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Cope with me for a moment
Back on the horse Robert. People need you. So I say so to myself.
It’s hard sometimes to write, because sometimes you have a blog post that you want to get out there, but you don’t have the time to do the research to do it justice, and such is the case in this blog about Laos.
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- Entrance to COPE
I have left Laos over 10 days ago I think, and still this post has been haunting me since then. Making it harder to move on to more current updates. It has to do with a museum, small little museum in Vientiane, the capital of Laos.
As far as capitals in the world goes, Vientiane is very underwhelming, the night market was very repetitive, the food ok. Overall, if someone was to ask me, should I go to Vientiane? My answer would be, not really, however if you do have a few hours of your time in the city I would recommend going into the COPE museum. That is, if you can find it first. Is not really a museum, but more like a room with some exhibitions on it. It’s free and it survives on donations and fundraisers.
So what is COPE? To answer that, I need to give a little of history lesson. One I didn’t know myself until I was in Laos. You see, Laos has the sad record of being the MOST bombed nation in the world. More than Germany in WWII, more than Vietnam, more than Korea. During the Vietnam war, Laos was a neutral country, albeit with communist ties. And they supported the Vietnamese communist movement. The USA in order to stop the influence of Laos in the Vietnam war, they decided to secretly bombed the previously-declared neutral country. And they did, for 9 years, at an average of a bomb being dropped every 8 minutes. Unfortunately, is a black eye in US, since they denied for years that they were doing this, and ultimately it had very little effect in the overall effects in the war. A better person with a history degree can provide a more detailed account of this events and the complexities of them, but after doing some research, it seems that all this facts do add up.
Which brings me to COPE. COPE is an organization that strives to provide prosthetics to the people that TODAY are still being affected by the effects of this bombs. Because not only were this bombs dropped, but a lot of them didn’t explode, so they are still in the ground, and when farmers working on their lands can ignite this bombs, kids trying to find scrap metal will try to dig the bombs for the metal might (have) detonate this old bombs. Many losing limbs or worse lives. COPE helps those affected by this bombs. Is very somber reality and very respectful work this organization does. They don’t receive money from the government (or very little if they do). The exhibition is small but powerful. It makes your heart ache for those affected by events that happened over 40 years ago.
COPE is housed within the Center of Medical Rehabilitation, one of the hospitals in the capital. You don’t see many signs until you are there, so is not easy to find.
Prosthetics have been used, created or outgrown by the kids.
Exhibit of the cluster bombs used during the attacks on Laos, the bigger bomb would relase about 75 small grenade size bombs
Closeup of the bomb inside the cluster bomb
In the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is king
“In the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.”
-Erasmus
Vang Vieng for some weird reason (apparently a travel show in Korea named Vang Vieng as the place to go) has a really big influx of Korean visitors, by far outnumbering all other nationalities combined. Most English signs are also in Korean, and there’s even a korean market (K Mart). I’m just saying there’s a lot of koreans here.
After having fun kayaking, and my night about to begin, I wasn’t expecting much from it. I was to meet Jenn and the Koreans from the night before. I had dinner (Red Curry Soup w/ Chicken and Rice) while the rest of the table had a beer. Did I mention I don’t really drink?
After dinner we went to the one place I really didn’t feel like going, but with David and Tatiana also going, I couldn’t say no to go to Sakura bar. Sakura bar is THE place to be in Vang Vieng if you want to party. They have free drinks from 8pm to 9pm, followed by happy hour. We get there at 8:50pm so we only have time for one free drink. The free drink is a water down whisky, with more coke. Water down drinks are fine by me, and free is even better in this equation.
Inside the bar I ran into Jaume and Lidia, a Spaniard couple I met earlier while kayaking. They told me that they would be renting a scooter in the morning, and if I wanted to join them. I said sure, and Thomas and Jenn were also up for it.
After hanging out with my friends from Chiang Mai, the Korean girls started to dance with some of their friends and invited me over to dance with them. The circle is small, about 6 people, 3 girls, 3 guys. It might be insensitive to say, but none of them had any real dance cordination. I will never claim to be a good dancer, I’m average on my best days, but on this night, I was good in comparison. We start dancing, the crowd is getting bigger, they are following my lead (I wouldn’t believe it if I wasn’t there) and we are all having fun. I’m even drinking a blue cocktail, that I didn’t even finish. The night is going awesome, crowd keeps growing, I’m no longer in control, and then Gandam Style comes up, and the place just takes on another level of craziness. Every Korean in the place acted like if the national anthem was being played at a futbol stadium. The place is just moving, this song they DO know how to dance it and sing it, the whole floor is shaking. There’s just dancing and singing like if Psy could hear them back home.
After an hour or so, I head out, I just sweated more in there, than I did the rest of the day kayaking. I ran into the Spaniard couple one more time, and we recheck we were still on for the morning. I head to my room and my two roommates were sleeping their tubing experience from the afternoon.
Woke up early and talked to the roommates (Brits Felix and Ed), see if they are staying one more night. It just made more sense to me, since Vientiane (capital of Laos) is also very small, stricter, and both Thomas and Jenn are going on Friday. They seem noncommital about one more night, but just let me know, I can pick up my bag from reception later and find another accomodations for the night if they decide to move on.
I head out to rent the bike, Thomas is MIA, and Jenn and me join the Spaniards in my very first scooter experience. Not only is it a scooter, but is a manual scooter. Jaume gives me a 2 minute lesson in how to ride it and we set off to go to Blue Lagoon.
Blue Lagoon as the name implies is a deep lake where there’s rope swings, chutes and launching/diving spots into the refreshing crystal clear blue water. Along with the entrance to the lagoon, there’s also admission to a cave. Thinking that this is just another Elephant Cave, I go up the mountain unprepared for it. Because is a REAL cave. Deep and dark, and went deeper into the mountain than imagined by anyone in the group. We explored the cave as much as we can, but is nothing compared to what seems to lie beyond. Wish I had time to go back. Be prepared if you want to do it. Headlamps are provided (for a fee) and good hiking, can get wet shoes, maybe even rope.
After the Blue Lagoon we went to a fall, but it was more of a stream coming of a rock than a fall. I wasted 10,000 kip ($1.25) in this endeavor. Maybe it would look more impressive later in the monsoon season, but certainly not worth anything at the moment. Skip this attraction.
Along the way I rode my scooter, it was intimidating at first, but easier as you get the hang of it. Going through unpaved roads, and treating it like my red-headed step child was awesome. You go through dubious bridges, slippery up hills and share the road with buses. Recommended. This was the cheapest scooter I found price wise, only paying 40,000 kip (almost $5). This experience is a build up to maybe buying a scooter in Vietnam, since it seems is done by other backpakers to go from Ho Shi Min to Hanoi (or backwards) and sell the scooter on the destination.
And went I went back to my Guest House, I had one of the best surprises a backpacker can have. My roommates Felix and Ed, decided to move on to their next destination, but they PAIDfor my room tonight. So that means I’ll have a full room for myself for the first time since I left the U.S. and free on top of that. Hope you read this Felix and Ed, but you guys rock!!!!
Viene y van or Vang Vieng
I’m now in Vang Vieng, which is my fourth city, in my five city tour of Laos.
I’m sorry, I haven’t share any of my stories of Thailand yet, they are awesome, and if I can get back to them, it will be even better. In those stories, there’s soccer, prostitutes (don’t jump to conclusions please), ladyboys, random dress ups, and learning about backpacking.
But I don’t want to keep holding back the stories, so I’ll write about my adventures of today.
I connected with David, and Tatiana (couple I met in Chiang Mai, Thailand) on what probably be my last adventure with them. They are going north and east to Vietnam, while I’ll be leaving south towards Cambodia. They made plans, along with 2 other couples, to go tubing and kayaking in Vang Vieng.
A little story about this city as explained to me. This is a party town, and based on my less than 24 hours in this city, I can see why. But what is even more interesting, is that, it used to be even MORE of a party town, up until 2012 or 2013, when about 27 people died in one year due to excessive drinking, accidents in the river and nearby clubs. After that, the government crack down on the seediest of places, and closed down a few others. This is not a big city, and they didn’t want the bad publicity. Even in TripAdvisor when you look for things to do, the number one is go to a club. And believe me, even if you didn’t know where it is, you will quickly find out, just by walking the streets. There’s only about 6 blocks, and 3 main streets in this town.
Jenn (friends also with David and Tatiana) found me at the entrance of this bar, as I was about to walk in, and she was just outside. She taps my shoulder and we said hello, she introduces me to some new friends she just made, 2 Korean girls. We start talking, and tells me about the kayaking the next day. Since I’m not a party person, and to have someone stop me from going to the club, I quickly change my plans and join Jenn and her new friends at a quieter bar, where we played a game of pool before the bar closed. Most (all I think) bars in Laos need to close by midnight. This has been true in all the cities I’ve visited so far.
I woke up early in the morning and booked my day trip with the same company as my friends. There’s 8 of us from the Elephant Santuary, our bond runs deep I guess. We start the morning by being transported to a nearby cave, where we are introduced to the Elephant Cave. I’m not going to lie, is more of a rock opening than a cave, but sometimes you have to take what you get in these tours. However, he explained to us that there are 3 main ethnic group of people in Laos: Laotians, Hmongs, and Mon-khmer, he belongs to the latter. There’s also another 130+ ethnic minority groups.
This is followed by a river entrance into a real cave, the cave is about 1km long, we used headlights to see, and tubes for us to float down the cave entrance. There’s rope to guide the way. Unfortunately there weren’t picture of this, because I didn’t like the chances of my camera finding its way at the bottom. It is highly recommended to be going down a cave in almost pitch blackness. We were the last group of the day to go in the cave, so we got to experience it all. Sometimes is good to be last.
Afterwards we are taken down to a launching spot in the Nam Song river where we proceed to kayak for 10km. Thankfully we are going with the current. The company provides lifejacket for us, but only as an option. I opted out of the lifejacket. We put our not-to-be-wet belongings in a dry bag that the company also provided for us. I put my Nikon Camera, cellphone, passport, and wallet in it. Me and Jenn quickly find out how waterproof this bags really are, when after going through a rapid, we didn’t control the kayak correctly and ended in some ravines that force us to capsize. I’m momentarily scared when I can’t come up for air, where’s that lifevest now? But is only the kayak stopping me from coming up for air. I breath air and with the help of the guides put the kayak in its upright position. I check my bags, and everything is dry. Thankfully that was our biggest scared of the day. The water was refreshing though.
The views down the river are just amazing, the city of Vang Vieng and it’s surrounding areas are cuddled by mountains and peaks that paint an outstanding view. I was able to take some pictures of it, but pictures are simply not enough.
Jenn's back and mountains
Mountains along the Nam Song
Children playing in the river
Another of the main attractions of Vang Vieng is to go down the same river (smaller distance) in a tube. There’s about 7 or 8 bars along the river (more before the crackdown), and if you want to stop at a certain bar, they’ll throw a line to you, and pull you into their bar where you will spend your money. All bars have some type of entertainment, we stopped at one that included the following:
Me testing my boxing skills
Me winning my boxing skills
Basketball hoop
Ping Pong and "bocce" court
Before finishing back in town for you to take a shower and prepare for the night. All in all, and awesome experience, and one of those reminders that when you are backpacking, everyday’s a Saturday.
Money note: The tubing in the cave and kayaking experience was 90,000 Kip (about 11 dollars), it included the dry bag, lunch and a water, along with transportation and kayak delivery. Very worth the money. Few in my group were able to get it for 85,000 Kip (10 dollars), so like most things in southeast Asia, everything can be bargain if you have the right number of people with you. The name of the trekking company was Riverside Tours. I have no affiliation with them, you can try others if you wish.
Moving around Bangkok and Thailand
Before I continue on telling my stories, I wanted to put this out there, hopefully it helps others that are doing the same thing as me, and some of this information is scattered across many websites, here I’m trying to compile it all.
There’s official cabs. They have a licensed number by the Thai government. This taxis are hard to spot, and to be truthful I don’t think I can tell the difference between the legal ones and not. Besides getting inside and see the meter working, I really can’t tell. On the illegal ones there’s a meter, but is conveniently turned off. For the latter ones, you want to settle on a price before you get in. Since you are a foreigner, they will try to take more from you, so bargain hard. If you think you can’t reach an agreement, let them go, there’s plenty of other taxis around. Taxis are better if you are in a group. It keeps you together, and you can split the already cheap price among yourselves. To give you an idea of price, from the Grand Palace area, back to the hostel, 10km or so away, it was 100 baht (around $3). Divide that among 3 or 4 of you, and you got a good thing going.
Besides taxis, there’s also Tuk-Tuks, this are motorcycles with an open air cabin, if you want to think about it that way. They look like this:
Like taxis, they are everywhere touristy. The drivers will ask any non-local “Tuk-Tuk? Tuk-Tuk?” so much so, to the point of annoyance and just for defiance, you will make a pledge to yourself to not get in one. I got in one. There were 3 of us, and through happenstance, we made a deal to go to 4 different places, with the one Tuk-Tuk for 100 baht. Cheap and easy, specially among groups. Not necessarily my first option, but it works in emergencies. Again, if there’s something I have a hatred of, is Tuk Tuks. I know, and understand, they are trying to make a living, but if I’m walking down the street, and there’s 7 of you in a row, and already pass 6 without asking for a ride, you better believe, I’m not asking the 7th either. In order to avoid their constant asking, I try to go against traffic in one way streets. It helps, but doesn’t eliminate the problem.
In Bangkok there’s also Subway lines, I could tell there’s 3 of them. There’s the SKYTRAIN. This one helped me get to/from the Airport and other areas. MRT and SRT. Both of them go through the city. All of them are in good shape, and very well kept. Only quirky thing, is how you pay for them. In most cities I’ve been, you pay one price and now you have access to the whole subway system. In Bangkok however you pay from Point A to Point B one price, and from Point A to Point C a different price. Even if is just the next stop. You pay for this with a rechargeable card, or with a one-time token. So you need to plan ahead as to where you going and be precise about your stop.
In Bangkok, there’s a healthy supply of public buses, and with Google Maps, it helps you plan your best bus ride. They are plentiful, and some of them have A/C. They run in about 10 minute intervals, so if you miss one, another is not far behind. Once you enter the bus a person will go around picking up the fare. Few things to have in mind: Since this is not the preferred method of transportation for foreigners, a lot of bus fare ladies don’t know a lot of English. It becomes a little harder for you, because not all buses charges the same. I paid between 6.5 bath to 11 baht. Also, they’ll try to help you get to where you want, but with their limited English and my non-existent Thai, it becomes a little stressful figuring it out. GPS and Google Maps are needed for you to know where to drop off to make your connection, again, Google Maps is pretty accurate about this.
In Chiang Mai however, it’s a little harder to move around. There’s no public transportation available. So you are at the mercy of your legs (my preferred method), taxis/buses, or the dreaded Tuk-Tuks. Did I mention how much I hate Tuk-Tuks? Can’t say it enough. The taxi/buses are modified pickup trucks that will take you to your desire destination. I say taxi/buses, because if a stranger is going the same route, they will go on the vehicle with you, and you pay per person when you reach your destination. I saw a lot of locals using this method. They are not as annoyingly harassing as Tuk-Tuks.
Picture of taxi/bus
Another option, almost all hostels/hotels will have a connection for you to rent a motorcycle/scooter or a bicycle if you wish. Prices for bikes are around 50 baht for the whole day, and scooters from 99 baht and up, depending on location and model. You will need to give your passport as collateral while using this modes of transportation.
While I haven’t run into any problems renting anything, be aware of certain places that will try to run a scam, where they claim of damage to the motor vehicles when you return them, and they will want more money. Again, I haven’t seen it, but I have always rented through my hostel, that offers very similar rates (or better) as other places.
Moving from city to city, is also not that big of a problem. There’s train rides that connect the country, along with buses. Buses come mainly in two ways, VIP buses, and XBUS. The VIP, as the name suggested, do less stops, thus faster, air conditioned, and the one from Bangkok to Chiang Mai included snacks, water, and a free meal with your ticket at one designated stop. XBUS, I’ll find out tomorrow when I move from Chiang Mai to Chiang Khong on my way to Laos. Is cheaper than the VIP buses, but also a longer ride. I’ll update once I completed my first XBUS experience.
Another note to make, with buses, you can pay online and with credit cards, but there’s different websites, I went through 12goAsia, and Green Bus Thailand, there probably are others, which makes keeping track of them, not as easy as you would think. Or take your chances and pay at the Bus Terminal before the bus depart, plenty of people do that.
Don't Follow My Lead 