the sleeper bus. They were a Chinese American family, father, mother, son at university, and daughter just finished school and going onto university later this year. They were on a three week holiday, through Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Burma, This was obviously a high school graduation, or getting accepted at university reward, and must have cost a few bob, particularly given the up market hotels they were staying at. He said he was in semi-conductors. Later this turned out to mean, sole owner of a semi-conductor factory in southern California.

The effect of this on Luang Prabang is that there is some backpacker accomodation but in practice, it tends to be the low end of the accomodation there - which mainly consists of boutique hotels, starting at about $45 a night, and going up to $1250 a night. In this latter case, I fail miserably when trying to imagine what you get for you money, and how it can possibly ever be value for money. his in a town where there is a charity in town trying to help people to become literate in English, because that is the only way that they can get a job; and they cannot afford books or tuition. I was staying in such a boutique hotel, run by a French woman - but who had obviously been born in Laos, spent all her life there, but still regarded herself as French. She had one endearing quirk. In the morning she did not speak much English, but she did understand a moderate amount, and could speak some. However, as the day went on, her English abilities became less and less, so by mid evening she could not speak or understand English at all.

Moving on by boat, as I did, from Luang Prabang, again acts as a filter. The cost of a three day journey such as I made does tend to deter even the determined backpacker. I was fortunate in that, as I could see my trip coming to an end, I did have a little bit left in the budget. This trip gives travel on the Mekong during the day, interspersed with stops at tourist sites en-route. Overnight one stays at hotels set up specifically for this trade, on the banks of the Mekong. Staying in these hotels puts one firmly in the slightly Alice-in-Wonderland world of the rich - not the mega-rich. Both overnight establishments gave one the full French colonial experience - from the colonisers side of course. The accommodation was veranda-ed large airy rooms, complete with ceiling fan and mosquito nets. Drinks before dinner on the veranda. The ambiance of the hotels was such that if you dropped a napkin, three people would immediately come over; one to offer you a replacement; one to pick up the fallen item; and one to apologise on behalf of the establishment, for the napkin having the temerity to fall in the first place. They provided entertainment for their guests - in one there was a variety of native skills on offer - shooting the Laotian hill tribes crossbow, that is used in reality as a hunting weapon using poisoned bolts; planting rice; fishing; and panning for gold. The other had a tour of one of the local villages.

Both establishments were run by expatriates - both French. They both had the slightly chivvying and patronising attitude to their staff, who they obviously found a little dilatory in always doing what was required of them. All the elements that I expected to really hate. And yet, I enjoyed the experience; the hotels are doing a major job in involving local villages - the food in both places virtually all came from the local village; they are providing, often for the first time, access for hill tribes to a cash economy, and are forces for good in both conservation, and moving the Laotian economy forward somewhat. They are a real benefit to the locals. And yet - I'll be continuing this in a later posting.

Culture Vulture

My last day in Luang Prabang proved to be my culture day. Whilst going round the National Museum earlier in the week, I had seen the Royal Ballet Theatre, which is in the grounds of the museum. I had investigated and found there was a performance on my last evening, so I booked it up. I have only been to the ballet once before, and that was the English Royal Ballet - a rather different type of dance. I did not have any idea what to expect.

When I go there, the requested 30 minutes early, they would not allow entry to the theatre for nearly the full thirty minutes. I, and a few other tourists who had followed their instructions sat talking outside the theatre. There were a small group of Australians who had obviously been travel companions on many trips, plus a young French theatre set designer, who though on holiday, was there partly out of professional interest. It proved to be an interesting introduction to the evening.

The format of the evening was a welcome dance to start with, and some general dances to end - a monkey dance, a goodbye dance, and a giants dance. These framed one episode of a continuing saga - The Abduction of Princess Siva. The company runs through one episode per performance, thus the entire saga takes about six performances to see. (This would take about two weeks in total.) The theatre very usefully provide information sheets about all the dances, including the episode of the serial being danced that evening.

The first dance was performed by the women of the ensemble. This was what I think of as typically Siamese/Indian - much of the action was in very small and precise hand movements, combined with small and precise steps. Very interesting, but there are semantic elements that just passed me by.

The rest of the dances were mixed, but all but one of them focussed very heavily on the male dance. This is completely different from the female dance, and like Beijing Opera, owes a lot to martial arts and the stances and movements from such arts. The dance is very slow, with a lot of foot stomping and held postures - very difficult ones. The whole thing was superb and thoroughly enjoyable.

After the ballet, I went to a restaurant just a few hundred yards up the road from where I was staying. I had seen this when I arrived, and thought it somewhat upmarket, so a possible place to have a special meal. As this was my last night it seemed appropriate. When I arrived there the place was packed, but they managed to find space for me in an extension. This is when I found it was not just "somewhat upmarket". It was a gourmet, French-Laos, living food vegan restaurant. Living food is one of the further reaches of veganism - I don't pretend to know all the implications of it, but they do include not heating any food above 115oC, and using "live" vegan ingredients. Again the implications of this are unclear to me.

There was only a fixed menu, at a fixed price. The menu on the day I went:

Elixir
Bee Pollen, Greens & Mint
Soup
Seasonal Lao Mushroom & Coriander Mouse
Starter
Tomato Carpaccio, Lime Zest & Vanilla Dressing
Main
Warm Laksa Curry
with Herbs & Vegetable Noodles
Green Papaya Condiment
Dessert
Chocolate with Coco Bean & Fruit Slice
Herbal Tea
Bael Fruit & Mulberry

The meal was of extraordinary standard - up there with Michelin starred restaurants - as was the price, which was expensive by western standards let alone Laos ones.

So for this evening I was the complete culture vulture.

The Buddhist Gaudi?

Outside Vientiane there is a sculpture park. I learnt about it from Wikipedia, and put it on my list of things to do while I am here in Vientiane. The reception desk at my hotel advised me to catch a local bus from the bus station just around the corner. This took me as far as the Friendship Bridge - the border with Thailand. A very local bus took me on from there. Two buses to the park; admission to the park; a can of drink at the entry; a meal and drink once I had finished going round the park; and two buses back - all this and I spent less than £3.50. It is very difficult to spend large amounts of money here. 

 The park is quite extraordinary. To describe it I can do no better than quote from the article I found.

"The park was started in 1958 by Luang Pu (Venerable Grandfather) Bunleua Sulilat. Luang Pu Bunleua Sulilat was a priest-shaman who integrated Hinduism and Buddhism. His unique perspective was influenced by a Hindu rishi under whom he studied in Vietnam. 
...........................
The statues are made of reinforced concrete and are ornate, and sometimes bizarre, in design. The statues appear to be centuries old, though they are not. There are sculptures of humans, gods, animals, and demons. There are numerous sculptures of Buddha, characters of Buddhist beliefs like Avalokiteshvara, and characters of Hindu lore, including Shiva, Vishnu, and Arjuna. These sculptures were presumably cast by unskilled workers under the supervision of Luang Pu Bunleua Sulilat. One notable sculpture resembles a giant pumpkin. It has three stories representing three levels - Hell, Earth and Heaven. Visitors can enter through an opening which is a mouth of a 3-metre-tall demon head (9.8 ft) and climb staircases from hell to heaven. Each story contains sculptures depicting the level. At the top, there is a vantage point where the entire park is visible. Another sculpture, an enormous 120-metre-long (390 ft) reclining Buddha, is also a park attraction.^"

So if you have ever wondered what it is like to be in a giant magic pumpkin, then this is the place for you.

(Nearly) Dead Millionaire

Today I became a millionaire, but nearly died in the process.

I returned to Thailand after visiting Siem Reap for Angkor Wat and other Cambodian temple complexes. I then spent a number of days in Bangkok, doing very ordinary things - shopping for replacements for some items of clothing I have worn out; finding and going to the local Buddhist temple; getting a hair cut; getting to recognise and be recognised by a few individuals in the local supermarket; and generally tootling about, writing this blog, and doing ordinary things. Part of this was catching up on my blog postings and I am now back to publishing more or less contemporaneously with my travels, rather than the backlog of postings I had in non-computer form.

I then travelled to Vientiane, Laos by train from Bangkok. This turned out to be a bit of a endurance trial - firstly I got to the railway station very early as I had had to book out of the hostel early. Then the train was just over an hour late in leaving the station - there was evidently some problem that was affecting all the train leaving Bangkok northwards. The train conformed to my view of Thai trains - reliably unreliable. It took about 25% longer to get to the Friendship Bridge into Laos than timetabled, so got to the border at about 11:30.  Travelling to my hotel finished off the journey - which had been 24 hours rather than the 13 1/2 hours   it should have taken.

Vientiane is a delightful town. French colonial in layout, cuisine and architecture,.  The local culture is relaxed to a degree that makes the Cambodian attitude seem frenetic and urgent, which takes some doing. All the major tourist sites are surrounded by formal, tropical gardens which are a riot of colour and are very, very attractive. It is also the only place I have been where one of the major tourist attractions in the city, the Patuxai Monument is described there as: "At the northeastern end of the LaneXang Ave. arises a huge structure resembling the Arc de Triomphe. It is the Patuxay or Victory Gate of Vientiane, built in 1962 (B.E. 2505), but never complete due to the country's turbulent history. From a closer distance, it appears even less impressive, like a monster of concrete."

As for becoming a millionaire - The Laotian kip is the lightest weight currency I have encountered so far. There are approximately 13,000 kip to the £. So I went to the ATM today and drew out about £80 - which makes me a millionaire in the Laos kip. And nearly dying while doing it. Well I had to cross the road to get to the ATM. In Laos there seems to be only one rule of the road/driving technique. This is "if you can't see it, it can't do you any harm. If you don't look you can't see." So you never look out for other vehicles, pedestrians, animals, just go where you need to go. A stranger reacting with this environment needs eyes in the back of their head; high speed vision rotating through 360o; the fortune telling powers of the psychics on Blackpool promenade; the reflexes of a cat; and the luck of the devil.