Vientienne Vanities

[gregchambers]

Vientienne Vanities

 

Took the bus from Bangkok to Vientienne. Or buses to be more exact. Stopped off for a night in Nakorn Rachisma and Udon Thani en route. Accompanied by the Movie Star (MS) ? actually an ex-Pattaya blow-job artist who seems to have permanently attached herself to moi but the only clue to her past the fact that she is traipsing around the country with a farang twenty-odd years her senior.

 

Nakorn was almost a farang free zone, the couple of louts we came across seemed barely able to restrain themselves from leaping on the MS right there and then but we managed to duck and dive around the idiots ? as far as I could tell Nakorn was a go-go free zone so they were probably in desperate need of some available females. Some karoke joints and beer bars. The only place in Thailand I?ve been where the market vendors offered a discount on the advertised price of their fruit as I was walking past! Nice people, probably due to the relative lack of farang (not Japanese, they must have some factories nearby).

 

I was viciously attacked by a giant bee that was just about to dig into my scalp but I brushed it off whilst doing a manic John Cleese imitation, much to the amusement of the MS. She had the common decency to rub some oil into the offending area. Later, a couple of killer dogs went berserk as we were walking past, but I bent down and pretended to pick up and throw a stone at them ? cowardly mutts did a runner. Nakorn is a huge town but not without some elements of the countryside in its make-up.

 

Judging by the number of babes who kept giving me the eye in the shopping malls I wouldn?t have had any problems if I was on my own (for some reason the MS won?t let me out of her sight, which is okay by me as it means she isn?t out of my sight as well!), despite dressing down to almost hippy anonymity. The same went for the MS but it didn?t seem to deter the local pimps (presumably, they had that desperate look about them, still mired in their gay youth when they took it up the backside a few times a day, until finding the wit to graduate to living off the local girls) who cast beseeching looks her way, as if affronted by the idea of her wandering around with an apparently poor farang.

 

Actually, the MS is funded by some ancient German chap (thanks Georg!) and I only have to pick up our living/travelling expenses, which will make for an interesting moment of angst when the German turns up and she has to decide who to stay with (the MS doesn?t know it, but I am have at least ten times as much dosh stashed away as the hard working Georg).

 

Anyway, for 450 baht a night you can get a rather nice hotel room in down town Nakorn, unlike Udon? the place I always stay is about a minute from Robinsons, started out as a clean bargain at 250 baht a night but ended up as a dirty, fast decaying edifice to indolence at 350 baht a night. Nakorn seems a much more interesting place than Udon, BTW. Next visa run I will give Nong Khai a go rather than Udon.

 

The Udon to NK bit of the trek was enlivened by taking a non-airconditioned bus, which was fine by me as I had the window wide open and a rather refreshing gale most of the way; the nearby Thais cowering in horror at the unprecedented drop in temperature. Shared the tuk-tuk from NK to the Friendship Bridge with a rather hideous farang in monks robes who complained all the way that he had been sent to get a visa in Laos without any funds. The other farang kept grinning at the MS and offered that he only had 900 baht with which to get to Vientienne and renew his visa (the price was going to rise to a 1000 baht the next day).

 

Exiting the tuk-tuk, the farang offered to pay the monk?s twenty baht and it later occurred to me that they had been dropping strong hints that I should fund their trek into the communist paradise of Laos on the assumption that I must have more dosh than sense to be in the company of the MS. Bloody cheek, as Al Culler likes to say!

 

Anyway, the visa on arrival into Laos is still 30 dollars (or 1500 baht!) and the tuk-tuk ride into Vientienne is still a 100 baht (for one or two), though some taxi driver this time round agreed to do the run for the same price. Probably taken by the MS. The cost of a decent hotel in Vientienne is in the 400-500 baht range (you can pay a lot more for not much more or a lot less for some horrible dump), helped along by many new hotels since I last stayed there two years ago.

 

Up to the 26th of August, the tourist visa fee was 300 baht, going up to a 1000 baht on that date (non-im 2000 baht or 5000 baht for a multi-entry one year non-im visa). As reported elsewhere, hundreds of Laotians caused chaos by getting their visas before the deadline but things are back to normal now with no need to turn up at 7.00am. Touris,t visa picked up next day at one o?clock, nothing more than a decent passport (with photocopy of the holder?s details page) needed (long list of countries that they won?t accept inc South Africa).

 

The increase had both the (tuk-tuk) farangs complaining and threatening to go elsewhere, but neither their suggestions of the PI or Indonesian had much appeal to me. A lot of noise about a relatively trivial increase in my humble opinion. The 900 baht farang turned up the same day as I was there, asking various farang how much the visa fee was despite it being displayed on a prominent poster. He seemed completely out of it when I told him it was a 1000 baht and was later seen wandering around in circles a few yards down from the Thai visa office (conveniently situated opposite the morning market, BTW). He wasn?t a bad looking chap but the MS had earlier sussed him as Ba Ba Bor Bor.

 

The MS wasn?t impressed with the shopping in Vientienne and gave me a wonderful smile when I said we could go back a day earlier than planned (at least it had broken her cherry passport). BTW, her high tech AIS mobile didn?t work whilst my humble DTac did! She kept complaining about all the Laotian men staring at her and I muttered something about her Vietnamese eyes confusing them. Most of the vendors prefer to sleep through the day and walking was hell on earth due to the excessive temperature/humidity ? three, four showers a day,

 

Vientienne seemed a touch more civilized than a few years ago, even spotted a few nightclubs when wandering around. Plenty of beautiful young Laotian gals all over the place, no idea how easy they are to chat up though I got plenty of eye contact and smiles whilst escorting the MS around.

 

We missed out Udon on the return trek, doing Vieitienne/NK to Nakorn in one push. At the Thai border a couple of Pakistani men, dressing way better than moi, were given an interrogation and marched off to the office, never to be seen again.

 

Only problem, the air-conditioning wasn?t working and in Khon Khan they told us we had an hour and I wandered off on my own for fifteen minutes, coming back to find they had changed buses and were about to leave, The only time I have ever left my bag under the seat on the bus and the MS, panicked by my disappearing act, didn?t object when it was placed in the bus?s hold ? the computer might be worth only 36k baht but it has about ten years worth of work on it!

 

I sulked to the next stop, full of visions of it being purloined but it was still there and the computer still worked. I made enough fuss to make sure the MS wouldn?t make the same mistake again (oddly, I get away with murder with the MS despite her wild beauty ? talk about a child?s mind in a woman?s body). The new bus was a marginal improvement and I was tempted to kick out the window a few times. I pissed myself with laughter when the conductor, a portly, piggish clown, tried to chat up the MS and he only sulked off when the MS curled herself into moi and pretended to fall asleep.

 

The MS has complained a few times about people chatting her up whilst I blithely look on and I tell her the admirers will be going home to whack themselves off whilst I will be enjoying the real thing. You either laugh or go insane, right?

 

I rather enjoyed the trek, though with the MS to hand I would probably have had a ball in Iraq!

 

 

 

[spirit_of_town_hall]

Interesting trip report.

 

sth

[Central Scrutinizer]

Thanks Greg.

 

Good info, good post, and amusing to boot! :-)

Anything else you can post on your travels and times with the MS will be appreciated.

 

Cent