Thakhek
ByHaving experienced the local ‘big’ bus we decided to continue our journey north to Thahkek on even more basic transport. This time it was the local minibus, a form of transport which allows you to get very much closer to your fifteen or sixteen fellow passengers – and their livestock. Our hand luggage was used to fence in three chickens under the seat we shared with a couple of other people. The art of comfort involves having two alternate people leaning forward whilst two lean back, then you change over as fatigue sets in over the four hour journey. At the comfort stop at a convenient wood the men walk one way and the women another. The traditional Lao sarong or sin comes into its own in these situations as they are roomy enough to form a kind of tent for the woman to squat decorously and without embarrassment. The bus services in southern Laos are actually very good. Buses are hourly and the can be flagged down anywhere along their route and people are dropped off where they want.
Despite the towns being very quiet there are a range of places to stay from very basic guesthouses with dormitories to hotels with en-suite facilities and air conditioning. The people are pleasant, friendly and not at all pushy. One expatriate Canadian commented that PDR in the country’s title stood for “Please Don’t Rush.” It is certainly a very gentle country.
We were following the road north which traced the course of the Mekong with Thailand on the far bank. So again the town of Thahkek was on the banks of the river and again we were living next to a pagoda, in the Mekong Hotel, what else?
We met Khamchan Phimmaha a teacher and rice farmer. Both he and his wife were teachers and whilst he supplemented the family income by driving a tuk tuk his wife looked after their three daughters, three, eight and eleven. Khamchan taught Lao language so during a one day tour of caves in the wonderful limestone karst mountains around Thahkek he expanded our vocabulary a bit. The mountains, covered by trees and thick vegetation rose up sharply from the river plain giving an arresting vista of layers, sharp jagged peaks like dragons teeth disappearing into the distance. The caves were every bit as spectacular as the caves we visited in Vietnam but there were very few tourists. One cave had been discovered only in the last twenty years by locals looking for bat roosts. In the cave a 600 year old Buddha statue was found. So the cave is now a Buddhist shrine where the original statue has been supplemented by hundreds of others. It was a very atmospheric place dimly lit with candles and incense sticks. A woman chanted blessings and rubbed her palm over a huge brass gong which filled the cave with an otherworldly pure tone.
Outside the cave, over lunch, we chatted to local visitors from Savannakhet where we had just come from and Vientiane, where we where heading to next. Lunch was roasted small green tree frogs on a stick, with sticky rice. They were eaten whole, the bones crunched nicely and they tasted quite good.
