Bpai heua

Blistered & burnt

This month I’ve been having a slightly sinister Dr. Strangelove style relationship with my left arm.  At the beginning of the month, an angry ant managed to get stuck underneath my watch strap.  He writhed and struggled and fought hard but ultimately succumbed to death by crushing and washing up water.  In his death throes, he bit my wrist red raw.  I can only assume he did this accidentally, not understanding that it was my watch and not me that had caused his untimely demise, whilst I was entirely focussed on scrubbing a frying pan.  Anyway, my wrist swelled to twice its normal size and was bright red and itchy for a week.  At the time, it made me laugh as I’d just that day been trying to describe some common ailments to my English class and both swelling and rashes had been difficult to mime.  ‘Oh the irony’ I chuckled to myself, promptly getting an Alanis Morisette song stuck in my head for the rest of the day.

The following week, I was cooking some fried potatoes to eat with some Lao style scrambled eggs and like an idiot managed to splash water into a pan of hot oil, resulting in some nasty blistered burns on my forearm.  In case you’re wondering, Lao style scrambled eggs are the same as normal scrambled eggs but without benefit of butter and only a drop of UHT milk.  Recently, all my eggs have had double yolks, which never fail to excite me, so I’ve been eating more than I normally would.  

Then, to top it off, my watch stopped.  It had been losing time all month, probably weakened by its run in with the ant and finally gave up the ghost at the beginning of this week.  So, all in all, it’s been a bad month for my left arm. 

In other news, I finally made a trip to see Wat Phu and Buddhist Lent came to an end.

Looking towards Wat Phu

Wat Phu means temple mountain and despite the Alton Towers sounding name, it’s a UNESCO World Heritage site about 50km from where I live.  Essentially it’s a crumbled down Khmer temple similar to the arguably more famous Angkor Wat in Cambodia.  It was an extremely pleasant day out with a volunteer from Vientiane who was passing through on his way to the flood stricken Thailand.  We zoomed down in the morning on motorbikes, crossing the Mekong at the Nippon Bridge (no word of lie – that’s what it’s called) in Pakse and taking the rather splendid road along the west bank.  Now the weather has calmed down a bit, the mostly tarmac road was a delight, cutting a course along the river and below tree covered mountains.  At one point we passed what seemed to be an organised 4WD race with chequered flags and everything but seeing as it was on probably the flattest piece of tarmac in the whole of Laos, it was a tad incongruous to say the least.  We arrived in good time and after a swift Pepsi cola we promptly set off up the mountain to see the temple.

Looking down from Wat Phu

Now don’t get me wrong, it’s definitely worth a visit, if only to marvel at how such tiny ladies manage to haul their wares to the top for sale but we couldn’t help coming back to the same questions, ‘what makes somewhere qualify for World Heritage status?’ and ‘how do I get a job with UNESCO because it seems like a piece a piss?’.  Neither of us knew but it’s quite easy to find out if you go to,
http://whc.unesco.org

Despite lingering scepticism about the impact of UNESCO, I had a smashing day, while my friend charmed the drinks sellers, confused a Cambodian, smoked an extraordinary number of cigarettes and tried to convince everyone he met that he was from Laos. 

That evening in Pakse it was unusually quiet and the only moment of hilarity came when we were eating at one of the floating restaurants as it was being hauled off the muddy bank by a diesel belching tug boat, which filled the restaurant with fumes in minutes, much to the chagrin of the Thai party on our left.

With hindsight, the evening was probably so quiet because everyone was anticipating the festivities to come. 

The Wednesday following my diesel tainted meal was officially the end of Buddhist lent, so to celebrate I ate a curry and had a couple of beers with the volunteer from Paksong who had come to see the boat racing festival to be held the next day.

The entire area around the river was transformed with stalls and stages and more people than I have seen in Pakse in the last six months combined.  There were colourful lights, fireworks, Chinese lanterns and the release of small plant based floating displays onto the river surface.  It was all fairly spectacular and another example of how well organised things in Laos can be.

The next morning it was pissing with rain and with some hesitation we managed to drag ourselves back down to the river for the boat racing.  When we arrived we had posh coffee and pastries to prepare ourselves and then spent the next few hours walking around the bank watching the brightly coloured boats and teams indulge in some frantically competitive dragon boat racing.  A dragon boat may be an insanely inefficient way to travel but it certainly makes for an engaging spectacle.  As I have something of a penchant for boats I found it to be a highly entertaining and celebratory day despite the rain, which became almost inevitably beer soaked as it wore on.

I’ve decided that I definitely want to be in a boat for next year, so if any sporty types are thinking of visiting, the middle of October would be a good time.  Hopefully my left arm will be back in shape by then.