Sandy Does Southeast Asia

The best thing about travelling solo and with no return date or itinerary is that I can change my mind at the last minute. It doesn’t really matter to me where I go and it certainly doesn’t affect anyone else. So I decided that instead of the Chiang Rai –> Chiang Khong –> Laos route, I’ll head halfway back south, then turn left (East, whatever) and go into Laos that way (see previous entry for why). That’s the plan for now, anyway.

I went out to the train station this afternoon and bought a ticket for tomorrow morning to Phitsanulok, a centrally located city that is a little over half the size of Chiang Mai. Geographically, that will put me in a good position to make the next move (i.e. decide which border to cross to renew my visa, in case I change my mind about going to Vientiane).

And I get to ride a train! I’m excited about that. It’s a seven-hour trip and knowing me, I will remain excited for about one of those hours, then spend the next six wondering if we’re almost there yet.

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Writing Update

I woke up this morning at 4:30 and knew that the story was completely wrong. Not surprising, since Realizing That Things Are Completely Wrong has recently gone beyond a personal hobby and way over into the territory of vocation. The more important thing is that I realized not only specifically what was wrong with it, but exactly how to fix it. Over breakfast a five-page synopsis blurted out with almost no effort.

The good news is that I think it’s going to be about 200 million times better than the original idea. The bad news is that I need to start almost from scratch. Oh well. It’s not like I have anything better to do at the moment.

When I went in for my Hepatitis A booster before I left, the doctor at the travel clinic suggested I fill a prescription for Malarone and take it with me so I’d have an anti-malarial on hand for Laos. Me – clever, miserly girl that I am – figured I would wait until I was in Thailand since I’d heard time and again that you can buy anti-malarials very easily and for much less expense once in-country.

I went to the pharmacy yesterday to stock up before leaving Chiang Mai. Pharmacies here (and most other places I’ve been) are more like clinics in the US, and eliminate the need to go to a doctor and get a prescription and then go to the pharmacy to get it filled. It’s like one-stop shopping. You go straight to the pharmacy and talk to the doctor there and he gives you the medicine. I asked for Malarone. He said they didn’t have it; that they only had Doxycycline. Anything-cycline is a no-go for me so I resorted to the tried-and-true method of simply ignoring what he’d said and asking again for what I wanted.

“You cannot get that here,” he said.

“I can’t get it here,” I asked, waving my hands around the counter and in his general direction, “or here?” now waving my hands around in the air.

He looked at me with a quizzical half-smile that confirmed my suspicion that two weeks without a normal conversation is doing very little to improve my already imprecise style of verbal exchange. “In Thailand?” I clarified.

He nodded, “It is not imported to be sold in Thailand. Only Doxycycline.”

“And that’s a broad-spectrum antibiotic, right?” Right.

Soooo we have a spot of trouble here. My body is highly intolerant of broad-spectrum antibiotics. The last time I took them (for 10 days), it resulted in a crippling three-month bout of digestive malfunction. Even before that, I’ve found that I get weak and generally very, very unwell from just a few days on antibiotics. And the kicker is that not only would I have to start them three days before entering Laos, I’d have to continue taking them for four weeks after leaving.

I’m not sure what to do. I emailed the travel clinic in Pasadena just to make sure I have all the information.

Obviously, I can’t justify running the risk of being exposed to a fatal disease…and I also can’t justify putting myself in harm’s way with the antibiotics either. And I can’t decide which is less bad (aaaand I am sick and tired of being presented with two almost equally horrible options and getting to decide between them – free will, huzzah!).

One thing I’m thinking is I might turn around and head back to the southern border of Laos and then cross over into Vientiane since the capital is the only guaranteed malaria-free place in Laos. But that would mean missing the Mekong boat trip & Luang Prabang which were at the top of my very, very short list of must sees on this trip.

I have to decide soonish because my Thai visa is ticking down and I’ll need to do a border crossing in the next week & a half or so.

If anyone has suggestions, I’m all ears.

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