Thakhek to Savannakhet - 6/11 - 11/11

According to the travel guide our next stop Thakhek would be a picturesque, quiet town with "fading French-style pastel villas", "a breezy riverside position" and a "relaxed ambience". Whoever wrote this particular chapter must have slept through his stay in Thakhek…

Arriving late in the evening we squeezed into a rather small tuktuk with 2 other couples, bags and all and bounced our way into town. We were deposited infront of the town's main hostel and whilst the other tourists went straight inside we set off in the direction of what the guide had promised was the next best budget option. On finding the hostel, the cheapo room turned out to be a space with 2 beds behind a screen in the reception area … we decided against this and paid a bit more for an actual room upstairs, complete with double bed, four walls, bathroom and lizards, spiders and ants aplenty.

After settling in we went out for some food, hoping to find some of the riverside street stalls the guide had promised us - there were a few scattered tables and chairs along the way but mostly it was very dark and everything looked closed. Finally we settled on a bar/restaurant which had some serious looking karaoke going on inside and some terrible live music going on outside. We spent the next hour eating average food, listening to one man and his guitar murdering some cheesy 80s classics and secretly gawping at a couple of groups who Dean was convinced must be part of the Thakhek Mafia. There were two separate "families" present this particular evening, the women were heavily made-up and dressed in all sorts of diamante-studded tat, whilst the men had shiny shoes and a shiny swagger to match. They sat at 2 separate tables, getting loud and silly on not very much beer and harassing the singing guitarist, eventually wrenching the microphone from his hands and making karaoke requests. The staff looked a bit nervous, but before long both groups left, crossing over to the riverside pavement, where there had appeared a neon framed gateway … evidently the entrance to some floating club. Drama over, Dean tried to tempt me into some Laos karaoke (they're nuts for it there, they even play karaoke videos on the buses!) but I informed him I was not emotionally prepared for this experience just yet and we went home to sleep, hoping to find the guidebook version of Thakhek present and glorious in the morning.

The next day revealed a dusty, dry, hot, charmless town with more hardware stores than you could shake a power tool at, hardly anything in the way of eateries and very little "colonial style" architecture. Even the fountain in Fountain Square looked like it hadn't seen a drop of water for several years. Nonetheless we set off towards the tourist information office, for some reason located a considerable way off down some quite residential looking streets. By the time we got there it was of course shut for lunch. Hot, hungry and frustrated we returned to town, berating ourselves for wasting a day on this dreary town. Of course, I'm being a little unfair here - there is a temple in the area that you can visit, but it's a taxi ride away and we were being tight with our Laos kip so we skipped it. There is also apparently some stunning scenery in the surrounding area which can be visited by hiring a scooter … again, we decided not to do this for money reasons and because we'd yet to pop our Scooter-hire cherry - so all in all, for us Thakhek was a bit of a disappointment.

A new day dawned and we hopped onto a local bus that whisked us happily off towards our next destination, Savannakhet. We were a little apprehensive, after the non-event of Thakhek. The guide book had actually said, if you were heading south you may as well skip Savannakhet and go straight to Pakse, but I'd found out about some treks that were run in the area so we decided to chance it. The bus dropped us quite far out of town and after successfully haggling with one tuktuk driver only for him to palm us off on his mate we got driven into town, only to be unceremoniously dropped off still quite far from where we wanted to be. Bored of pointing at maps and arguing over money we grabbed our bags and set off on a long hot walk towards the Eco Guide Unit office, which we eventually located and yes, guess what, it was closed.

Next we tried to find a hostel which was recommended in the guide book. This was also shut. We walked around some more, finally settling on a dingy motel-style hostel which seemed to be completely empty. The room smelt of cigarettes and there was the usual compliment of lizards scattered over ceiling and walls but by now our standards have considerably dropped and the A/C unit was enough to make us feel like kings. We dumped our bags and went back out to search for the tourist office, hoping they could get us onto a trek for the next day as our time in Savannakhet was limited. We found them fifteen minutes after their closing time, (welcome to the Katy and Dean Show) but happily they opened their doors to us and proved to be the most friendly and helpful people we'd come across in ages. After half an hour and a few phone calls they had successfully booked us onto a 2 day trek with Eco Guide Unit (despite their own office being shut) and made all sorts of helpful suggestions about where to eat and what to do with our bags whilst we were on the tour etc. Spirits raised we wandered round till we found a very cute coffee shop where we shared a delicious BLT sandwich and Dean had a Black Power Smoothie…

That night after taking in the sights of Savannakhet (not much more than an old Catholic church, an old square and a temple/monastery), we went down to the riverside for a dinner of Sindat, a sort of make-it-yourself soup meal. You get brought a container of burning coals with a pot of hot broth balanced on top, a plate of meat cuts and pieces of fish and a basket of green leaves, herbs and noodles. Then it is up to you how much of everything you throw into the broth (and in what order), allowing it to cook and dodging as sparks fly off the coals, before spooning portions into your bowl. There is also the usual selection of chilli sauce, soy sauce and a peanut sauce to add according to your taste. It was delicious, we ate the whole lot emptying meat plate and greens basket into our soup in 3 rounds. It was one of the best and cheapest meals we'd had in Laos. Tired and full we sloped off back to the hotel.

The following morning we were running late when our trek guide knocked gently on the door, greeting Dean with a big smile and telling us he would wait outside. A few moments later we jumped in the tuktuk with him and headed for the Eco Guide Unit office, to pay for the trek and leave our bags before finally getting on our way. Back in the tuktuk our guide introduced himself as Souliyong, but we could call him "X". Supressing a giggle Dean asked how he got the nickname "X" and he replied that his friends had given it to him because they simply liked the sound of it. Fair enough. We drove about 20km from town to reach the start of the trek, during which time we chatted with X. He was instantly very friendly, insisting that on this 2 day trek we should think of him as our friend, not our guide and he would think of us as his friends too. At 20 years old, he was quite young and eager, this was only his second trek working for the company - something he was doing for free in order to practise his English and in the hope that eventually they might give him some paid work. Over the next 2 days we had several interesting chats with X about the state of things in Laos and despite his young age he was quite intuitive and pleased to answer our questions when he could, being quick to admit when he didn't understand.

The first day's trek was quite long but easy, initially following a flat path through a forest and later meandering through fields and small woods. Along with X we had a local guide who spoke no English but who continually pointed out various plants, getting us to taste things that were edible and with X's help, explaining what uses the local villagers had for them. Of course we can't remember now what any of the plants were called but it seemed that just about all of them could be taken in tea for a stomach upset, whilst others were good for pregnant women, urine problems and issues of the manly sort which might otherwise require a Viagra…

For lunch we stopped in a clearing that contained the crops of a local family. The family were themselves resting for lunch in a hut without walls, raised on stilts. Removing our shoes we climbed up into the hut and sat down whilst X produced a fantastic spread from his backpack of cold marinated meats, cold cooked and fresh greens, a chilli salsa and a bamboo pot each of sticky rice. As we watched, the wife of the family prepared a fresh spicy bean salad, using their own fresh produce and pounding it together with whole fierce chillis in a pestle and mortar. After walking for hours we were hungry and the food was delicious. We followed X's lead, plucking a lump of sticky rice from our individual pots and rolling it between fingers and palm into a ball, before picking up a bit of meat or greens, dunking it in the chilli salsa and popping the whole lot in your mouth. The local woman laughed and (with X translating) told Dean that he should take bigger balls of sticky rice so that he wouldn't still be hungry later. We finished off the meal with bananas - in Laos they are small and fat like sausages and really tasty.

As we continued our walk we became aware of an incessant high-pitched sound which sounded something like an alarm going off, just one long continuous note. At times it was almost deafening and we were stunned when the guide finally pointed out what was making the noise - a bug called Cicada. These things are a bit like a locust and they essentially have speakers behind their heads which let out this high whine. One cicada can make a huge noise - so a whole wood full of them can be quite a distraction. After a while spent trudging along in the heat with the background noise of the cicadas you start to feel just a little bit crazy…

We finally arrived at our destination, a village called Ban Phonsim. First impressions were that it was bigger than we were expecting - we later learnt there are over 600 families currently living there. We crossed a big green field to reach the village huts just as school was ending and attracted lots of stares and a few giggly waves. Our overnight stop on this trek was a homestay, meaning we were spending the evening and night with a local family. This particular village only has 3 homes that offer the homestay in conjunction with the Eco Guide treks and they only have visitors about once a week … we were the only tourists there that evening and possibly for several days, so it felt very special walking round and receiving lots of curious smiles, lots of waves and greeting everyone with "sabaidee"!!

At our host house we met the mother and daughter of the family who were very welcoming. The house was in the typical Laos style of one large room raised on stilts. As is now common in Laos, if the family can afford it they may choose to put in walls of concrete brick in between the stilts, giving them an enclosed ground floor - our host had done this so they had a downstairs room with a small area walled off for the kitchen. They had an outdoor concrete hut which was the bathroom, with squat toilet and a large concrete basin full of cold water for washing. There was also a small garden with a vegetable patch, a sadly skinny cow and calf, a few ducks waddling round, some chickens and chicks.

After we'd had a wonderfully refreshing wash we went for a wander round town with X. We found ourselves outside the village temple and X told us that he used to be a Novice (trainee monk). I was really interested as we could finally get an insiders answer to some of our Buddhism-related questions. He seemed a little shy to talk about it though… We already knew that many boys become novices as a way to receive an education without the financial burden this would normally put on their parents. Quite a big step to take as there are so many things they must live without - X recounted to us living without music and without playing games or football. He seemed relieved to have returned to a life free of such constraints. I was a little disappointed though when I asked if he knew the reason why most monks wore the "saffron coloured" robes but just occasionally we had seen a monk dressed daringly in red - he replied that it might just " be the fashion"…

Back at our host's house we were sat outside when the father of the family arrived home and joined us at the table outside with a bottle of whisky. He explained through X that a guest to the house is always welcomed with a shot of whisky … Dean and I looked nervously at each other, remembering the trouble the last Laos whisky had caused, but not wanting to appear rude we both knocked back the shot and thanked our generous host. We chatted with him for a while through X - our host had 4 children, 3 sons who no longer lived at home and his youngest, the daughter who was 16 … they had always lived in Ban Phonsim.

A short while later, one by one, neighbours started to arrive at the house, each shaking the host's hand and receiving a shot of whisky (its surprising they get anything done!) and greeting us with a wave and a grin … it was finally it was time for the Baci Ceremony, something we had been looking forward to without knowing what to expect. X and our host had explained to us that this ceremony was performed whenever someone came to stay at the house, tourist, friend or relative alike. The purpose of the ceremony was to inform the local spirits of the presence of guests in the house, hopefully appeasing them and bringing good fortune on said guests.

Besides our host husband and wife, their daughter, X, Dean and I there were soon 5 or 6 other local men, 2 women and a handful of young kids who just an hour earlier had been entertaining themselves wildly by peering through the fence at us until we looked their way, then running off shrieking. We all went into the ground floor room, where the family's ceremonial tower* had been positioned on a large mat on the floor, with thin candles positioned around it (*apologies, this probably has an official name but we didn't learn it - it stood about a metre high and consisted of a woven wood base, topped with a large silver bowl, containing a smaller gold bowl holding a large green cone of banana leaves with bright orange flowers attached.) We all positioned ourselves on the floor in a circle around the shrine and Dean, X and I were given embroidered sashes to wear draped over our left shoulders and tied at the waist. The whole group crowded in, placing one hand on the silver bowl of the shrine and a senior member of the group led the ceremony with a chant.

A few moments later the chant finished and the leader came over to myself, Dean and X one at a time. In turn we were given a bowl to hold in our right hand whilst holding our left hand up, palm turned towards our face. The bowl contained a cooked chicken, some boiled eggs and some chocolate and bananas. As we each held up the bowl the leader blessed us, wishing us good fortune before tying a white string bracelet round our wrist, giving us another shot of whisky and informing us to eat a boiled egg from the bowl. As he finished with each of us, the rest of the group approached, presenting us each with another white string bracelet which they would stroke along our wrist 3 times whilst muttering blessings before tying the bracelet in place. One of the villagers did his blessing in broken English, sweetly wishing us good health, wealth in the future and happy travels. Soon the three of us were sat there with an armful of white string bracelets … I looked at Dean and could tell we were both deeply moved by the ceremony. For them it is simply part of their tradition and culture, but for us it was a real honour and we were very grateful for their welcome and their blessings.

At last it was time for dinner and the group divided into two, positioning ourselves once more round 2 large round silver platters, on which were placed bowls of meat, vegetables, fish soup, more chilli salsa and the all-important bamboo pots of sticky rice. We all tucked in, whilst admiring our many bracelets. X explained to us that we must sleep with all of the bracelets on that night, before removing all but one of the bracelets the following day - this one we must wear for 2 more nights before we could remove it.

We chatted (with X's help) to the villagers at our dinner circle. One of them turned out to be another guide in the village who would be taking us on the second day of our trek. He was very kind and keen to tell us about the village, which he did in spurts of English and French. Pudding was more bananas and eventually the neighbours started to leave, all wishing us well as they left.

We sat around chatting some more, but although it was no later than 8pm we'd been walking all day and we were tired. Our host family showed us upstairs to the large room which was their bedroom/living room space. A line of shelves split the room in two - the family slept behind the shelves and we would sleep in the front half. To Dean's concern we were told that boys and girls had to sleep separately - there were 2 large mats laid out on the floor, each with a mosquito net, 2 blankets and 2 pillows. Dean was to share with X whilst I had a whole bed to myself. Deans face clouded over at this news - he'd been murmering to me all day that X had inexplicaly been putting his hand on Dean's knee or even patting him on the bottom! I couldn't help but chuckle as Dean climbed tentatively under the mosquito net and lay down next to X, rigid and wide-eyed. I at least slept like a log.....

We woke the next morning at 5.30am and quickly got ready as a heavy pink sun slowly rose in the sky, giving the village a rosy glow. We were expecting to watch the morning's Alm's procession - something we'd observed before in Luang Prabang when the monks walked down the streets surrounding the temple, collecting offerings of food and money from the townspeople. X told us that in rural villages the people actually go into the temple with their offerings, instead of the monks coming out. This is because the villagers usually work on nearby farms and can take the time out of their workday to come to the temple, where in the towns the people have jobs with strict hours. As we stood waiting, the mother of the house appeared and seemed to eye me up and down before disappearing and returning with something folded in her hands. Clearly my blue vest top, checked shirt and green combat trousers just weren't going to do for a morning at the temple - she opened the material in her hands to reveal a traditional Laos skirt which she helped me climb into and fastened round my waist. We were then again given an embroidered sash to wear over our left shoulder, tied at the waist. Next we were each given a large silver bowl/goblet to carry which contained a couple of bananas, a few chocolate bars and a small bottle which had been emptied of it original contents and filled with water. Lastly we were handed a bamboo pot of sticky rice each. Finally we were ready and the French-speaking gentleman from the night before and who would be our guide today, arrived to take us to Alms. Our host family didn't join us for some reason - possibly because we were wearing their ceremonial clothes and carrying their offerings pots…

We walked through the village to the temple. Our guide seemed quite proud to have us with him and eager for us to take part in every detail of the ceremony, but I have to say Dean and I were already sharing nervous looks, worried that by dressing up and taking part in something that clearly wasn't part of our own culture, we might unwittingly cause offence. Before we knew it we had arrived at the temple where we left our shoes outside and our guide led us in - any hopes I had of hiding at the back were soon crushed when he led us to a gap at the very front of the temple. We sat down awkwardly on the floor, the eyes of a hundred villagers boring into the backs of our heads.

There were 3 monks seated facing the crowd on a little raised platform: a younger monk in the middle who led the ceremony, flanked by 2 slightly crustier old monks who stared toothily out at the worshippers. Off to the right was a row of 4 or 5 novices who looked very young and slightly bored. The ceremony began with lots of chanting and bowing - X was sat next to us nudging us and indicating when we should dip our heads towards the floor. It reminded me slightly of the few Catholic services I've attended in the past: it felt deeply serious, there were lots of bits where the congregation had to join in with the prayer (and much like the Catholic services I still didn't know what we were supposed to be saying) and there was a level of physical discomfort involved: at Mass its the ache that pervades your knees and bottom after hours spent sat/kneeling on hard surfaces … here we had to sit crossed-legged on the floor for what also felt like hours and if you're not used to sitting this way it is amazingly difficult to achieve for long periods. We were both shuffling about in our places like fidgety children as our joints began to hurt and our legs went numb, only to be revived with sharp pins and needles. The locals can spend hours squatting back on their haunches, or sat cross-legged, but as Westerners we've had a lifetime of apparatus designed to make things easier on our bodies (soft, high-back chairs, "memory-foam" mattresses, shoes with magical back-supporting insoles) and now we're simply not built to bend and fold as they do.

Aside from the chants and prayers, there was a point in the middle of the ceremony when the villagers made their offerings to the temple and monks. For this we all shuffled on our knees towards a row of large silver urns placed on a low table in the middle of the room, where we inched along in a queue depositing the chocolate bars, bananas and balls of sticky rice into each of the urns. With our silver goblets empty a short while later the congregation each poured their bottle of water slowly into the goblet, one hand held up to their head as the monks chanted.

Eventually, after the head monk had delivered what I assume was his sermon the ceremony was over and everyone filed out and chose a spot within the temple grounds to ask for one last blessing whilst emptying the water from the goblets onto the ground. This done, we walked slowly back through town, with a short stop at the French-speaking gentleman's house, where he proudly invited us into his ground floor room and pointed out photos of his family. He quickly changed his shoes and grabbed a hat as he was our guide for today then took us again through town, this time to a wooden hut coffee shop, where we were bought some rich Laos coffee and also a glass of local tea. Back at our host's house we were greeted with a fantastic breakfast spread of more vegetables, meat, chilli salsa and sticky rice. At first it had struck as bizarre to eat such heavy meals 3 times a day, but the food was so tasty and it provided us with so much energy that by the end of out trek we were really into it and I found myself craving sticky rice and pork for days! At one point Dean even asked X why they ate so much sticky rice and he replied, deadly serious, that if he didn't eat sticky rice at LEAST once a day he would not grow up to be strong.

The second day's trek was again very easy. Our new guide led us through rice paddies and forests, explaining things to us in his heavily-accented French and at one point passing the original site of the village Ban Phonsim, where he paused to pray at a little shrine. After a few hours we reached Turtle Lake, which looked less like a lake with clear banks, than a huge area of flooded grass land. It was very pretty though with bright pink lotus flowers standing up from the water. After walking round the lake we stopped for a rest in another raised bamboo hut and whilst we sat enjoying the relief of the shade and staring out at the peaceful lake, the old man lay back and was soon gently snoring. After a little while our lunch arrived, courtesy of our host's daughter and friend on a motorbike! Sticky rice, veg, meat and bananas all consumed and that was the end of our tour. Almost. A tuktuk appeared from nowhere and drove us back to the village where we collected our bags, thanked our host a dozen times for the warm welcome and delicious food, thanked our lovely guide and climbed again into the tuktuk with X for the journey back to Savannakhet.

To our amusement, after a very short drive we whizzed past the point from where we had started our very long walk to the village the previous day … and a short while later stopped for a visit to That Ing Stupa, an important site of worship in this area. Here I once again had to don a traditional skirt over my trousers and once inside X made a small donation on our behalf so that we could each have a piece of incense and ask for a blessing. He showed us how to light the end of our incense with the flame which is kept burning in a pot near the stupa, before kneeling on the floor and bowing three times, with the incense clasped between 2 hands and held up to your head. Prayers said we each placed our incense in a silver sand-filled trough infront of the stupa.

We wandered round the grounds for a little, trying to understand from X why certain trees and statues hold religious meaning for certain people - at every temple we've been to we've seen that the locals tend to have a particular spot where they like to pray. I think the meaning was lost slightly in X's translation but it has something to do with the spirits which reside everywhere... There were also a couple of large bronze gongs with the centre knocked through so it stuck out on one side like a small dome. Women and girls kept approaching these gongs and rubbing the gongs, giggling - X told us that if the girls can make the gong hum (bit like running your finger round the top of a wine glass) then it means they will find a good partner. Unfortunately though, the only person visiting the Stupa that day who seemed to be able to make the gongs sing was a scruffy looking boy of about 8.

Finally back in Savannakhet we collected our bags from the Eco Guide Unit office, thanked X for his company and brilliant guidance over the last 2 days, exchanged contact details and set off to find a hostel they recommended for our last night in town, before we got the bus to Pakse the next morning. Hostel Lina was a palace in comparison to the motel of a couple nights earlier and we enjoyed a hot shower before heading out for pizza - sometimes, even sticky rice just won't cut it!

Katy x