Love and Marriage, Horse and Carriage

About the internship...

The past two weeks have been full of interviews. There are a total of 75 loan applicants and over the past two weeks, we've interviewed almost all of them. The interviews themselves were fairly straight forward, although, at times, I had to repeat my questions and repeat the loan applicants answers to make sure I was understanding correctly and getting all the information we need.

The most difficult part of the interview process was finding where each applicant lives. There are no formal addresses in Nicaragua, especially not in the communities on the outskirts of Granada where we work. Addresses are described by distances and directions from major landmarks, such as a school, a church, the health center, the statue, or the old water tank. The first few days of interviews we spent a lot of time trying to figure out where people lived. There was one group that was particularly hard to find. The directions to their house (translated to English) said 'From the health center, 3 blocks to the west and one to the east.' We asked a woman who lives in that vicinity and she did not know any of the women we were looking for.  We found the group of women eventually, but it took a lot of asking around.

The meeting with new loan applicants at Dona Nora's house

We set a meeting time for about twenty of the new loan applicants for Tuesday at 3 pm.  On our way to Marcela's house, Phoebe, Alex, Emma, and I got caught in the rain.  When we finally got to Marcela's we waited for a while for the rain to die out and for Gilberts (who also got caught in the rain on his motorbike) to arrive.  Because of the rain, we assumed the loan applicants would not show up for the meeting, but Gilberts drove to Dona Nora's house, where the meeting was supposed to take place, just to check anyway.  When he came back, we were all surprised to hear that nearly everyone was there!  The fact that the loan applicants were waiting for us in the rain is truly a testament to how much they want a loan from PHPG!  We set to work interviewing each new applicant and finished the interviews in about an hour.

About life in Nicaragua...

I love living in Granada! We walk through the market every time we go to Pantanal for loan repayments or interviews, and Phoebe and I usually stop on the way back to get fresh, delicious, and cheap produce at the market. Living with Phoebe is awesome! We've experimented with several new recipes: black bean burgers, chile, tomato sauce & pasta, falafel and yogurt sauce (with fresh tortillas as our 'pita'), brownies, salsa and guacamole, lots of curry, and daily smoothies with mango, pineapple, banana, or some combination of them. The constant cat-calling, I could live without. But once in a while, it can be amusing. Today when Phoebe and I were leaving the market, several men started yelling after us in English with thick accents saying things like, 'Hey baby!' or 'So beautiful, baby!' We immediately burst into laughter and kept laughing the whole way home.

One of the best parts of living and working in Granada is getting to know Marcela and Gilberts, the PHPG employees. We meet at Marcela's house before going out for loan repayment meetings or interviews and usually have some time to chat before everyone gets there.  Phoebe and I met Marcela's boyfriend (he recently became her fiancée!), who was very quiet but very nice.  We've also met her parents, aunts, uncles, siblings, grandmother, and numerous cousins.  Her aunt's stall in the market has become our favorite source of refresco de cacao- a chocolate drink sold in a baggie with a straw.  There are several types of refrescos, but they tend to be overly sweet (with the exception of cacao).  Last weekend we went to a dance club, Cesar, with Marcela and Gilberts.  The bartender was one of the guys I had interviewed that week for a loan, which was a bit awkward.  Even more awkward, is me dancing.  My dance skills definitely need some work, but I am such a slow learner when it comes to dancing that I don't have high hopes.  I will try though.

It's impossible not to make embarrassing mistakes when learning another language and it's not nearly as fun if you don't make mistakes.  I've made my fair share.  Usually, I realize my mistake as soon as I say it.  One of our neighbors, Rafael, stops to talk to us when he walks by.  The first time he stopped to talk to us he asked us a bunch of questions including 'Do you have any kids?'  I responded with 'No, pero quizas cuando estoy cansada' instead of 'No, pero quizas cuando estoy casada.'  For all you non-Spanish speakers, I told him 'No, but maybe when I'm tired' instead of 'No, but maybe when I'm married.'  I started laughing as soon as the wrong word came out.  Another good one was when I was talking to Gilberts after an afternoon in Pantanal.  I was trying to tell him how I wouldn't meet Alex or Isabel, the founders of PHPG, because I'll be leaving Nicaragua before they get back mid-August.  Instead of using the verb 'conocer' (to know), I used 'cocinar' (to cook).  I will not be meeting (or cooking) Alex and Isabel this summer.  I've definitely gotten used to laughing at myself.  More embarrassing than mixing up words in Spanish, I have been mixing up words in English.  As my Spanish improves, my English is getting worse!  Phoebe can attest to this.

Horse and cart a block from our house

Two more things I love about Granada- the colorful buildings and the horse and carts!  Horses and carriages line up near Parque Central.  I haven't taken a ride yet, but I plan on it before I leave.  Maybe a day when I'm feeling rather touristy or when I'm showing my sister around Granada.  She gets to Nicaragua in a little over 2 weeks!

Stay tuned!

Matagalpa & San Ramon

A view of the mountains from the Chocolate Castle

Early Tuesday morning (I'm talking like 5:30 am), Phoebe and I set out for Matagalpa.  We took a bus to Masaya (a half hour north from here) in order to catch the 6:45 am express bus to Matagalpa in order to avoid a stop in Managua.  I was a bit sick that morning so I slept the entire bus ride.  Once in Matagalpa, we spent the day walking around- we went to the Cathedral, a museum on the life of Carlos Fonseca (the founder of the Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional (FSLN)), the 'Chocolate Castle' a little outside of town where we bought lots of Nicaraguan Chocolate, and a coffee museum.  Matagalpa is a beautiful city in the mountains.

In the afternoon, we met up with Beth, a family friend that runs an NGO in the Matagalpa/San Ramon area called Planting Hope.  She took us to San Ramon where she set us up with a host family- the same host family my family stays with when they go to San Ramon.  Margarita (our host mom) and Alvaro (our host dad) and their kids, Enrique, Elvin, Mili, and Anabelin, were all very welcoming.  Mili (an adorable 6-year old) and her friend showed us around San Ramon that evening and then again the next day.  When we went to the playground, there was a Mariachi band just hanging out- a few of them on the swings.  I wish I had my camera them to snap a photo.

Phoebe, Mili, and I during our tour of San Ramon

San Ramon is a beautiful and peaceful town and I'm sure I'll be returning when my sister gets to Matagalpa in July.

Wednesday was Mother's Day, so we didn't want to impose too much on our family so we left in the afternoon.  We chatted with Beth a little about Planting Hope and their projects.  Planting Hope built a library in La Chispa, a neighborhood on the outskirts of Matagalpa, 10 years ago after she surveyed the children in the area asking what they would like to see in their community.  Sarah was there for the first few weeks it opened and she is returning for the month of July to teach photography classes at the library.  We also heard about the their mobile library program from Alvaro.  Planting Hope has a bus that Alvaro drives to rural communities to lend books for the day to school children.

Our return home consisted of three bus and two taxi rides, but we made it safely back to Granada!

Diakachimba

Phoebe, Shohta, and I have settled nicely into our house a few blocks from central park. We have a lovely house with a big open space, kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom downstairs, and two bedrooms and one bathroom upstairs. Phoebe and I live upstairs and each have a shower in our rooms, which is awesome. We've explored the market thoroughly. We can buy anything from street food, to fruit, shampoo, rice, veggies, flip flops, bras, notebooks...the list goes on. It's all packed into a small area. People just throw garbage on the ground, but someone comes around with a garbage wagon to sweep it up. Two more interns arrived this week, Margot and Corie, so six interns went with Gilberts and Marcela (the Nicaraguan employees of People Helping People Global) to the Friday repayment meetings with the group leaders. On Fridays, we meet with a total of 6 group leaders. The first two leaders have 'Pulperias' or little convenient stores. Some of the other popular businesses of our clients are firewood cutting, selling clothes or other goods in the market, and there is even one dentist. I think I'm starting to get a better idea of the layout of the community. Shohta is working on a map of the area which we can then fill in and add more details, such as specific houses and landmarks, to help us get around when we don't have the guidance of Marcela and Gilberts. The picture is of some of the kids at the third or fourth group leaders house. They were super excited when Margot started taking pictures of them, so I had to join in and catch one of them posing for the camera. After our visits to the group leaders, we were asking Marcela and Gilberts about Nicaraguan slang and how to say things like 'cool.' They taught us 'dia kachimba' which means something along the lines of 'cool' or 'awesome' if someone asks you how you feel. On our way back to our house, we passed this little old lady selling merengues on the corner. So we decided to buy some. She counted our change for us in English, so Phoebe asked her how she knows English and she launched into her family history, telling us about her 9 children and how she was a nurse (we think that's what she said, but something might have been lost in translation). The merengues were too sweet for our liking, but we will stop and chat next time we pass her. Side Note: On our walk from house to house on Friday, we came across the coolest plant. It looks like a tiny fern, but when you touch the leaves, it folds and closes. Part of what we'll be doing this summer is working on independent projects, such as the map, quality of life surveys, and making small videos to send to donors. Phoebe and I are trying to gauge the health needs of the community to see if there is a health education program we can incorporate into the micro-lending model. We found out that visits to the local health center are free. However, prescription drugs are not. We plan on visiting the health center early Monday to ask them questions to find out more about the health problems specific to the communities we're working with.

Nicaragua

After almost three years since I left Asia, I'm back on the road for a few months. I'll be working for People Helping People Global, a non-profit NGO that give micro-loans to individuals in a few communities in Nicaragua. I'll be based in Granada but will be travelling around Nicaragua, and hopefully Honduras and El Salvador. I arrived in Managua, Nicaragua on Thursday night and made it to a hostel for the night just before it started pouring. The hostel was quiet and nice with a few hammocks out by the pool. A girl in my dorm was headed to the same bus station as me, so we split a taxi and went our own ways: me to Granada, a colonial city on Lake Nicaragua, and her to San Juan al Sur, a beach town. The bus cost about $3-$4 dollars including a tip for the guy who showed me to the right bus and carried my bag. It was only about an hour to Granada. I found a hostel, threw my stuff in a locker and headed to the central park to meet two fellow interns, Shohta and Morgan and one of the staff members of People Helping People Global, Gilbert. From there we walked about a mile to a community called Pantanal, first meeting up with Marcela, the other PHPG employee. Alex and Isabell, the founders of PHPG were here last week, but I didn't get to meet them. They will be in Vermont during the 2 and half months I'm here. In Pantanal, we visited the houses of six group leaders. PHPG lend out small amounts of money to groups of borrowers to improve or start their own business. Each individual is responsible for paying back their loan, but elect a group leader that collects the money, so each week we only have to visit a few households instead of everyone. I think they used to have repayment meetings in which all borrowers met at a specific time and day each week to repay the loans, but it was hard for everyone to make it and they turned to group leaders to improve efficiency. Individual borrowers are required to pay 60 cordoba each week (less than $3) to pay back the loan over a year period or they can opt to pay more to pay off the loan faster. PHPG charge no interest. This is largely due to the hight interest rates that plagued Nicaragua around 2008 and led to the 'no pago' (non-payment) movement in the north in which President Ortega encouraged agricultural producers to refuse to pay back their loans. Instead of charging interest, PHPG uses donor money to pay the Nicaraguan staff and other expenses to make sure the people who need the money most are getting it. They have been successful with approximately a 95% repayment rate. The group visits took several hours, partly because we had to wait about an hour for one woman receiving a loan to get home. But it was nice to chat with Gilbert and one of the group leaders Carlos for a while. My Spanish isn't great, but it's enough to get around and it will get better with practice. The community we visited, Pantanal had few paved roads, most were dirt roads or paths and we wound around visiting the six houses following Marcela and Gilbert. Most of the houses had barbed wire fences out front, mostly to mark their property, since the gaps in the wire are big enough for a dog or human to fit under. The floors were dirt and the ceilings were atin. The walls ranged from wood planks to tin. We were invited into one of the houses in which there were two beds, a freezer, a few chairs, and a tv. A few kids were on the beds watching tv and eyeing us suspiciously. Most of the kids we passed in the community yelled 'hello' to us and kept waving. The next round of repayment collections is Monday here in Granada and Tuesday in Matagalpa. I'm waiting to hear if there is room in the car that is going from Matagalpa to the community PHPG just starting loaning to. If there is, I plan on going to Matagalpa Monday morning and staying for two nights for the meetings there and heading back to Granada on Wednesday. I just settled into a room in house a few blocks from the central park. Shohta is also staying here and possibly another intern as well when she gets back from a mini-trip to the south. Right now there is an older gentleman who is living in one of the rooms, but he'll be moving out next week. In total, there are 3 rooms, so it'll be a little intern house. While walking around the central park in search of some breakfast, two high school girls approached me with a survey about what I think about Nicaragua. And then 3 boys with the same survey came up to me at a cafe. I think they were offended that I guessed their age was 14 (they're 16), but looked so much younger. They were friendly and were interested in my taste of music, particularly rock- they are slip-knot fans. Anyway, that is all I have time for now. I'm off to the market to buy a cell phone and some fruit.

Kathmandu!

I have yet to finish blogging about my Laos/Cambodia adventures with Margo and Michelle, but since I left my laptop and diary in Bangkok, I will share some stories from Nepal first.
Upon returning to Thailand after Cambodia, Michelle, who wasn’t feeling well, stayed at Ba Ahe’s house in Bangkok with Margo while I headed up to Lampang to visit P’Ple (Apple) and Maprang. I ended up hanging out all week with Maprang, while P’Ple had school and partying with them at night. I got back to Bangkok on Friday, the day before our flight to Kathmandu, just in time to pack my stuff.
All of our bags were completely stuffed with various things that Ba Oy requested from Bangkok- everything from frozen fish to ziplock baggies to shower curtains to wine. Luckily, we got away with 100 kg between the 3 of us.
We arrived in Kathmandu on June 6th. Ba Oy and Lung Jacques met us at the airport with a UN driver and we set off to their new home in the center of the city. Although their house is in the middle of the city, it is in a quiet neighborhood and the only bothersome noises are the dogs howling at night and the sound of the generator when the power goes out. Their house is large and beautiful. Margo, Michelle, and I each have our own room, and I actually have my own bathroom!
We arrived with volunteering at an NGO in our minds, since we'd be here for a month and should put our time to good use. Lung Jacques had went to the Environmental Day the day before our arrival and picked up a brochure from an NGO called Environmental & Public Health Organization (ENPHO) in Kathmandu. I read through the pamphlet about 3 times I was so excited. All the projects they worked on were related to environmental engineering, and it was exactly what I was looking for! So I called Monday morning and set up an appointment with the executive director for Tuesday and have been volunteering there since. I've been focusing on decentralized wastewater treatment plants in the Kathmandu Valley. Basically, they are trying to identify key demonstration sites for treatment plants near the Bagmati River. The treatment plants generally include a septic tank and then constructed wetlands or other low-maintenance technologies such as ponds.
I had heard that the Bagmati River was polluted, but it wasn't until my first site visit that I realized to what extent. I could smell it before I could see it. The river is absolutely black and dead. It is essentially an open channel of sewage flowing through the city. There's definitley a lot of work to be done.
We all settled into a routine quickly. I wake up around 8:30, get dressed, enjoy coffee, oatmeal, and sometimes a croissant for breakfast, read the Kathmandu Post and Himalayan Times, finish getting ready, and head off to the ENPHO office. The walk takes me about 40 minutes each way. I pass the markets of Dilli Bazaar, through crowded streets and sidewalks (occasionally I even get beeped at while walking on the sidewalk- by a motorbike), around women with umbrellas that almost poke my eyes out, around or through the piles of garbage on the streets, pass the guards at Singha Durbar, and pass the same cow (which is generally in the same area everyday). I come to the office and work on reports for three sites in Kathmandu or head into the field to see the potential sites. I've been to quite a few inside and outside Kathmandu, but two seem to be more promising than others since they already have land available and land is a huge issue.
For lunch at the office, about a dozen or so of us eat together. We each bring a small portion- either a cooked dish, fruit, or cookies- and share. We never have enough plates or utensils, so we share those too. So I've gotten to try lots of interesting and yummy dishes. In the afternoon we are served milk tea while we work (something I look forward to everyday). Lunch time talk is usually in Nepali, so I can only understand the few English words that are thrown in, and when they switch to English to talk to Silli and I.
Besides working at ENPHO, I have done a little traveling and exploring on the weekends. Our first weekend we went to Nagarkot, which is about 2 hours East of Kathmandu. The Fort Resort, where we stayed supposedly has views of the surrounding mountains, including Everest, but it was so cloudy, we couldn't see anything. We took a 12 km hike to a lookout tower, but there too we couldn't see a thing.
That following Monday, my first full week at ENPHO has an interesting story...
I left the house as usual, but it was eerily quiet. There were no cars, no taxis, no trucks on the road- only people walking and a few motorbikes. I was confused my entire walk to the office. I thought "Did I miss a memo? Is it a no-automobile holiday or something?" I saw a road blocked off and then saw people re-spraying the traffic lines on the road, but further down there were still no cars on what is usually a hectic road. In the last stretch of my walk, I saw a familiar face. It was Silli, another volunteer at ENPHO. We walked the rest of the way to the office and found the gate locked. It turns out the "no auto-mobile holiday" was actually a city-wide protest/strike called banda. So I turned around and walked all the way home, where we stayed the rest of the day under Ba Oy's orders. The next day there was news in the paper of protestors attacking cars, even cars with people on the way to the hospital, and protestors deflating tires of bikes. I don't remember the cause of this particular banda. Bandas are fairly frequent, but usually contained to only a part of the city.
On our second weekend- we spent Saturday walking around the city sight seeing and shopping. Sunday we went to Baktapur, a historical city not too far from Kathmandu. As foreigners we had to pay a steep $10 entrance fee to the city. We spent the day walking around taking pictures of temples. We saw various stages of the wood carving industry. All of the windows in BaktapurMichelle and I went in search of the "Peacock Window" which is supposedly the most famous/best carved window in the Kathmandu Valley. Next door was a paper-making factory- so we got a tour of how they make the hand-made paper that Nepal is famous for.


This past weekend we went to Patan, where Margo, Michelle, and I went to the Rato Machhendranath Festival. Machhendranath supposedly has power over the rain, so the festival is a plea for good rain. A tall wood-carved tree-looking temple is paraded around by a chariot for a month. We caught the last day in which the Prime Minster and President and other government officials participate in the "showing of the sacred vest." It was all very confusing because we couldn't see very well, but we could see a guy holding up a black vest and the crowd clapping and cheering.
On our way back from the festival we ate a type of street food called poni puri. They start as little hollow balls. The vendor uses his thumb to poke a hole and then pours in an unknown liquidy mixture and hands it to the customer on a plate, and keeps handing you them until you've had your portion. They were ok, but the next day they didn't feel so ok anymore. I ended up sick for 2 days and cautious with what I ate for the next 2, so today is my first day of 3 meals all week. I'm glad to say I feel much better after stomach issues, caused by (I'm assuming) the poni puri.
This week I've finished up the reports I was working on for the wastewater treatment plants at work. Yesterday was my last day. I didn't have anything to work on but I went in for lunch and to say goodbye. Lunch was a feast. On top of the usual dishes, there was just as many desserts and snacks. After lunch, lots of pictures, and gifts, most everyone hung around and talked. It was sad to leave when I feel like I was making friends. If timing had been different, I could have seen myself staying here and volunteering for longer. I really enjoy what I do at ENPHO, and I've learned a lot...who knows, maybe I'll be back!


We leave in about 2 minutes...a month in Nepal sure went by fast!

Motorbike Diaries

Southern Laos...
We left Vientiane on an overnight bus called the “King of Bus.” It was by far the best bus I’ve been on. It was not only an overnight bus, but a sleeper bus- meaning it had beds! The beds are supposed to fit 2 people, but luckily I didn’t have to share mine because it would have been a tight squeeze, not to mention awkward. The attendant made rounds through the bus, first giving us a meal (pork fried rice that I couldn’t eat anyway), water, garbage bags, and then a handful of candy- it felt like Halloween. We arrived in Pakse in the morning and made our way to a guesthouse a bit nicer than usual. Margo had been sick and up all night, so the splurge ($5 each) for the hotel was worth it. Even though I had slept through the night, I was still exhausted and we spent most of the day watching TV, napping, and planning our next few days.
The next morning, leaving most of our stuff at the guesthouse and only taking enough for a few days, we rented motorbikes and set off on what Lonely Planet calls “The Southern Swing”- a motorbike loop around part of southern Laos. Our plan was to drive for 3 or 4 days, stopping in the afternoon at our destination, exploring, spend the night, and then continue the next day.


A few kilometers outside of Pakse, we stopped at a Resort that is known for its tree house bungalows, waterfall, and inside few on Laos village life. The waterfall was nothing compared to Luang Prabang, but the tree houses were cool- just too expensive for our budgets. We followed signs to the “village cultural center, “ where they had sample houses from the different villages.


The rest of the was easy until the sky opened and poured buckets of rain on us, soaking us the bone in mere seconds. We stopped at a noodle stand, and the soup warmed us up while we waited for the rain to subside. It finally cleared up and we continued on our way, arriving in Tad Lo in the early afternoon. After driving around for a bit, we finally found where the guesthouses are clustered together and secured ourselves a room in a rickety building on the river with a view of one of the waterfalls. We spent the day exploring the area, which boasted 3 waterfalls. We came to a dead end when searching for the third and largest as the bridge was under construction. Tad Lo was a slow-paced place, so it was nice to relax. Once again, 3 of us shared 1 bed, although it wasn’t quite as comfortable as the first.
The next day we headed out for what was described as the roughest ride of the trip- 30 kilometers of unpaved mountain road. It was a bumpy, and sometimes terrifying ride. We carefully picked our way around potholes and rocks, mainly sticking to the outside of the road. The worst part was an uphill stretch, which we had to crawl up. At one point, Michelle had to get off Margo’s motorbike and walk for bit while Margo maneuvered around the ditches.
Finally we reached the town the marked the end of the dirt road and the beginning of the paved portion to Sekong. Sekong was a little town with a market and not much else. We stayed at a place called “Women Fever,” the only place we could find that could accommodate 3 of us in one room only about $1 each. The room had a bare concrete floor, dirty white walls, 3 single beds lined up and a table. It felt like a prison cell. The lights and fan had to be turned on and off from the room next door because at one point or other the rooms were joined and when they split them, they never split the electricity. By the time we ate dinner, enjoyed a Lao Beer, and showered, it was dark but still really early. There was not much else to do- so we walked around and stared at the stars. Before heading out in the morning, we gave Michelle her first motorbike lesson. We had her drive down the road and turn around a few times. We watched as she puttered away and then made wide turns on the way back. Riding a motorbike isn’t hard, but it does take some getting used to.
Our next stop was Paksong, the coffee capital of Laos. Situated on the fertile Bolaven Plateau, its soil is perfect for growing an assortment of crops, but since coffee brings in the dough, coffee is the most popular.
No one warned us about the 70-kilometer stretch of unpaved road leading to Paksong. Parts of the road were in decent shape and parts you could tell became part of a river when it rained. On the unpaved road in the middle of the jungle- all we could do is pray that our bikes held out and it didn’t rain. We kept our eyes out for a path the led off to the left to a waterfall. We finally found it. The path led to a spectacular view of a tall waterfall on the other side of a valley.


The dirt road finally ended and gave way into a terribly pot-holed paved road. I felt like I was playing a video game as I weaved through the potholes strategically planning my path. After 2 kilometers of this, we were finally on a real road!
In Paksong, we stopped at a café with a huge COFFEE sign outside. The owner was a Farang that directed us to a decent restaurant and guesthouse. The guesthouse was nice; it had a decent bed and bathroom and a view of their pet monkeys out back. We went back to the COFFEE place and arranged a coffee tour for the next morning. We then drove to a resort about 8 kilometers away that had a nice view of yet another waterfall from its restaurant.
The next morning Michelle and Margo made an early trip to the market to get Michelle a new pair of flip-flops after discovering one of the owners dog had chewed hers apart. We then met for our coffee tour. The owner of the café is a guy named Cornelius, but goes by the name Coffee, which he got at a young age for his love of coffee. After a breakfast of pastries, bananas, and coffee, he took us around to see arabica and robusta coffee plants in different stages of growth, explaining how the process worked. We saw everything from the seed to the roasting. We even bought some beans that we watched his wife roast. The tour was only an hour long, but it came packed with so much information that it was worth the few dollars we spent.
We drove to Champasak, home of Wat Phou, one of the pre-Angkor temples outside of Cambodia. To get there, we had to take a ferry with our motorbikes. The ferry was just two small wooden boats held together with a few planks of wood. I thought I was going to drive right off the ferry trying to get onto it using the skinny ramp. It was at Wat Phou that we discovered the ancient obsession with “lingas” which literally means “phallic symbol.” The mountain is home to the huge temples because from a distance it resembles a linga and its name translated means “Mount Penis.” There was a path of lingas leading (which we called the “penis path”) to ancient (and very steep) stone steps to the top. At the top there was a small temple, stone carvings, and a great view of the ruins below and surrounding countryside.


Finally, we headed back to Pakse and checked back into the same guesthouse after-dark where we could prepare ourselves for the last leg of our Laos journey- Four Thousand Islands.


Four Thousand Islands is a group of islands in the Mekong, a few of which are big enough to be inhabited. Our first stop was Don Kong- the biggest island. We took a “bus,” which was really just an overstuffed songtheaw to where we could take an overpriced ferry to the island. We found a guesthouse where we could get two rooms for pretty cheap, so I ended up with the room to myself. The first afternoon we walked around, ate on the river, and relaxed.
The next morning we got up super early to go to the morning market, which turned out to be tiny. After walking down two small isles I was through the market- I like to avoid the areas with dead or still flapping fish, dead pigs, half-dead chickens tied up, and slabs of raw meat, but that’s not always possible.
After the market we rented bicycles and set out on a loop of the southern tip of the island that was described in my travel book. At the start we were on a wide bike path right along the water, but it eventually got narrower and narrower until we were on an overgrown footpath and had to walk our bikes. When we finally emerged from the woods, Michelle had a stick lodged in her front tire and her back tire was completely flat. We were directed to a little bike shop where an 8-year-old boy popped out of nowhere and set to work on patching the tire. Back on our way, we finally reached the other side of the island and stopped to eat som-tam (papaya salad) for lunch. Another 4 km, and we were back at our guesthouse…and I was sick.
That afternoon we took a boat to Don Det, where we (or at least I did since I was sick) spent the next few days swinging on hammocks and drinking fresh fruit shakes at the guesthouse we stayed. The restaurant there was called ‘Rasta Café’ and virtually anything could be made ‘Happy’ by sprinkling some magic green herb in it. Throughout the restaurants on Don Det we saw, Happy Shakes, Happy Pizza, Happy Curry, and Happy Pancakes, to name a few.
The island only has electricity from 6-10 each night, but since it’s from generators, its very noisy. The three of us were in one small room in which the bed took up 80% of the space. The power (and thus the fan) would go off around 10, and by 10:30 each night I was sweating. So I took my iPod, flashlight, and bug repellent to one of the hammocks and slept out there each night. I could give my self a little breeze by swinging back and forth, but the bugs would come swarming anytime I changed songs on my iPod.
One of the days on Don Det, we actually left the hammocks and took a walk over a bridge to one of the other islands, Don Khon, where we saw, yet another, waterfall.
We booked our next stop: Michelle and I to Cambodia and Margo back to Thailand. We parted ways and set out on the next part of our backpacking adventure…

Bilbo Baggins would be jealous of our adventures

A lot has happened since my last post. Margo & I left Lampang last month to come down to Bangkok to pick up Michelle, one of Margo's buddies from UCLA, and start our backbacking around Laos and Cambodia. After getting our Laos visas squared away, we set out for Vientienne, the capital of Laos, arriving on April 27th. Laos, in general, reminded me a lot of Thailand. The food and language are similar to Thai, so the little Thai I learned came in handy when negotiating prices and such (the numbers are exactly the same so I can understand prices). Margo's Thai was of coure very useful. Everyone can understand her because Laos gets its music and tv programs from Thailand. Margo just has a little trouble understanding them when they respond in Laos. Michelle's Chinese came in handy too since there is a large Chinese influence.
We walked around the city to see some of the temples. There's also a big French influence here, since it was once a colony of France (so that means lots of bakeries, yum!) In terms of the food, it seems to be heavily influenced by Thailand, China, Vietnam, and of course French pastries.
Our first full day, we rode bikes around the city. Margo & I have to get re-used to driving on the right side of the road...we had to let Michelle lead the way after I lead us down the wrong way. Our second-day bike adventure took us to "Buddha Park," a park 27 km outside the city with large concrete statues of Hindu gods and Buddha. One looked like a bizzare giant pumpkin, which had a dark staircase leading to the top from which you could get a good view of the whole park. You can see the "pumpkin" in the background.

The ride back was deathly hot. We returned drenched with sweat, and at least for me, a farmers' tan.
Our next stop was Vang Vieng. Vang Vieng was a soul-less tourist town. The town was full of guest houses, restaurants, internet cafes, tour companies and little else. The best part was our 6 hour tubing adventure down the river...stopping at a bar with an awesome zip line into the river. The first time I tried the zip line, my hands slipped and I plunged into the water from quite a height. The second time I made it to the end and dropped the few feet that we're meant too. Besides that, the town had little to offer on our limited budgets. We had to splurge on a meal or two since there were no cheap options (when I say splurge I mean a bit more than $2 for a meal.) The odd thing about Vang Vieng- it seemed as if every restaurant played FRIENDS on the tvs there. It was scary, that no matter what restaurant we passed, I knew exactly what episode it was, and possibly what season it was from.

Louang Prabong, our next destination, was my favorite city in Laos. We spent the first afternoon wandering around the city visiting temples and shops and absorbing the culture. Luang Prabang has a good mix of cultural sites and cafes, so it was nice and relaxing to spend a few days there. Our second full day there, we rented 2 motorbikes to drive to the Kouang Si waterfall outside the city. This was my first time driving a semi-automatic motorbike since the first time Margo taught me how to ride, more than 7 months earlier, but I got the hang of it quickly. Our only problem was just a flat tire on Margo & Michelle's bike a few kilometers into the ride. Luckily we were near a village and had it patched up in no time. The waterfall was gorgeous- pool after pool of crystal-blue pools which were perfect for swimming.

Michelle went on a 2-day trek, so Margo and I had extra time hanging around the city. We spent the days at cafes, visiting wats, and researching English camps in Korea. We spent the nights at a cafe drinking sangria and watching movies (including "Smart People," which I highly recommend) with other tourists and spending too much money on local crafts at the night market.
We left Luang Prabang for Phonsavan, the site of the Plain of Jars. On the bus, the guy behind me proceeded to get sick on my leg, yuck! Luckily it was only a splash and I soon as I felt it I jumped out of my seat to join Michelle a few rows up. The buses in Laos don't have toilets and there are no public toilets, so on long bus rides, they stop every few hours the let their passengers empty their bladders on the side of the road. Its hard to find privacy when 40 people are using the "bathroom" at the same time.

We arrived in Phonsavan and found a guesthouse that would fit 3 of us in one room, which has proved to be difficult in most places. We found a place that had a mat that the third person could sleep on, but after seeing a cockroach or two, we opted to squeeze all three of us on the bed, which we did with relative comfort.
The Plain of Jars is exactly as it sounds- a plain full of jars. The large jars are made of sandstone, are 2000 to 3000 years old, and a mystery. No one knows what they were actually used for. Most scholars believe they were giant urns, while a local legend says they were containers of alcohol. My personal theory is that the king at the time had many children who liked to play hide-and-seek. The lack of hiding spaces on the wide-open plains made it difficult, so he had the jars created to keep them out of his hair.

Our tour guide would gather us all together to tell us about the sites or a specific jar. Unfortunately I couldn't understand about 60% of the words that came out of his mouth, so I can't share those stories with you. Our tour around the 3 sites, also included a stop at a lao-lao (local Lao whiskey) village, where we see how its made. The only way to describe it is throat-burning. After seeing the conditions in which its made and trying a shot, I don't feel the need to ever drink it again.

The site also had many craters created by the dropping of bombs by the US during "The Secret War" from 1965-1973. The US dropped two million tons of bombs in Laos in order to cut off ties to Vietnam. A good portion of the bombs were filled with 600 or so cluster bombs, or "bombies," many of which never detonated. Even today, UXOs (unexploded ordanances) are scatterend in the region, which deter the farmers from expanding their farms. We were told not to stray from the paths when walking around the Plain of Jar sites, since not all areas had been cleared of UXOs. Locals use the bomb shell casing as fence posts and plant pots. Scrap metal hunting is a lucrative, but very dangerous business in the area and leads to several deaths and amputations a year. We visited the MAG (Mines Advisory Group) office in town and learned a lot about what they are doing to deal with the situation. They have trained locals, mostly women, to safely check and clear areas by safely exploding the UXOs. Margo & I were interviewed by an expat who works there. He asked us questions about the display in the office and what we learned about UXOs. I must have sounded like a bumbling idiot because I tend to use the word "like" every third word. Apparently it will be played on BBC radio at some point in the next month or so, so keep an ear out.
Our next destination was Pakse, in the south. We stopped for a few hours in Vientienne before getting on a 10 hour overnight bus. This marks the end of the northern portion of our trip.
The map of Northern Laos below shows our route (in dark green) and stops (in lime green)