One more Laos sunset before we go

Luang Prabang

I know I speak in superlatives a lot, but you’re going to hear some genuine non-exaggerations in the next couple of posts, mostly regarding Luang Prabang and Hoi An. Both of these are world heritage sites and cars are banned in the city center – only bicycles and motorbikes of all varieties. But let’s start at the very beginning: Luang Prabang.

After my days on the farm, I took a (gorgeous) 7-hr bus ride from Vang Vieng to LP. Unfortunately I was too busy avoided motion sickness to take any photos of said ride. After a day there I met up with Ali, and that evening we took a little sunset boat ride up and down the Mekong for . . . $2 I think? I did take some photos there.

I took this photo all by myself.

The song that was in my head for the whole of our visit to Luang Prabang was "Isn't she looooovely? Isn't she woooonderful?"

And then one day we took a lovely (brutal) cycle over and mountain and to the coolest waterfall I have ever seen (worthy superlative) Here are some photos.

And we saw some decent sunsets.

In short, Luang Prabang is lovely. Really all of Laos is this amazing simple and pristine place which most people haven’t yet discovered. The whole thing looks rather like a movie set. I hate to write it here because I feel like I’m exposing a best kept secret, but you should get there. Hopefully I’ll get to post some more about this trip before we set off on the bike ride. If not, I’ll just play catch-up in December. Starting in three days, it’s all biking updates from the road. So at least stay tuned for that!

3 days away!

We’re back in Saigon, Ali’s asleep and the lights are out and I can’t sleep! I’m way to excited! I saw lots of people from school for the first time today which was great. Ran all over the city trying to complete my to-do list (thank God there’s still tomorrow!) and went to a final dinner to see off the ones who are heading up on the train tonight. It’s all happening . . . it’s really happening! So with all this nervous energy I’m going to post some photos from our trip.

Getting excited . . .

Sorry I’ve been absent for a while. Ali and I have been busy seeing some of the coolest durn places I’ve ever been. But more on that later, hopefully. (I left my camera cord behind at one of our stops so I haven’t been able to upload any photos!)

The bike ride starts in 5 short days! We’re flying back to Saigon tonight, I’m getting my things together and doing a few last admin things before I fly up to Hanoi to meet the group on the 31st, and we start heading south on the 2nd.

And I’m soooo excited.

Scared, but excited.

Ali and I have done some pretty cool cycling in the last couple of weeks. When we were in Luang Prabang, Laos (which you should definitely go to if you even come close to the chance to do so) we cycled to this waterfall on the other side of a mountain. Not only was it the coolest waterfall I’ve ever seen, but it was a hell of a cycle to get there and back! It was tough, but as we were coming back, cruising for miles downhill which told me we had done a heck of a lot of uphill that I didn’t even notice, I thought “maybe I just might be ready for this trip.” I hope.

Then yesterday, we went for this long, flat ride between Hoi An and Danang, Vietnam. It was incredibly flat, and more of a liesurely walk than a practice ride, but lovely nonetheless. We were coming back during the time a lot of kids were walking home from school. We passed one group of kids (8-9 years old maybe) who started jumping up and down: “Hello! What’s your name?! Hello! What’s you’re name!” Right after that, another group of kids, similarly aged, all lined up to give us high fives as we rode past, squealing with glee after they did so. It just made me laugh, and think about some of the great things that are going to happen on this ride which I hadn’t even considered until then. Until now, it’s been all about training and preparation and making sure we’ve done everything we need to do and worrying about the bad things that could happen. This reminded me that this ride is going to be a pretty sweet experience all by itself. We’re going to see new things every day, and parts of Vietnam that we never would have seen otherwise. I just can’t wait.

My fear, of course, is failure. What if my knees don’t hold up? What if my back doesn’t hold up? What if I get some random injury that stops me from finishing. I realize now how very much I hope that doesn’t happen. But I’m trying not to think about it too much as these are the things I can’t control. We’ve gotten support from so. many. people from everywhere and I want to hold up my end of the bargain as much as I want to see this country on two wheels.

So it’s a wonderful combination of excitement and nervousness that only comes when you don’t know exactly what’s in store, and you’re either going to be able to do something or you’re not. I know I’ve done everything I can, and I know the others have as well. I just can’t wait to do it already!

High on a Hill With a Lonely Goatherd

As I’ve said before, this farm has the cutest milk goats in the whole wide world. So this morning I took some photos during mucking/feeding/milking time. And the man who works with them, Pi (I’m sure this isn’t actually how you spell his name), couldn’t be cuter himself. Today after we finished he snuck me this giant piece of goat cheese to eat and kept making shushing signs with his finger like “don’t tell anyone I just did that naughty thing.” Let me share these adorable things with you.

There he is now. Cute old thing. He doesn't really have a word of English, but he communicates well through pointing and giggling.

Learning from the pro

My knees are too old for this!

My Class This Week

I spent the evenings this week teaching a class of teenage monks. My biggest challenges were two: don’t point at them and don’t. touch them. I slipped up once by a slip of the hand when handing one monk his camera. I don’t know what’s going to happen to him now. But they were lovely. So eager to learn and I think they found me funny/intriguing. God knows why.

The Boat Races

On my first morning here, I was wandering around the town of Vang Vieng looking to rent a bicycle. It turned out to be quite a feat finding a helmet to go along with it, as “there are no bicycle helmets in Vang Vieng.” Why would you wear a helmet if you don’t have to? That would be silliness. So I’m riding a mountain bike wearing a motorbike helmet these days – imagine the looks I get with that!

Anyway, one of the Lao fellas who I was asking for a helmet ended up asking me to go to the boat races with him. Unsure what the boat races were, I said yes, why not? I like races and I like boats.

It was splendid fun. It seems to be an annual event which is comparable to, I don’t know, the Super Bowl? Ok not that big cause Lao isn’t that big, but it’s big, ok? And it’s a crazy fun party. Here are some photos from it.

I think videos will do  better job at conveying the atmosphere.

The Farm

I’ve only been on the farm for a few days so far, but I feel like I’ve been there for ages and I’m loving it. It’s so nice to be close to nature, hearing crickets at night, waking to roosters in the morning, and marveling at the biggest spiders I’ve ever seen. It’s also good to be around so many kindred, kinda purist spirits. Back in Ho Chi Minh City, it seemed like everyone my age was sleeping late, going out late, and spending mornings hungover. I’m now with people who like to get up and spend some time with goats in the morning! So in short, I couldn’t be happier. And I love goats. I think they’re one of the top five cutest animals ever. I think it goes: otters, prancing monkeys, swimming elephants, goats. Yep, that’s the order.

So I’m spending my time with a couple of German kids, an English girl, and a Pakistani-American guy, all of whom are modest rock stars. We’ve been spending our mornings, well, with goats. And picking/cutting everything mulberry. And working on building a mud house that this farm will soon be able to house guests in. My afternoons have been spent on a mountain bike. More on that in a later post. And in the evening I’ve been teaching an English class that consists of 11 teenage monks! Aside from having to constantly think about never touching or pointing at them (both of which are so difficult for me when I’m teaching!), it’s been thoroughly enjoyable.

I haven’t taken enough photos yet, but here are some to give you an idea of my (lovely) surroundings at the moment.

My back yard

From a spot along the bike route

Can you tell that this all just makes me very happy?

I got no keys . . .

Well hi!

In the time since my last post, I’ve moved out of my apartment, turned in my motorbike, stored my November bike, bought the final things for the November ride, shipped a couple of boxes home, given away lots of books and work clothes, stored everything else at Ali’s, packed a backpack, and traveled to Laos!

So that’s me done with living in Vietnam . . .

I’ll be back, for a small bike ride and a final trip to the beach, but that’s really it.

I can’t tell how I feel about that. It was a strange place to live. In many ways, I ended up liking my life there better than almost anywhere else I had been. I liked my job and my living situation and the things I was spending my time on, and found a really great balance there that was difficult to strike in the States. In other ways, I found it more difficult to truly connect with Vietnam and its people than any other country I’ve been to. The worlds we lived in up until now are so dramatically different from one another. There are gender things and power things and “saving face” things that I’ve never stopped struggling with. I don’t know how long it would take to bridge that gap, but for me, it would take much longer than a year.

But yesterday, as I was sprinting to the post office, trying to finish the last of my chores before hopping the plane to Thailand, I saw a painting that I might have bought if I hadn’t . . . . been . . . sprinting to the post office. It said:

“Vietnam is a country, not a war.”

I just thought that was a really lovely thing to see on my way out. I think in the States at least it almost inevitably sounds like the name of a war. There are so many things that I’ll probably never understand about this place and definitely won’t identify with, but I’ve at least come to see Vietnam as a country and a people. It’s not a time and it’s not a war and it’s definitely much more than an era in our own political history. It’s here now and we spent a while trying to understand each other.

And that’s all I’ll say about that!

So now I’ m in Laos, currently in Vientiane and making my way up to an organic farm outside of Vang Vien to do some mountain cycling and, well, farming. I think it’s splendid so far, except that I just got foiled by an atomic chili pepper in disguise, much to the amusement of many small Laotian children. Other than that, it seems a sweet, sweet place.