Surviving Tham Chang Cave - Laos (Part 1)
Marc and I arrived in Vang Vien a few days ago. It is the right sized town, one paved road through it's centre, an internet café, a few restaurants and a couple of different night spots. Last night we stayed out drinking Pow-Pow, which is some local moonshine made from rice. I woke this morning with bleach stains on my pants where I had rested my hands the night before. My head hurts and my throat has spicy bile to it that won't go away.
"Wakey wakey..." Marc is pursing my lips with something. My eyelids are still too heavy to open, but the flick, flick of the lighter startles me out of my coma. From my lips juts a quarter ounce of weed rolled in newspaper. I start to admonish him but see he is hurt and instead offer "It's going to be like this, eh?".
Marc offers his boyish, wide eyed smile and I sit up. He even has coffee ready and we drag ourselves out to the balcony to play our customary game of Asshole to wake ourselves to a brand new day.
It's already getting warm (though it might already be 10 or 11), the sun is still driving it's waves through the morning haze. Vang Vien is beautiful and our view from our second story balcony helps alleviate my disconnected feeling brought on by the bad hang over and more so by the joint.
Money goes far in Laos. The exchange rate for KIP is 5000:1. Our room is 8000KIP each and our quarter pound cost 15,000KIP ($3). It's not very good stuff as you can imagine. The lack of oxygen and influx of carbon monoxide are probably the main effects, but hailing from Ottawa, we would spend hours some nights, in the bitter cold, tracking down equitable contraband for $10-15/gram.
Our balcony mates come back (presumably from breakfast) and roll their eyes at our sorry and dilapidated state.
Life is Laos is good. Our balcony mates are helping my attitude. There are 3 girls sharing a room next door that we travelled to Vang Vien with. They're all pretty. Two are from Vancouver, and one is a beautiful Swede. We bonded with them on a harrowing slow boat ride on the Mekong, coming from northern Thailand, through the Golden Triangle. The boat was severely overloaded and almost capsized more than once. We also saw a tied up, bloated dead body floating down the river which spurred innumerable conversations and catchy song Marc made up on the spot.
I really like Hanna (the Swede), but she has yet to forgive me for breaking her Chanel (sp?) sunglasses a day ago.
"How can you start in on such nonsense, so early?" Hanna asks, a hint of condemnation directed solely at me.
"C'mon" says Marc, "Play a game and join us for breakfast."
"Look at that view, how an you not start your day like this?" I add, looking at Hanna for an easement in her reproach. Definitely not getting any.
"You boys are hilarious, it's lunch time!" Carly banters back. "We're headed to the internet café, coming?"
"Ya." Marc and I say in unison. We fill our day bags with money and weed and wait for the girls to collect whatever girls need and we amble down the steps after them.
Continued tomorrow..
