| hello everyone, we are at the lao border! today our odometer recorded 999km total tripdistance. we just missed 1000, so ed was going to spin the front wheel ofmy bike just so we could have a round number. i didn't let him though.... tomorrow we are crossing into laos. we'll be in vientianne for 2 days.we'll be checking with the american embassy there to find out if thebiking we are planning to do is safe or not. we read somewhere that aportion of the road we're planning to take (this is the only road in laosby the way) might not be safe, and there might also be problems withflooding at this time of year. if travelling through laos doesn't turn outto be a good idea, we are planning to fly (with our bikes) to china. wechecked today, and for 100$ we should be able to get a one way planeticket from vientianne to kunming in china. the monsoon is definitely here now. for the past 3 days it's been rainingevery day, fortunatelly all in the afternoon. twice we were caught inmajor downpours, once riding to a restaurant and once yesterday, justbefore we reached our hotel. it's intimidating at first, it rains so hard,but then you get soaked and you can't get any wetter, so you just keepriding. riding in the rain is definitely more dificult than on dry ground.the puddles slow us down a lot, plus we have two punchos that we put on inan attempt to keep ourselves and our backpacks relatively dry, butunfortunatelly they swell with wind and create considerable drag. today we got to a big city, called nong khai. we were both really excitedespecially at the prospect of having a bit of diversity foodwise. we'vebeen having rice and noodle dishes pretty much 3 times a day every day.there's not much else to be had besides that in the country. there arefruits, which we have for snacks and deserts, and which make a nicechange, but still... ed was getting a bit exasperated with the foodsituation (hard to beleive, he loves rice so much at home). i am handlingit a bit better, but we're both looking forward to the french bakeriesthat are supposedly in vientianne (lots of french influence in laos sinceit used to be a french colony). i have learnt to eat rice and chicken forbreakfast. i couldn't really do it at first, it seemed too weird,especially since i am used to toast and jam, or eggs at most. my pallatejust wasn't ready for it. but after i've had it a few times, i realizedthat it gives me a lot more and better energy than the breakfast i am usedto so i started liking it and wanting it. because we're biking, i reallyneed a lot of energy, and if i don't eat i really see the effects as islow down considerably.i am looking forward to lao food, i wonder how it will be different formthai... today when we got into town, we met a guy from australia and a woman fromthe us, travelling independently but together (they just paired up overthe past few days). they are travelling from place to place by bus,throughout south east asia. apparently the bus rides they are taking arebetween 20 and 35 hours. it sounds pretty nightmarish, so ed and i arereally happy to be doing this by bike.meeting these people was nice though, you don't realize how much you misssharing your impressions with someone who sees things more from yourperspective until you actually do it. we were talking at a street cornerand laughing at the little things that happened to all of us, such asbeing treated as oddities/celebrities wherever we go, or getting the samedish for breakfast lunch and dinner because that's all you can say inthai, etc. last night we slept in a little bungallow owned by a nice family. we werethe only guests, so obviously we became the center of attention. whilewe're eating, they turned on this huge tv for us, for entertainment. inthe meantime, they all sat on their chairs, facing us, their backs to thetv, just watching us eat. i just couldn't stop laughing, it was all sofunny. they laughed too, and although we couldn't understand each otherlanguagewise, it was nice. i think that in laos the governmment is a lot more restrictive with themedia, internet and everything else as compared to thailand. so i am notsure how much access to email we will have. so don't worry if you don'treceive mail with the usual frequency (some people might be going 'thankgod!'). well, i'm off now, trying to find that second hand english bookstore i waswriting to you about last time, and maybe get some food (i am so hungry!),so until next time, keep well and be happy! cu drag,raluca |
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