La La Laos

Wow what a trip its been amazing...

On Monday I went to Mae Sai to get what I thought was easy enough was my Non-Immigrant visa extension. But apparently not. So after a wasted trip I ended up back at Mirror with no extension and a piece of paper dictating what I have to bring to get my extension (mind you it was written all in thai). After much descussion between Thai officials (on the phone), Thai Mirror staff, Thellie (our resident farang who speaks thai) and myself, or rather I was just listening, the conclusion was for me to now go to Laos.

I had 12 hours til my songthew (thai taxi) came to get me at 6am Wednesday to take me to Chiang Rai town where I caught a mini van with other farang to the border town of Channg Khong. We were then put on a longboat which took us across the Me Kong river. When we entered Laos we had to do all the visa paperwork and pay the immigration officers.

Welcome to Laos
$30US later we were put in another minivan where we and our new guide took us to the slow boats dock. Myself and a couple from Switzerland Auralie and Dameon had decided not to take the slowboat and opted for a bus which took us to our destination in the one day... supposedly.

Laos Transport
On the bus maybe 2 hours into our trip (which is like 11hours long) the bus broke down in the middle of nowhere! After a few hours we were hungry and decided to walk to a village I saw not too long before we broke down. We got some food and drinks and headed back to the bus.
7 hours after breaking down (and meeting new friends) we were able to bribe our way onto another bus VIP bus. Cramped in the asile on the floor was little tough but the driver had offered me this bed area behind the driver seat, so myself and Duarte from Portugal went and stayed there. We pulled into our destination at like 10am-ish. A total of 30 hours later we got there, the 2 day slow boat pulled in 4 hours after us. Go figure.

Mama
We found a guest house (loving Lonely Planet right now) which was run by a lady named Mama (or i think thats just what everyone called her). She was so amazing, I loved her, she would teach me Lao and we would both speak in thai together. She really looked after us.
While here I went to visit a few temples, a stupa, the National Museum and just hung out. I found so many people were amazed when I spoke thai and then would say "you know thai?!", it was funny. The the conversation would start and my little brain would freak out and all I could say would be "Mai lau" (I don't know). Thai and Lao are very similar. Same same but different.

But sadly we had to leave the beautiful town of Laungpra Baan (sorry spelling is a bit off) and off the rest of Laos, all 5 of us.
Duarte and Jorge from Portugal,
Auralie and Dameon from Switzerland
and my little old self.

Z.