Vientiane III
It took me an hour and a half to upload about ten pictures yesterday, so no more of that here. I also saw a familiar gait on the sandbar of the Mekong and sure enough, it was Jean-Pierre from Luxembourg whom I’ve met four other times already in Laos. We went to the Mekong River Festival and watched things get blown down by the wind and expecting heavy rain yet again. It ended up not raining though, but it was quite chilly when the sun set.
At around 9pm I walked to the park towards the Future Bar and noticed about six to ten policemen stopping vehicles randomly. Some were sent back on their way fairly soon afterwards, but others were there for quite some time. The cops didn’t have any police vehicles, but rather three personal motor scooters. I saw at least two newer trucks just blow by them and the cops made no attempt at chasing them. I didn’t want to get too close so I couldn’t see exactly what was happening between the cops and the drivers. It seemed shady.
I got to the bar at 10 and of course, Marco was nowhere to be found. There were several people there, a few Caucasians, some non-Laos Asians, and some locals. It’s a pretty small bar with thumping music and no dance floor. I finished my big bottle of Beerlao and left. On the way back to the guest house before the curfew I kept getting accosted by ladyboys. Who knew there was such a market for them in Laos and that the communist government would be so tolerant.
This morning I checked out of my room and had a nice breakfast at the Scandinavian Bakery down the road. Then I went for a walk down to the Mekong riverbank. It was a good three hundred meters from the high water bank and the sand here is flecked with golden particles just like in Kratie, Cambodia. So I’m sure now that it’s really not gold that Meggie and I were looking at.
At 7pm tonight I’m off to Pakse. Hopefully it’ll be a nice bus for as much as I paid for it.
