Sam Neua and a Hmong Village in Vieng Xai

On this trip, I will have to do two long bus rides through the mountains. The first was two days ago: A long but very beautiful 8-hour trip to the northeast from Phonsavan to Sam Neua. The entire trip was a roller-coaster ride through the mountains, passing through many hilltribe villages perched on the edges of the cliffs. Every now and then we would stop and the village children would run out to see who was arriving.

Once I arrived in Sam Neua, my original plan was to rent a motorbike and drive 30 kilometers to Vieng Xai to visit the famous Pratet Lao caves. I figured that I could do the trip to Vieng Xai in one (long) day trip on my own. But that turned out to not be the case. I was unable to locate the motorcycle rental shop in Sam Neua and was resigned to try to make the trip alone by songtaew (the truck with benches in the back).

I still had one evening to kill in Sam Neua, so I was wandering around on my own when I met another Hmong hilltribe boy who wanted to practice English with me. His name was Kani, and is first question was to explain what the phrase "It's right under your nose" means. If nothing else, I have learned to sympathize with anyone struggling to learn English idioms!

We chatted some more and I told him I was going to Vieng Xai the next day. He said that his sister and brother-in-law lived there, and would love to go visit them and be my tour guide, assuming I could pay for his US$1 bus ticket there and back. I figured this was a small price to pay for a local guide.

He recommended that we make it an overnight trip, so that he could spend some time with his family. So this morning, I packed a small overnight bag, leaving my big backpack at the hotel, and headed to Vieng Xai in the songtaew with Kani.

And what a great move this turned out to be. After I checked into a guesthouse, Kani took me to the Hmong village on the outskirts of town where his family lived. The houses were all one story on the ground, and were made of bamboo with thatched roofs. I have seen houses like this before, but for the first time, I was invited in.

I had to stoop down under the thatched roof to step in, and as soon as I did, the dis-orientation that I felt in the Phonsavan market a few days ago returned, as I stepped into what seemed to be a parallel universe. The floor was hard dirt. There was one small mattress on the floor with a mosquito net above it. At the far end of the house was an open flame fire with a pot on it cooking dinner. And next to the pot in the shadows sat the grandfather of the family, smoking tobacco out of a long bamboo bong.

It's as if I was in a museum: "And here is how the Lao people used to live a hundred years ago. The rice and corn are stored over here, and the pots, fishing nets, and other tools go over here." And then I realized that it really wasn't all that long ago that everyone in the world lived like this.

As a guest of the home, I was served a glass of water and a strange fruit that I still am not sure what it was. On the outside it looked like a yellow watermelon. On the inside it looked like a cantaloupe. And it tasted like cucumbers. It was very odd, yet is was cool and refreshing; the perfect welcome treat.

I eventually left Kani there with his family and headed back down the dirt path to the town of Vieng Xai. There is a boat racing festival going on, so I plan on checking that out tonight. Tomorrow, Kani will re-join me and we will go visit the Pratet Lao caves. I can hardly wait, as I am expecting tomorrow will be the highlight of my trip.

(This entry describes my experiences on October 10-11, 2008.)