The Observer Goes South

My very first Observer Column submitted from south of the equator is also the first sequel I've written to a previous Observer Column.: it was meant to be funny (of course) although people have told me it's a bit sad.  I'll let you decide:

http://www.ndsmcobserver.com/viewpoint/true-love-in-bali-1.1126671

My Lao Run-Down

Note: I’ve been working on this off and on for the last couple weeks.  It only pertains to my time in Laos, and some of the sections were written much earlier than it was published.

Where Am I NOW?? (sort of)

After our brief stay in Jinghong, China, it was time to make our way into Laos.  We took two buses to get from Jinghong to the border city of Mengla (where we spent the night).  The next morning we crossed over into Laos, and took a van to Luang Namtha.  After a two day trek and other activities we took the most miserable bus ride of my life to Luang Prabang (the line on the map is an estimation of where we must have gone).

After a couple days in Luang Prabang, we then took a van to the river city of Vang Vieng where we spent a week tubing down the Nam Song and drinking too much.  From there we took a shorter bus to Vientiane (which is the capital of Laos). 

(I’m actually now in Bali, but I’ll detail how I got here at a later time)

Five Things I’m thinking about This Week:

They Put Four Straws in them for a reason

Vang Vieng is probably the coolest place I have ever been.  It is a small traveler town that is filled with western tourists (mainly from Australia and Europe).  The town is on a river, and the main attraction is tubing down the river.  Basically, you rent an innertube and they drive you several miles up the river.  Then, there are makeshift bars on the river, and you just get really drunk and swing off of swings into the river and fly down ziplines.

It is awesome.

The idea is that you just float from bar to bar down the river in your inner tube until you get back to town (where there are more bars on an island).

What ends up happening, however, is that everybody just stays at the first three bars drinking and swinging off the swings into the river.  On our first day there we went to the river for what would become round one of five.  I started off slow with a couple beers and some swinging.  Then I decided it was time to get drunk, so I bought a bucket of Whisky-Coke for myself (I imagine there are about 5-6 shots of whisky in the bucket).

After finishing my first bucket, I was somewhat drunk, but decided that I needed to drink another bucket.  I didn’t really calculate in my mind whether or not the first bucket had taken full effect, but after a few more swings I purchased my second bucket of the afternoon.  During the second bucket is where things get a little hazy, but I remember that I nearly finished it when Gavin said we needed to float down the river.  I swung down into the river, and Gavin tossed me an innertube.

While we were floating down the river, I decided to get out and do another zipline at another bar.  After I was done at this bar, I got back in my innertube and continued floating.  I passed out in the inner-tube (briefly waking up to prove that unlike Ted, I am not vomit-free since ‘93). 

When I woke up it was dark and cold.  I was shivering and I couldn’t see any other tubes in either direction on the river.  I didn’t know where I was and I didn’t know if I had passed to spot where we were supposed to get out of the tubes or not.  I floated for a while longer, and then some Lao guy picked me up in a boat and drove me back to town.  Obviously, I had no money with me, so he carried my inner tube to the rental place and took half of my deposit.  I stumbled back to my guest house and passed out.

Sometime later, I awoke, thankful to be alive and fully aware of the fact that they put four straws in the buckets for a very good reason (although this episode didn’t stop me from getting two buckets again three days later). 

On Variables and Incidents

This week it was the return of one of my favorite television shows, Lost, and the final season should prove to be as amazing as the previous five.  For those fans of Lost out there, here are five ‘under-the-radar’ questions that I hope are resolved.  I’m omitting the obvious ones like: “What is the connection between Locke, the Man-in-Black, and the Smoke Monster?’* as well as the questions I don’t actually think will be answered like ‘What are the numbers?’

5) How did Locke’s dad get to the island in Season 3, and what is the magic box that Ben discusses then?

4) Why was Desmond in a military prison?

3) How did Charles Widmore make his fortune, and what are his objectives?

2) What happened to Richard and the Others when Ben moved the island and the time-shifting began? 

1)    Who were all the people Sayid killed while working for Ben?  Who is The Economist?

*This was apparently so obvious that they decided to make it clear less than two hours into the final season.

What a story it’ll make, Ray.

As far as I can recall, there is only one book I have ever read twice, and that book is The Catcher in the Rye.  So I guess JD Salinger will be missed, but I really don’t know.

I’ll Be There For You

One of the unique things about Vang Vieng is how most of the restaurants are situated.  At almost every restaurant in the city, all of the tables are short and raised up.  There are pillows behind one side, and you basically lay down at the table and face the televisions that are in front of the restaurant.

Every one of these restaurant either airs one of two television programs: Family Guy or Friends.  As Family Guy becomes nearly unwatchable after roughly 1.7 hours (hey, this is like that time when I . . .) I stuck with one restaurant for my midafternoon relaxation after tubing, and in the 5 and a half days that I went to this restaurant, or just walked past the restaurant and watched an episode for awhile, the entire run of the show cycled through almost one full time. 

While I certainly didn’t see most of the episodes, this way of viewing a show like Friends really gave me the chance to make some broad macro-points about it, which I’ll do now with bullet points:

-The character of Joey is never evolved at all, doesn’t change at all, and simply gets more stupid as the show progresses.  This is really a shame as a show that lasted for so long should have had ample time to give depth to all of its characters.  In later seasons the producers seemed to think that by making Joey ‘fall in love’ with Rachel would give his character depth, but it comes across as completely cliché (although, maybe Friends is what made things that are now cliché, cliché).

-Rachel’s character’s conclusion would really annoy my Gender Studies professor from college.  When viewed as a whole, the story of Friends is really Rachel’s story.  The main dramatic arc of the Pilot starts with Rachel leaving her wedding, and she grows far more than any other character throughout the course of the show.  Compared with other characters, say Phoebe, Rachel storylines make far more season-ending cliffhangers, and they are always given more prominence.

With that said, the ending of the show would really annoy any proper feminist because it appears that after all these years of growth and maturation, and all the hard work with her job; when push comes to shove in the series finale, she ends up giving all that away to be with Ross. 

-Overall, the characters start out as real characters, but slowly become caricatures of the original characters.  As the series goes on, each character eventually gets boiled down to one or two traits that were originally unique. Monica just becomes very loud and controlling.  Chandler’s jokes and sarcasm become more and more.  Ross becomes more and more dopey.  

I wouldn’t care that much about this because the show remained funny and enjoyable throughout, but I am worried that it is a warning for what is currently happening with How I Met Your Mother.  While Barney was always a caricature of a real person, the other characters always seemed like real people you could meet.  Now we find Ted become more and more ‘douchy’; Robin becoming far more commitment averse and psychologically dependent on her looks than she ever was in previous seasons; and Marshall and Lily becoming far more ‘couply’ than they ever used to be. 

Does any of this matter as long as the show remains funny and entertaining?

The Bus Ride From Hell

It didn’t start off terribly.  Sure, every seat was full, but I was able to close my eyes and get a few hours of sleep as we left Luang Namtha and made our way to Luang Prabang in northern Laos.  It was supposed to take about nine hours or so, and I figured that I would be able to sleep during most of it and listen to podcasts and watch television shows for the rest of it.

Boy, was I wrong.

Roughly one hour into this bus ride, the driver started to blast some music so loudly that there was no possible way I could have slept.  If that music had continued the rest of the ride, I probably would have soon offered the driver some serious cash, maybe 500,000 kip (like $60), to shut off the music.  Luckily it didn’t have to come to this, and by the first stop some people got off the bus that netted me my own row.

The second part of the bus ride was very pleasant.  I was able to listen to Meet the Press, I was able to read some of The Economist that we bought in Shanghai, and I was able to just relax.  It was probably the best two hours of a bus ride I had while in Laos.  Clearly (as you can tell by the title of this section) this did not last.

At the second stop, people started to get on the bus: a lot of people.  Not only were all of the seats full, but then people started to sit on bags of rice that had been piled into the aisle.  Once the bus started again, the music started.  This time, however, there was no possible way for me to even make it to the front of the bus to make my Godfather-offer to the driver.  I was stuck, and there was nothing I could do.

The seats having very little leg room, I first began to get cramped.  I tried to stretch out my legs, but there wasn’t enough room.  I then tried to open a window because the air quality was getting dramatically worse in the bus.  That wouldn’t work because clearly the Lao girl sitting next to me could not get her hair messed up.  Finally, as I had trouble breathing with my legs cramped against a seat and nowhere I could move; my situation changed.

After a couple hours of the music blaring across the bus, I got a spitting head ache.  I could barely hear myself think, I was having trouble breathing, and there was no place to move my legs.  Eventually (3 hours later, after a total of 11.5 hours on the bus) we got to Luang Prabang and I was able to get off the bus.

I celebrated with a nice, cold, Beer Lao.

Pictures, Pictures, Pictures:

As of this moment, I have all of my pictures on Flickr.  If I get a chance before I re-enter China, I hope to make a “Best Of” album for Facebook.  For now, you can look at all of my pictures (neatly divided into Sets, but with absolutely no descriptions on them) here.

Tales From Toledo (and I’m not talking about Ohio)

As most of you probably know, my sister Julie is currently studying in Toledo, Spain.  This section is written by her (with only limited edit by myself).

Estamos en la lista de Juan Carlos Carrera

Last weekend my friends and I ventured off to Madrid in search of all Spain’s capital has to offer.  We visited the Prado and the Retiro, saw a Real Madrid game, and even went to the Museo del Jamon once or twice (or 5 times) for some bocadillos. 

As we walked to the Prado at 4 PM (the time we could go for free), we noticed a line that seemingly went on for blocks of teenagers and young adults alike…at 4 PM on a Saturday.  So one of our friends walked over and asked one of the girls who looked most like Julia Roberts’ best friend in Pretty Woman what was going on. Their response? “We’re waiting in line to go to the discoteca, duh.”  At 4PM?

After feeling somewhat silly for asking, our friend walked back over to recount the story to us and we walked over to the Prado.  Although we did and saw some great things during the day, nothing will ever compare to the excitement we felt when we were informed that we were on “the list” at Madrid’s biggest discoteca, “El Capital”.  Why were we so excited and what does this have to do with that long line?

That line filled with slutty looking adolescents fed into Madrid’s biggest discoteca, El Capital.  As it has been described to us, El Capital is the mecca of discotecas, as it boasts 7 floors with different music on each one, 10.50 Euro drinks and 18 Euro cover (however as we learned the night before, the better dressed/better looking a girl is, the price goes down). Being on the list results in no wait and no cover charge, and we were on that list…as long as we get there after 1:30 AM.

As 1:45 AM rolled around, we decided fashionably late had occurred and it was a good time to exercise our power that was “la lista de Juan Carlos Carrera”.  We walked up to the huge bouncer at El Capital and one of my friends said “We’re on the list, las lista de Juan Carlos Carerra.”  The bouncer looked really confused and responds, “There is no list, it ended at 1:30.”

Generally any embarrassed person would walk away and hop in line with everyone else.  Are we those kind of people? No.  And our friend persisted, “No, no, but we’re on the list, la lista de Juan Carlos Carerra!”.  This went back and forth for sometime, until we decided our friend had misinformed us about “la lista de Juan Carlos Carerra” and it actually ended at 1:30. 

At this point we decided we were not paying 18 euro to get in, and found somewhere else where they let us in for free.  Excursion to El Capital: Failure. 

Meal of the Week:

When we were in Northern Laos we did a trek through the jungle to a village.  For those of you that don’t know, trekking is basically long-term hiking.  We hiked through the jungle for a day, spent the night in a Lao village, and then hiked through another stretch of jungle the next day.  The hiking was a lot of fun because we were able to see a lot of the great Laos scenery, and parts even became very difficult.

During the trek, we ate four meals: two lunches, one breakfast, and one dinner.  The lunches that we ate were in the middle of the hike, and actually consisted of food that one of the guides had been carrying.  Our dinner was prepared by the guide over a fire.

Each of these meals were pretty similar.  There was a type of meat (pork, beef, or duck) some plant looking things that I ate sparingly, and sticky rice.  Sticky rice is pretty cool because it is rice that (obviously, I suppose) sticks together into a large clump.  To eat it you have to break pieces off with your hands.

Sticky rice is a staple of the Lao cuisine.  While rice is eaten a ton throughout China, sticky rice is literally the meal in Northern Laos.  We ate sticky rice as the primary item for four meals straight while we were trekking, but the Laos people eat it for an eternity.

               

Beer of the Week:

One thing that I will never forget about the two weeks we spent travelling in Laos is the Beer of choice all across the country: Beer Lao.  Beer Lao is a great beer.  I enjoyed it with meals and I enjoyed it when it was time to get really drunk. 

The interesting thing about Beer Lao (for me at least) was how ubiquitous it was around the country.  In Laos, Beer Lao has a market share roughly equivalent to all the Budweiser, Miller, and Coors brands COMBINED in America.  Most restaurants and bars in Laos are denoted by the same yellow signs featuring the Beer Lao logo and the name of the place.

I’ve never seen a beer so universal, and as long as I can remember my time in Laos, I’ll remember Beer Lao.

Quotations of the Week:

“People ask you how old you are because they wished they looked like you.” –Stupid Girl at bar after she asked me how old I was.

“It was the best two years of my life.”—An Israeli girl describing her time in the Army.

Picture of the Week:

This is a picture of the second bar on the Nam Song River in Laos, to give you an idea of how awesome this place was.  Notice the zipline in the upper right hand corner, the swings in the background on the left, and all of the people day drinking at the bar.