Laos to Vietnam, on $50
Tuesday, December 5th, 2006If you plan to traverse 200 miles in a country with only two ATM’s, don’t leave with only $50.
On my last night in Laos, I spent it over dinner with two Laos and an Irishman. Our hotel was on stilts on an ancient lake, with huge limestock peaks jutting out of the ground around us. After dinner the Irishman and I do as the Irish do, and drank ourselves silly talking philosophical thoughts. It was the best night of the trip, and a wonderful way to leave Laos. However, the beer squandered 1/5 of my remaining cash.
This was the wild west of Laos, (metaphoricly, geographicaly it was the north-east corner) where no one speaks English and there is very little transportation. In the misty, hungover morning, I packed up my bag and set off down the road by foot, asking locals to point me to Vietnam. Walking past the local schools, the kids would get so excited to see a foreigner they would all run to the entrance of the grounds and flashed smiles that melt your heart. And they did, and helped me to walk for that cold hour shrouded in mist. After 3 miles, a pickup truck taxi offered to take me to the border for $8. I agreed. I arrived at the line to Vietnam with $28 in my pocket and an ATM card I didn’t know where to use.
Unbeknown to me, this was the sleepiest, least traveled border crossing in Laos. The 2 guards on duty were indeed asleep, and I could have just strolled on through into the deep reaches of Vietnam. However I needed my stamps. After waking them up and having my bag searched, I proceed on by foot again, on windy mountain roads and past towns that didn’t look charming enough to sleep in.
I walked and walked, hoping for some speck of civilization. I’d pass small villages and the kids would come out to greet me, but there was less charm and calm to their manner, and they yelled at me to hire a motorcyle ride for $10, which is much more than I could spare. I kept walking. 3 hours I walked, the snaking mountain roads under overcast skies. Each step had a subtle terror to it, I was scared. The daunting fact came to me that I had never been in a more vulnerable position in my entire life. Money is the wind that makes the travel wheel turn, and I was running out of it, and fast. Plus the mountain roads were leading nowhere, only to more fog and more road. Bamboo houses punctuated the road every few miles, but I had been told the bus was gone for the day and judging by the looks of things, there was no ATM anywhere.
Finally a trusting looking man rode his bike past me, tickled to see a foreigner. I thrust up the meager offer of $3 in Lao kip; he smiled and accepted. We drove the road I had been planning on walking, there was not a town for 5 miles. He dropped me off in front of a restaurant in another small farming town that was just a little more developed than what I’d seen on the road before. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was 100 miles from an ATM or hotel.
Outside the restaurant, confused locals swarmed me to get a look. No one spoke english and my hand gestures weren’t working. It’s hard to ask for a hotel room at a restaurant, especially in the middle of the most rural of towns in Vietnam.
Amid the confusion, finally the schoolteacher burst through the crowd huddled around me. She spoke English. I told her my situation with worried eyes, and what she told me put me at ease. She arranged for me to sleep in the restaurant and have dinner for $5. A bus would come at 4am which could take me to a city with an ATM for $5. She changed my remaining dollars into Vietnamese Dong and I finally felt that things were on the right track. I spent the evening watching Vietnamese news with a crowd of 20. When they cleared out at about 8, I made my place on a straw mat on a wooden platform where their entire family had eaten dinner, cross-legged, only hours before. I found little bits of rice where I lay.
At 4am the bus came, and I jumped on with a large smile. The driver sat me down on a stool next to the steering wheel and wrote $40 USD on a piece of paper. The smile vanished. I was a little panicked, and wrote down $10. He motioned to the door of the bus, signaling it wasn’t enough money. Heartbroken, I stood to get off, but he pulled me back. I ripped the wallet from my pocket and turned it upside down, showing him all that I had was $15 in Vietnamese dong. He took all of it and told me to sit down. Triple the price everyone else paid on the bus, and I had officially run out of money. I was a nervous wreck for most of the ride, unsure about the ATM I had been promised.
I made my situation very clear to the people on the bus. I learned the words for ‘I need’ ‘Bank’ and ‘ATM’, which is universal: ‘Ah-Tee-Em’. When we arrived at the bus station they arranged a motorcycle to take me to the bank. Overjoyed, I ran into the ATM stall and requested the highest amount possible. An error screen popped up, and angrily spit out my card. I tried one more time, praying, absolutely needing it to work. I asked for a much lesser amount, thinking maybe I had requested too much before, and Ho Chi Minhs stunning picture crawled out of the ATM. I was saved, money never felt so good. I looked up the word for train and instructed the motorcycle to take me to the station. The next train was in 5 hours, and I waited in the sad, damp station and made a good dent in Desert Solitaire. After 5 hours the train arrived and took me here, to Nimh Binh, which has an ATM that I will return to tomorrow. I plan to put a small fortune in my backpack before leaving, so as to avert such a mess again.
These were the most uncertain hours of my life, and it could have been much worse. A few more beers with the Irishman might have made the bribe for the bus driver not enough, and I might still be 100 miles away in the rice fields of the mountains. Luckily, it all worked out, and tonight I splurged and spent $5 on a room that has cable. It could have been worse, much worse.
I’ll will be in Hanoi tomorrow. The flight I decided not to get would have arrived yesterday. All that, to save what ended up being about $20. Adventure indeed.
Today I just walked out from my hotel door to see what was around the area, I was pleasantly suprised. Very nice day in the wilderness.
There are rocky trails all along ... 
bumwaiter