Travel Diary #4: Chicken anyone?

My advice to anyone with even the slightest aversion to poultry is to steer well clear of Laos.

Thailand’s most common animal was the dog, at least three scabby specimens per 20m square; the most common animal in Laos seems to be the Chicken (Dogs are few and far between which is rather worrying – what meat are we eating on the Satay sticks ?). It appears that it is compulsory for every dwelling, from the largest hotel to the smallest tin shack, to house one Rooster, three hens and at least six chicks. It’s almost as if the Laos populace are following some twisted government decree : “All homes must keep Poultry. Any household not owning a rampant family of fowl will be incarcerated.”

One side effect of this stunningly large fowl population – apart from the obvious, a large dose of Chicken in the diet; is that 5.30a.m. signals the start of a citywide cacophany of Rooster calls in which hundreds (if not thousands) of Roosters sound ‘Cock-a-doodle-doo’ in a multitude of musical keys and varying pitches. Oh, how I long for the simple electronic bleep of an alarm clock!

Laos has only just opened the borders for falang (we are known as ‘falang’ here, not ‘farang’ as in Thailand) tourism which means that things are never quite as easy as in other Asian countries. Attempting to purchase tickets for either bus or boat travel can be a trying experience which, in the case of boat travel, usually involves huge amounts of highly gesticulated bargaining (not unlike dealing with Tuk Tuk drivers in Thailand).

Landing in Houaixi from Chang Khong, we were immediately introduced to Lao’s sleepy culture. I clambered off the boat, past immigration (two very official looking men whose sole job, between immense bouts of sleep, is to frown whilst handing out immigration forms and cheap biro pens to passing tourists) and into the nearest cafe while Anne played yet another round of the compulsory backpacker favourite : ‘Find a good guest house for the night’.

Thirty minutes later when Anne returned, not one of the five staff members had taken my order! In Thailand you cannot even walk past a cafe or restaurant without one of the staff trying to coaxe you inside – in Laos, it’s your responsibility to find a table and order the food and drinks – a real “You want it, you ask for it” ethos.

A couple of lazy days were spent in Houaixi before boarding the two day slow boat down to ‘Luang Prabhang’, one of Laos three cities. As it’s still the rainy season, most of Lao’s roads are nothing more than two feet of thick red mud punctuated by the occassional land-slide. This means that most excursions into the country are achievied through the use of slow boats that splutter up and down the Maekhong river on a regular basis.

Slow boats really have to be experienced – no words could fully describe two back breaking, ass numbing days spent on one of these traditional Maekhong vessels. The boat itself is almost 40 foot in length, around 8 feet wide and constructed by nailing various pieces of wood together in quite a haphazard fashion. It has three main sections, the wheel house, the storage area and an engine compartment that doubles for a staff kitchen when at sail.

A longboat kitchen

Unfortunately for falang passangers, the boat has been built for the diminutive Laos frame, this makes standing upright impossible and means that visits to the onboard lavatory; a hole cut into the floor at the very back of the boat and open for all to see, are dangerous affairs indeed. You first have to clamber through the storage area (which, along with the passengers, can hold anything from pigs and chickens to sacks of rice) and past the open engine (trying not to get your clothes caught in the propeller shaft or fan belt) before crouching through the entrance to the toilet. You then have to ‘do the business’ whilst trying to avoid the rudder chains, convieniently placed exactly where your feet should rest. It is also not uncommon to be caught ‘in full flow’ by a group of highly amused children standing on the river bank!

Riverbank children

After the boat has been stuffed with an assortment of goods and passangers, two of the four resident crew members manouvre the boat out into the fast flowing Maekhong using large bamboo sticks, the engine is hotwired by a third member of staff (the onboard mechanic) while the fourth battles with the wheel in an amusing attempt to stay on course.

The “mechanic”

At this time of year, the Maekhong is a dangerous river indeed; full of whirlpools, strong undertows and large floating dead trees big enough to shatter a slow boat into miniscule shards of timber. For this reason, two people are required to ‘captain’ the boat; one steers while the other (usually the mechanic) keeps a look out for dangerous currents or pieces of flotsam.

A view of the Maekhong river

Seven hours of crouching in the hold and a few ‘stunt man’ trips to the lavatory took us down the Maekhong to ‘Pakbeng’, a one street village that resembles a gold rush town from America’s wildwest. The towns one street contains an abundance of hastily constructed wooden accommodation, full of character and usually with stunning river views. One night in Pakbeng and you rise with the Roosters, ready to board the slow boat for the second leg of the journey to Louang Prabhang.

Eventually, Luang Prabhang appears from behind a canopy of Palm trees. Built on the delta between the Maekhong and Namtok rivers, it occupies a space roughly 1 kilometre long and 0.25 kilometres wide. The town itself exudes quaint French colonial charm and has been declared a world heritage site by UNESCO. Most of the houses, shops and even the former Royal palace, are built to resemble traditional French buildings – it’s rather like walking into an episode of “It a’int half hot mum” in which the entire Indian cast has been replaced by smiling Lao understudies.