SLOW LIFE…. LAOS
Landlocked and laidback, Laos is the perfect unwinding spot in the the big city busyness of Southeast Asia
Sabaidee! It’s a call of greeting stretching from the
posh corridors of five-star hotels to the noodle soup stalls in little
alleyways. Laos in a nutshell!
I began my trip with a night of leisure at the
stunning Settha Palace in Vientiane (and became an instant fan of the Laotian
version of tom yum soup). Vientiane is majestic but not breathtaking. A day
spent walking around the Buddha park with over a thousand Buddha statues,
gazing at Thailand across the river and a cute ‘friendship bridge’ later, I was
ready to move on.
BAMBOO TRAIL
Next, I booked a trek to the Ban Nam O Forest
Sanctuary from the Manali-like Luang Namtha town. The group was an unusual mix
– a retired Canadian couple, my mountain-man fiancé, brownskinned me and two
local guides. After a short walk, traversing little streams on precarious logs
thrown across and stopping to gasp at tall and thick trees, we arrived at a
river where a boat was waiting for us.
However, the boatman took off for lunch and we ended
up waiting two hours in a tiny village playing with little children and
feasting on wild pomelos. When the boat arrived we found out that our guide
arranged for petrol while the boat’s motor runs on diesel. This amusing turn of
events coaxed us to halt in the village for the night.
MORE WILD POMELOS
Next morning, with the balmy sun beating down our
backs and tall bamboos providing shade in the forest, we hiked for nine hours
to Akha village. This is a minority hill tribe of Laos and whilst we were
greeted warmly, no one paid us any special attention. I welcomed this behaviour
and was beginning to realise that Laos is a shy, introvert country. The day was
spent in the forest, discovering poisonous mushrooms, strange beetles, more
wild pomelos and a wonderful wild lunch. The food is hotpot style served in
bowls with a soup spoon and chopsticks. The meaty soups, varied greens, huge
amounts of sticky rice and hot chilli paste are recipes straight out of the
village chief’s family kitchen, who was proud to announce that he played host
to the first Indian people in his village. We grinned thinking, “Well, finally
we are first at something!”
Next day, we hiked for nine more hours to another
hill tribe village of the Khmu people who greeted us with shy affection and
showed us their secret river spot meant for swimming, washing and soaking in
the sunset as a variety of birds bid farewell to the day. Next was the old
heritage towns of Laos – the never-ending caves of Vang Vieng where we
discovered a Scottish bar and were treated to spectacular sights of hot air
balloons drifting into the limestone karsts.
CULTURE KICK
My favourite part of our trip was a town recognised
as a Unesco World Heritage site, Luang Prabang, that sits pretty alongside the
Mekong river. Not only were we in time for the last day of Buddhist Lent when
the town is decked out in pretty lanterns (quite evocative of Diwali) but this
was also the time of ‘dragon boat’ races and we egged on the enthusiastic
village teams whilst feasting on a lunch of Laotian river-weed soup, sticky
rice and banana leaf steamed fish, washing it all down with some extremely
potent Lao Lao, a local fermented rice whiskey.
Laos, in its curious mix of the rural and urban, left
a deep impact on me for its cleanliness, its thriving culture and its farming
people.
Sugandha Das
TOI9DEC18
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