Laos is the backwaters of South East Asia. It's only got 4 million people compared to Vietnam's 70 million and Thailand's 60 million. It's like the South Dakota of South East Asia. Once you get outside the main towns, there's nothing.

My train ride from Bangers was pleasant and I chatted with a young idealist Dutch girl, and a 69 year old Thai lady who told me she exercises thirty minutes each day. She was very proud that her one son lived in Georgia and owned a Thai restaurant. Then she said "you like Thai food?" I'm WAY over Thai food but of course to be polite I raved about it and said that the fresh ingredients and spicy hotness were great.

I got to the border with no major issues and had a new Thai departure stamp in my passport lickety split. While waiting for the Friendship Bridge bus to get moving, I saw a weird, slightly aggitated guy wearing an Osama bin Laden tshirt. He kept wandering around and generally annoying the seedy looking bus driver, which was fine by me because they banned him from the bus it seemed. It was just weird to see someone wearing a shirt with Osama on it. I've seen them on TV, but never in person before.

I had heard from another traveller that this border's visa service was slow as shit so I got ready for a long wait. Well, what I didn't take into account was the fact that none of the other farang tourists could figure out what "race" meant. I was done with my visa application in thirty seconds while they were trying to spell "caucasian". Righto.

I handed it in, paid my $31 (that $1 extra's for the priviledge of crossing on a weekend), and off I went. As I am notoriously hateful towards taxi and tuktuk drivers, I did not look forward to the impending negotiation. To my surprise though, I walked out and the first guy I saw said 200B. Nope. Then he said the magic fair number of 150. Bingo, let's go.

As it turns out, my driver was a giggly character who didn't get bent out of shape when I changed which guesthouse I wanted to go to from the looks of the outside of the place. He smiled and took me to my second choice. Rock on. Maybe it was the fact that when he asked me where I'm from and what I did, I told him I was a taxi driver from New Zealand and most of my clients were sheep. I asked him if he was from Colombia and he pointed to himself and said "NO! Me Lao!!!"

I checked into my guesthouse, and promptly paid the $6 for the night, which includes aircon and hot water, a huge treat and needed extravagance this time of year. The manager/owner was a middle aged woman who was more than happy to let me chose from several rooms.

After settling in, I set off for Pha That Luang, the most important stupa or Buddhist relic in the country. It was a big gold number that had the appearance of a pointy wedding cake, with layers on top of one another. On the way, I saw the Patuxai monument, which looks like the Arch de Triumphe, but made out of concrete that was sold to Laos for use at the Vientiane airport.

Right after passing the "vertical runway" (some expats nickname for the big ugly concrete archy thing) I saw a truck all tricked out with Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden stickers!! I dug into my bag as fast as I could for my camera but the afternoon heat made me too sluggish and I missed the photo. If I've seen two in the span of 4 hours, I'm sure I'll see more and have to ask them to pose for me.

The weekend is looking dull because well, I have a knack of showing up in places having national holidays. Everything will be closed tomorrow so I bought myself a book to pass the day. If I'm lucky, the Morning Market will be open and I will be able to get to the Buddha Park outside of town.

For those interested, my toe is practically done healing. More to come soon....