I perhaps haven't mentioned before in this diary that I suffer from migraines. When one comes, I get a blind spot somewhere in my field of vision, a shimmering circle of grey, that over about half an hour grows until it is difficult and nauseating to look at anything.

My vision then clears up and there follows several hours of headache, generally feeling sick, photosensitive eyes and occasionally vomiting. Before this trip, I got one every two or three months, but during my travels they've been coming more frequently, probably one a month. Seeing as they seem to be tied to changes in stress levels, irregular meals, possibly eating dodgy food, possibly being too cold at night (?), this increase in frequency isn't surprising. I had been mulling for a few days as I crossed into Laos that I hadn't had one for a while, at for least two months - so I wasn't that surprised when I got one an hour into the bus ride out of Boten. I imagine all migraine sufferers go through a similar checklist when one hits: what medicine do I have on me, how far I am from home, where can I spend the blindness bit of the migraine, where can I spend the ensuing headache hours? At first, I was quite worried - I had nowhere as a base where I could retreat to and collapse. And a bumpy bus across the Lao countryside was not perhaps the best place to relax in. But then I realised it wasn't a bad place to be at all, I could shut my eyes on the bus and probably would just need to find the Pholay guesthouse, recommended on the Roughguide's website, with a bit of a rough headache.

Some hours later, substantially recovered, perhaps my still not good head is responsible for how I'm feeling about Laos, I'm not sure. But I'm getting nothing from the town I've travelled to, Oudomxai. I was aware it was supposed to be fairly lifeless, but I don't mind lifeless generally, and towns people pass through onto other places can be very interesting. But this town is pretty depressing. Nor, strangely, is the idea of visiting some of the northern Lao villages and nature very appealling at the moment. It struck me, just now, that going from frenetic China to Laos was never going to be an easy adjustment. My brain is still set for more stuff and drama happening around it - I've gone from the bright lights of Kunming to a town where they only turn on the electricity at 6pm.

My solution to this is to head for Luang Prabang tomorrow. Luang Prabang is the one place in Laos everyone has told me to go to, a beautiful town, strong Lao culture, the centre of the country's tourism and lots of traveller amenities. I plan to go there, enjoy the lovely city, ease down to a slower pace of life, probably get sick of how touristy it all is, then head for the countryside and natural wonders in the right frame of mind.

I'm definitely feeling unused to travelling. I feel as though I'm starting my trip again, unsure what I want to do with my time, how much money I should be spending, where I want to go. That feeling of pointlessness, that feeling of floating without meaning, I felt all the way back in New York has returned; the things I have given up weigh heavily.
South East Asia could also be a very different type of travelling. I've met more travellers in this nowhere Laos transport hub than I met in almost everywhere I went in China, excepting maybe HK, Yangshao and Dali. I spend the evening chatting with two Frenchmen, an Englishman and an Italian. Each of them has come in from northern Thailand, each is a bit surprised I have crossed the border from China. The way they talk about Thailand makes me smile, they list in quite perfect detail how to find a particular travel agency on Kho San Road, or how to reach a particular "Lady" bar in central Chiang Mai. For long periods, the conversation is entirely devoted to a prescise discussion of where the cheapest VIP bus ticket from Bangkok to Chiang Mai can be found, or where the cheapest visa to Vietnam can be obtained. It is like men directing you around their favourite local pubs. One asks me about Chinese prostitutes - he seems quite affronted when I apologletically say I came across only a few.

Thailand sounds fascinating, but also like it will be a challenge. Not a challenge to travel around and find the essentials, it sounds as though a lager lout with a sunburnt belly and a full moon hangover could manage it. But to have an experience of Thailand beyond, "Life's easy here!" could be difficult. I think my plan will involve just travelling slowly, seeing some of the cities in the middle of the country that maybe fewer people go to, spending a while studying different bits of Thai culture like cooking and massage, trying to stay with an urban Thai family at some point, spend some time in Bangkok (though away from Kho San road's guesthouses).

And, either way, Cambodia sounds wonderful and much less tamed - plus I am keen to return to Malaysia, the first non-first world country I ever visited (on a two week holiday a few years ago) and see how I now see it with my supposedly experienced traveller's eyes.

As evening in Oudomxai draws, how depressing this place is becomes clearer. While there are odd sparks of life, twenty kids splashing beneath the bridge in the town's brown river, it is almost a town waiting to happen, a town waiting for that new road across the Chinese border to be finished. In the west of the town there is a long row of Chinese guesthouses and various construction sites - it feels a bit like China's mania for building and business has followed me south. In Boten, nothing was happening, but that felt relaxing, how things should be. Here in Oudomxai, I feel like I should be doing something, but there is nothing going on among the chained shut buildings and lacksidaisical young men hanging around each of the many guesthouses. Bring me to Luang Prabang on a swift wind.

PS One reason for mentioning the migraine thing, is that I'm summoning the courage to eat cheese in Luang Prabang. For the last few years, I haven't touched cheese, chocolate or red wine, as a doctor advised me they might help bring on migraines. But clearly I'm still getting these headaches, and it feels a lot like the cheese etc thing has become more of a taslimanic protection than a scientific one. I want to reintroduce the probably least guilty of the trio, cheese, to my diet - writing this forces me to carry the plan out.

Daniel, 28 April 2004, Oudomxai