Friday, March 20, 2009

Laos, Bangkok, Korea, and Home

Even though we had two months to begin with, travel time was growing short so we decided to bypass the overland trip through Laos and across southern Thailand and opted for a flight from Luong Prabang to Thailand. We ended up flying Lao Air, in spite of their less-than-stellar reputation for safety. Luckily, I was able to do a brief visual inspection of the plan as we walked across the tarmac to board and I could see for myself that the duct tape on the wings seemed pretty secure.

We only had a short time in Bangkok with Mary but we spent a great day along the Chao-Phraya River. The lady sitting next to Maya in the photo below even shared her sweet rolls with Zak and Maya. We visited the pottery-decorated Khmer-style Wat Arun, enjoyed some cocktails at a small restaurant on the Chao-Phraya River, and prowled the shadowy-warrens of the Amulet Market. We also visited the Golden Temple at Wat Saket and hit the touristy Kaosan Road market where we picked up a variety of souvenirs. We went into nearby Chinatown for dinner on our last night in town. Zak was feeling pretty chipper on the walk over but started feeling a bit peckish when we got to the restaurant and the meal progressed. We decided to cab it back to the hotel and Zak really got the cabby’s attention when he leaned his upper body out of the cab at a red light and projectile vomited all over the median. Zak continued to be ill in the hotel as the kids and I packed up, (in a bag) in the back of the cab on the way to their, in the airport as we waited for boarding passes, etc. I was a little worried they wouldn’t let him on the plane while he was violently ill but, luckily, he seemed to have depleted himself by the time we got to the gate and he and Maya passed out pretty hard for an hour or so until we got onto our 1:15 a.m. flight. We all slept well until we arrived in South Korea the next morning. Mary would be following on a later flight.

We had a long-layover in Seoul so the kids and I got to spend a great day kicking around in Seoul. It was cool there, brown grass, bare trees but above freezing and no snow on the ground, quite a change from the heat and humidity of Bangkok. We spent the day in the Insa-Don area of Seoul, a cute little warren of narrow lanes, art galleries, old tea houses (one in which birds flew around freely), hip little shops, etc. We had lunch at this great restaurant called Sanchon. The owner/chef learned his "temple cooking" during his 18 years as a Buddhist Monk. The cuisine is all drawn from fresh vegetables gathered in the country's woods and mountains. The restaurant itself was spectacular but the food was amazing. We just followed a small group heading back down this twisty narrow little lane and stumbled on what I would be willing to bet is one of the best meals you can get in all of Korea.

George and Carol met us at the airport back in San Diego. Dad had made a very clever poster with drawings of the different events we did on the trip. The kids both promptly ran off to their respective friends’ houses. 24/7 with Dad and sibling for two months is enough for anyone; now I know why some animals eat their young.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Luong Prabang

We are now in Luang Prabang, Laos. Before we arrived I had heard that Luong Phrabang had been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Centre in part because of the blend of traditional Lao and French colonial architecture and that, until the Communist takeover in 1975, Luang Prabang was the royal capital of Laos. I’m not sure exactly what I was expecting but I was surprised by just how undeveloped the city was. It was as though it had suffered from decades of neglect and tropical decay which is, I suppose, what follows in the wake of decades of colonial rule followed by decades of Communism. However, from our perspective, we found ourselves in an incredibly charming, laid-back town that time forgot. There are numerous Wats and a royal palace and many French-colonial buildings but the European-built buildings are struggling against decay and sit cheek by jowl with old wooden houses with canted floors and rusted metal roofs. Poverty and charm all wrapped up in one.

The cuisine was a bit of polyglot as well. We enjoyed Lao salads, fruit shakes, a Mekong seaweed dish, small cooked "bird," water buffalo, and other exotic dishes as well as incredible French baguettes, baked goods, and coffee. We ate baguette-sandwiches at primitive restaurants overlooking the Mekong, fine cuisine at fancy, but reasonably-priced restaurants, and particularly enjoyed dining at the bustling food stalls on the side streets of the night market. Each evening, the main street was made over into a lively street market selling handicrafts and cheap T-shirts to the tourist while the addition of small kitchens, tables, and chairs transformed the side streets into good, cheap eateries. Periodically the lights of the entire downtown area would cut out, but the vendors were clearly used to this state of affairs and had candles ready again, decay and charm in one. In keeping with the theme, we all ended up with upset tummies to some degree. Maya has the constitution and digestion of a dog; nothing seems to bother her that eating a little grass won’t cure. Mary, on the other hand, spent an entire day moving between the Reclining Buddha pose on the bed and the Praying to the Porcelain Buddha pose in the bathroom.

In the morning we would get up to watch long lines of saffron-robed monks walk down the street with their offering bowls. The good people of the city sit on the sidewalks and make offerings of rice, bananas, and other food to the monks as they walk by. The Lao women looked particularly exotic in their brilliantly-patterned long straight silk skirts and sarongs and the orange robes of the many monks shone brightly in the early morning light.

One morning, after doing our own part to gain merit by making offerings to the monks, we walked to the top of the Phou Si hill in the middle of the old city to watch the sunrise over the mountains. The city is bordered by two big rivers (the Mekong and the Nam Kahn) and from the top of the hill, it almost looks like the whole city is floating. The entire peninsular area is easily traveled by foot although we rented a bicycle to help get us all around.

On two different nights we enjoyed a great Lao Massage (about 46,000 Lao Kip/hour or about $5) and a session in a Lao herbal steam sauna. For the sauna they burn wood to fire up a big boiler of water and herbs, the steam from which is piped directly above to two small dark wood sauna closets, one for men and one for women. The key is to sit in the sauna for a bit, then get out and have some special herb tea, then back in the sauna, etc. On our last full day in town we, along with some others, hired a small truck to take us to the waterfalls outside of town. The water of the rivers was a milky-blue and the water provided a welcome relief from the tropical heat. Zak and I had fun jumping off of rope swings and down waterfalls; he is quite the water boy. Of course, on the way back, the little truck broke down but after a bit of tinkering and a little assistance, we were back on our way.

Friday, March 13, 2009

Down the Mekong


The trip down the Mekong was amazing! We were loaded on a long wooden “slow boat” with about 100 other backpacker types. The average passenger is 20 years our junior and Maya and Zak are the only kids on board. We got a late start and are loaded well beyond the maximum seating capacity. Many of the kids are sitting on the gunwales. One has a guitar and softly provides a pleasant soundtrack to the images of water buffalo on the shore and young monks splashing in the river while their companions perch among the orange robes on the rocky beach. The trip turned out to be one of those zen parenting (parenting by not parenting) moments. For two days the kids were exposed to a cosmopolitan pile of young adults laying about, playing cards, and drinking Thai Whiskey and Beerlao. Our kids, outgoing and attractive as they are, were soon enlisted in the card games and even sent from one party to another to beg or steal bottles of Thai Whiskey when supplies began to dwindle; I’m not sure whether I should be proud of their forthrightness or embarrassed by the activities. In either case, we had two beautiful sunny days for cruising down the Mekong. Laos is the only landlocked country in SE Asia and the poorest. The Mekong snakes along and through the entire country. It provides food, water, transportation, and ties the country together. I was surprised at how rocky and narrow the river was in places and not at all surprised that boat traffic shut down at night. We spent the night at the little river town of Pakbeng. Pakbeng is the kind of rural outpost where the power is only on from six in the evening until midnight. In Pakbeng I was again reminded how the Laotians do not display the same type of pleasantness as the Thais. I was lied to by touts trying to get me to visit their hotels, lied to by touts trying to get me to buy boat tickets, etc., etc. Life must just be harder requiring more guile.

The next day it was back on the river. It was hard to believe I was actually on this big old wooden boat, floating down the Mekhong, drinking beerlao, sharing Billie Holiday with Mary on the ipod, looking at the jungle and the water buffalo and the Lao kids on the banks; transcendent.

Laos

We are in Laos! We took the bus this morning from Chiang Mai to Chiang Khong, about a 5 hour ride. Once in Chiang Khong, we boarded a motorcycle rickshaw/tuk-tuk (motorcycle in front and two benches facing each other in the rear) to get to immigration on the banks of the Mekong. From immigration we headed down the fancy (not) border crossing at the beach where we got on a long long-tail for the ride across the river. This boat was an inboard with a fixed drive shaft going below the boat and no gearing. I was a little disappointed to finally land on the Laotian shore as the day was incredibly hot and humid and the breeze offered by the boat ride was quite refreshing. We broke a good sweat walking up the hill to immigration; heck, I had a serious sweat going just filling out the immigration documents. We bought tickets for tomorrow’s slow boat to Luong Prabang and booked a room at the Sawadee Hotel. After paying for the boat tickets and hotel and visas (1500 baht or about $45 each), I was a little low on cash so I hit the local ATM for some Laotian Kip. As near as I can tell the exchange rate is about 10,000 kip to the dollar. There are no coins in circulation and the bills go down as small as 500 kip. I wanted to pull out about $200 but I was limited to 700,000 kip per transaction which turned out to be just as well because this ATM apparently dispensed no bills smaller than 20,000 kip. This made for a serious wad of cash. So much so, I was unable to fold my wallet and, for much of the time in Laos, carried my money around in a big roll held together with a rubber band.

Once we settled in we headed over to an herbal sauna and massage place in the Red Cross building in town. The Red Cross apparently runs these throughout Laos as a means of raisign revenue for the good work they do. Mary and Zak and I first got an hour-long massage. The masseuses used a tiger balm/mentholated balm as they needed our back and muscles. There was a bit of tweaking and twisting but this was not the same as a Thai massage. After the massage, we showered and entered the herbal sauna, one for women and one for men. The saunas were heated by a large wood fire on the lower level that boiled an herbal water mixture that was vented directly to the saunas above. The idea was to spend 10 minutes or so in the sauna and then come out and drink some herbal tea. Both the herbal mixture in the saunas and the tea are unique to each spa and supposedly held in strict secrecy. There were other Laotians enjoying the sauna as well and the Lao girls looked quite exotic in their sweaty sarongs. Maya was not able to get a massage and didn’t want to sit in the sauna for long but she enjoyed running around in her sarong and playing with a younger girl who was the daughter of one of the women working there.

Elephants, etc.


Yesterday, Mary and I went for a two hour run up at the reservoir before we all headed over to Grace’s for an outing of elephant riding and other adventures. First stop was the elephants. This time, Zak and I were allowed to ride on the heads of our elephants. Every time they would walk downhill we would have the sensation of an imminent fall over the front and then, presumably, under the feet which would make for a horrible slimming technique. However, as long as we kept our legs lodged behind their ears it would have been almost impossible to fall off. I was wearing shorts and I can attest that elephants are very bristly. While on the elephants they were allowed to feed on some young bamboo growing at the edge of a deep gully. They can really rip that vegetation out; wow. After the elephants we went to a waterfall where our guide Jimmy and Zak and I went swimming. The day was hot the water was not to cold which made for a welcome and refreshing dip. Jimmy jumped off about a 25 foot ledge into the pool and we had fun trying to walk upstream against the force of the water at the base of the falls. After we got back to the red songthaew truck, Zak mentioned it sure would be fun to ride on the roof. Jimmy readily agreed and up the two scrambled; so much for seat belt laws. Luckily it was not far to the bamboo raft put in point. We had a great trip downstream past elephants and through the rapids. We had a great time.
That evening, back in Chiang Mai, all four of us loaded up on the scooter and drove over to the Wararot Market on the bank of the Ping River. I bought a big Kum Loi (floating paper lantern) and we headed up on the foot bridge over the river to launch it. Mary had not yet mastered the art of crossing the busy Thai streets but we were eventually all assembled. When we launched the Kum Loi, it first dropped (very bad luck) down to just above the surface of the river before it started to rise (good luck). There is a lesson there for us I am sure. After watching the Kum Loi join the stars, we headed out on the Riverside Restaurant Ping River cruise. It was very nice. The last photo is of all four of us on our main mode of transportation in Chiang Mai.

Cooking School


Mary arrived yesterday – Yeeaah! After getting her settled in, all four of us got on the scooter and drove to a nice restaurant overlooking the waterfall just past the zoo. From there, we got on a red truck and headed up to Doi Suthep. For dinner we headed over to the Riverside but were unable to get on the dinner cruise boat so Mary and I enjoyed a small bottle of Sam Sang with fresh juice before heading over to the Night Bazaar for food and shopping.
This morning Mary and I got up for a little run and then we were picked up by the Thai Farm people for an all-day cooking class. They took us to a market to discuss the food we would be using, then we went out to the farm where they showed us some of the food growing, how to prepare the rice, how to prepare the various dishes, etc. We ate everything we cooked and had a great time.

Thursday, March 12, 2009

The Golden Triangle


Yesterday was Valentine’s Day and we celebrated with a visa run to Myanmar. This time we chartered a tour to see some other sites along the way. Our first stop was at some hot springs where we boiled some eggs and bought some pumpkin chip snacks from one of the many vendors at the site. We continued on to the White Wat, a contemporary temple built by a famous Thai artist in his home town. The contemporary spin on some classic themes - such as the hands reaching from below in the photo to the right and the contemporary levels of Hell including nuclear bombs and other technological "marvels" on a mural in the interior - were quite powerful. From there we headed to the Golden Triangle where Burma, Laos, and Thailand meet. We chartered a small boat to take us across the Mekong River to Laos. Note the attention to detail on safety gear in the photo to the left. Life on the other side of the river was starkly different than that in Thailand. Clearly this was a much more impoverished community. There were some open-air shops selling knock-off designer clothing bottles of alcohol containing snakes, scorpions, tiger penises, armadillos, etc. Now I’m always up for a libation but this stuff was enough to turn my stomach. However, there were fellow travelers braver than myself and the man offering samples was downright drunk; good for him. We returned to the boat and headed up the river along the Burmese shore. In both Laos and Myanmar/Burma, Chinese entrepreneurs had started ventures including a large casino in Burma (where no one ever wins according to our guide) and a large neo-classical hotel complex in Laos. On the Thai side of the triangle there was a huge seated gold Buddha statue on a boat-like base. The statue had been was a combined gift from Laos, Myanmar, and China to celebrate the Queen of Thailand’s birthday.

We then got back in the mini-van and headed North to Mae Sai and the official border crossing into Myanmar. Interestingly, as you can see by the photos of the clocks on the wall, the time in Myanmar is one-half hour behind the time in Thailand. I couldn’t help thinking this was more reflective of how Myanmar is one-half hour out of step with the rest of the world. After renewing our entry visas into Thailand, we stopped by an Akha hill tribe village. The older woman in the photo is wearing her traditional garb and her teeth are stained from chewing betel nuts. The older man is smoking from an opium pipe. The last photo is of me standing, on level ground, next to a woman from an ethnic Chinese community.