Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Trekking in the Nam Ha NPA

We left around 8:30 in the morning on January 2nd for our trek. We found the trekking company because they had a little office right next to the guesthouse. They had a specific 3 day/2 night trek which sounded pretty good to us so we decided to do it. It was a bit expensive but it turned out to be well worth it. Our two guides, Khong and Chang, were very nice. Khong’s English was pretty good and Chang didn’t know much English but always had a smile on his face.

We chose this trek because we wanted to have some time in the jungle/forest of Laos but also wanted to see a bit of the ethnic hill tribes. Laos has a very high number of ethnic minorities including Akha, Black Tai, and (probably the most famous) Hmong. Many of the tribes immigrated from southern China or Tibet through Myanmar and Thailand and some continued further south or into Vietnam. The hill tribes have a history of being subjugated by the governments of all these countries and consequently keep mostly to themselves.

The trekking company drove us out for about a half hour into the Nam Ha National Protected Area and then dropped us off at an Akha village. There was a marriage about to happen and the bride and groom were in different houses and dressed in traditional marriage clothing. That consisted of black fabric with many different colored embroidery going horizontally with mini mirrors and glass beads interlaced in it. Pretty cool stuff.

We took off and had a pretty good hike that day. It was described as “moderate” in the brochure so we weren’t expecting anything too strenuous but at a few points the hike got pretty difficult and we wondered what a “difficult” hike would have been like. The views were amazing, though. We had a pretty good lunch before the first big climb. The presentation was pretty cool as Khong got a banana leaf from a nearby tree, rinsed and wiped it off, and then put out the various greens and meats in little piles. Finally he portioned out a bit of sticky rice for each one of us. Again, the meal was fantastic.

We came down around 3ish to a Black Tai town which would be our resting spot for the night. The place turned out to be Khong’s village and we stayed at his uncle’s house. He made a joke when we got there about it being the “hotel” of the town. Well, the house was built on stilts (like every house in the village) and consisted of one room when you enter where they cooked and ate and in the other, much bigger room were a long line of mattresses on floors with mosquito nets above them. In one corner, shielded from view by some sheets that were hung up, was the family’s alter to their ancestors and the spirits. We were told not to go over there out of respect for their tradition.

Showering wasn’t really high on our priority list because we were just hiking and knew we’d get just as dirty the next day. We weren’t sure, however, if not showering and walking around smelly would offend them, so we opted to be on the safe side and shower. Well, Patrick went first and it turned out the way you shower there is strip down to your underwear and then stand near the faucet in the middle of the village where everyone gets their water. We found it pretty hilarious because as Patrick was showering people kept coming and taking some water from the spigot. Well, the other three of us just filled up a bucket after that and went and had a bucket bath in the latrine so we could have a little privacy.

We had another great meal that night and after dinner we also got our first taste of lao-lao, the traditional rice whiskey which we’d heard a lot about. Well, it’s essentially moonshine but didn’t taste nearly as bad as I thought it would. It was quite strong, though, and had a kick to it. Khong poured everyone a drink and there’s a lot of ceremony around it such as toasting to the spirits, tapping the glass on the table and then downing it. Then you pour another glass for everyone, toast to friendship, tap it on the table and down it again. After that, you were free to have as much or as little as you wanted.

We went to bed pretty soon after dinner and woke up early to get started again. The previous night it had rained which was unheard of because it was the dry season. And some people don’t believe in climate change. We had a nice cup of lemongrass tea and then some more greens and fish with sticky rice. Needless to say, it was delicious. We set out for that day’s hike which was also very beautiful. At one point we hiked down a bit into a mini canyon to see a waterfall. The waterfall was pretty small and unimpressive and after a few minutes down there Khong said, “okay, let’s go back up!” Um, excuse me? It was an incredibly steep descent and we had assumed that we’d be continuing on by some other route and that the measly waterfall was just on the route, not an attraction in itself. Not the case. We had to walk back out the way we came. Well, we decided to have lunch at the waterfall and then continue on afterwards.

That night, we stayed in an Akha town that was built along a river and the scenery was stunning. Little mountains popping up everywhere and the town was built up against a very steep mountain. We all took “showers” in the river which was cold but surprisingly refreshing. After this, we walked around the village a little bit which, to our surprise, had a couple pool tables. Due to language barriers we weren’t able to tell any of the villagers that we wanted to play so we just settled down and had a BeerLao instead, the national beer of Laos. Later, we went back to the house and just lounged around for a little while playing some cards and relaxing.

That night’s dinner was very similar to the previous night’s except there was one more dish that was a bit unsettling. Throughout the day, Khong and Chang had been picking these orchids that were along the paths and it turned out that they made a dish with those that was incredibly bitter. The taste wasn’t bad, mind you, but it wasn’t something you wanted to eat a lot of. During and after dinner we again had some more lao-lao and poor Chang had to go to sleep right after dinner because I think he had one glass too many. Khong, though, was having a fun time chatting with us and trying to learn our game of euchre.

The next day we had some leftovers from the night before and then headed out a little after 8. It had rained again the night before and had soaked some of the clothes we’d left out on the clothesline to air out. After about a half an hour it started to rain a little bit. Just a drizzle at first but then it started to pour. Khong put on a pancho and when he found out we didn’t have any rain jackets with us he cut down some big banana leaves for us to hold over our head. They actually worked out pretty well at first but then when it really started coming down we all pretty much just ditched them as we were thoroughly soaked. We put the few electronics we had on us in Khong’s bag under his pancho and just set out through the rain. It was a pretty miserable day of walking and we had to cross some streams and rivers at least a half a dozen times. By the end we had stopped even trying to walk on the stepping stones and just walked straight through the ice cold water. It’s not like we were going to be getting any wetter. A few times Khong tried to get us to stop for lunch but we were pretty cold and miserable so we decided to just push on. We arrived back at the main road in a Hmong village around noon, having done the estimated 7 hour hike in under 4.

A covered pickup was waiting for us and we changed our shirts to some dry-ish ones from our bags and hopped in for the freezing half-hour drive back to Luang Namtha. Once we arrived, we got a couple more rooms from our previous guesthouse and then ate our pre-prepared lunch with Khong, Chang, and the tour organizer. We ended up spending another day in Luang Namtha where we had our guesthouse do our laundry and tried to dry out a lot of our things. Patrick, Henry and I ended up leaving our shoes there as they were already in pretty poor condition and showed no signs of drying out. I ended up ditching the Paul Theroux book I’d bought in Chiang Mai a few days later because it also showed no signs of drying out and had even started getting a bit moldy.

The last day of the trek was pretty cold and miserable but we still had a great time overall and it was nice to get some physical activity after almost a month of very little exercise and too much Thai food. Have I mentioned yet that we were all noticing how much weight we’d but on in Thailand? Well, since the portions were so small there we were eating around 5 or 6 meals a day. We had become master sport eaters there and were well on our way to doing the same in Laos. The next couple places we went to proved to be a bit more difficult to find food at any hour of the day.

Sunday, February 12, 2012

New Years in Luang Namtha

We woke up the next day and packed everything up. Then, Maleewon drove us up to the port in the northern end of town in her little pick up. As we were leaving, Don said something to us like, “Now make sure to not get into any trouble over there in Laos!” Sure thing, we said. Henry, Patrick, and I rode in the bed of the truck and Paul rode in front and Maleewon said with a devious smile, “it’s only him that gets in trouble!”

We went through Thai immigration and then hopped aboard a little speed boat that ferried us across the Mekong to the Lao side. Patrick ran into some passport problems there. See, with Peace Corps we are issued an official Peace Corps passport, similar to a diplotmat’s passport, except that it won’t really open any doors for us. Most of us also have our own personal passports and Patrick and I had been using those while Paul and Henry had been using their official PC passports. Patrick ran into a problem when we were getting our Laos visas in Bangkok because the pages of his personal passport (with his Thai visa/stamps) were full, so he got the Laos visa on his PC passport. We hoped that neither country would look for the other’s immigration information but sadly we were wrong. Long story short(er), Patrick had to go back to the Thai side where an official just stamped his personal passport “USED”, which sucks because we’re supposed to turn in our PC Passports once we get back to the states and this now means Patrick can’t just apply for more pages for his personal one but instead has to apply (and pay) for a new passport. Bummer.

After the immigration hoobulah we found a pickup taxi to take us to the bus station. An older man who worked with the taxi men helped us along and it was pretty interesting because he spoke a bit of French, which was better than his English. This was one of the first signs of the relics of French colonialism which we came across. At the bus station Patrick and I each got a bowl of noodle soup and it was quite different than Thai noodle soup. The noodles were not nearly as good and the broth was mostly just water with a bit of oil. When our bus pulled up we were immediately a little tickled as it was a coaster, very similar to what we used in Cameroon. Sure enough, they packed it up and the two Europeans who were also in our row (which consisted of Paul, Henry and I) were kind of pissed at me when I made everyone squish so I could sit down too. All I had to say to them (but unfortunately I couldn’t at the time because they didn’t speak English or French) was: get used to travelling in a third-world country.

Speaking of it being a third world country, this was instantly apparent after crossing the border from Thailand. The houses were mostly made of logs, on stilts, and sometimes even with thatched roofs. The road we were on was recently paved which made for a pretty smooth ride and the scenery was gorgeous. It was funny how crossing the border could bring such a different change in scenery and prosperity. I think I read somewhere (maybe Theroux?) that the best way to enter a country is by land, that way you can see the differences of a country directly as you enter and also see how the minute differences become more apparent the further you get from the border.

We got into the trekking center of Luang Namtha a little before sunset and we spent some time just playing cards and taking the town in. Across the street from our guesthouse was the Luang Namtha night market. We had some roasted/rotisserie duck that night for around 4 bucks. It was amazing, possibly the best duck I’ve ever had.

The next day we got up and walked around town, trying to get a better feel for it. I noticed what I thought was a fairly apparent Soviet influence as the streets were very wide and broad. I’d never been to another Communist country before but I remember reading somewhere that a key element of Soviet city planning was wide boulevards so that military parades and movements could happen with relative ease. Well, as we were walking around an Italian dude waved to us from across the street and then came up to us and asked if we were the Americans at the night market the night before. As you can imagine, there aren’t too many Americans in Laos, given the history with the Vietnam War and the concurrent, secret war in Laos. Well, we told him yes and he said somebody had found an American passport at the market the night before.

I had mine on me, and Patrick and Henry both were positive that they had theirs. Paul looked through his backpack and, sure enough, it wasn’t there. Our guess is that it fell out of his pocket and then luckily some person found it, made it known to the community around (there really weren’t THAT many foreigners in town so it was a bit easier to spot us) that he had it, and then he told the tourist police. Well, it was quite an ordeal getting it back and getting everything squared away. Luckily, though, Paul didn’t have to pay any bribes to get it back. I was guessing he was going to be set back quite a bit but fortunately he wasn’t and ended up buying the guy a case of beers for the New Years celebration that night.

After all this, I talked with my parents on skype for a bit and then the four of us booked a trek leaving on the 2nd. We also went to a restaurant called Minority Restaurant which was run by a family of Black Tais, an ethnic minority in the mountainous hill country of Northern Laos. The food was delicious and they had a wide variety of typical Lao food, traditional Hill Tribe foods (such as Black and Red Tai, Akha, Hmong, etc.) and even a couple burgers and sandwiches on the menu. We all tried some different hill dishes and we were all pleasantly surprised by how good it was. Many people talked about how boring Lao food is, but from this meal on I can only disagree and point to all the flavorful, unique dishes we had for our three weeks there. The food was surprisingly different than Thai food but it was almost always delicious.

Anyway, that night our guesthouse bar/restaurant was closed for the holiday so we went to the night market again and this time got roasted pork ribs with sticky rice and some bomb sweet and spicy dipping sauce. Later, I went and found another guesthouse that was open to watch the Manchester United game. When the game was over, around 10, the bar seemed to be closing so we decided to go see if we could find another place to post up for the countdown. Well, we walked out to the street and NOTHING was open. If we wanted a party, we sure chose the wrong place to spend New Years. Every bar and guesthouse was closed, except one. It was a bar run by two New Zealanders (though I’m sure fronted and quietly owned by some Lao people) and they were working hard to get the party atmosphere going. Well, it worked pretty well and they had a deal on jello-o shots which all the travellers (probably around 30 total—just about all of them in the town) seemed to have been hitting pretty hard before we got there. We were hanging out and having a fun time when we started talking to this threesome travelling: two French girls and an Irish girl. I tried to convince them I was French which the four of us and the Irish lass found funny but the Frenchies were certainly not amused. Note to self: French women don’t like it when an American pretends to be French. Eesh, it was only a joke. It’s not like I was putting on a thick accent or making fun of France or anything. Anyway, we made it to midnight and then the kiwis kicked us out around two at which point we didn’t really have any other option than to just go back to the guesthouse and crash. Unfortunately, Patrick had the key to his room and he’d wandered off somewhere beforehand so Paul shared Henry’s and my bed. Patrick later said he came back and was going to wake Paul up but found the sight too amusing to disturb: the three of us sharing a queen sized bed.

The next day we didn’t do much other than relax around town (our guesthouse still mostly being closed due to the holiday) and get some more meals at the Minority Restaurant and the night market. We played a couple games of Settlers and then turned in pretty early so we could be ready the next day for the start of the trek.