Hamburger Monkey Pants: I Travel Occasionally : Laos, I Love You!

I was ridiculously frustrated last night because I spent 3 hours working on a post about my first 24 hours in Laos and lost it all. I had all of the pictures and videos uploaded, it was saved more times than I can count both through the autosave feature and by manually saving it, and then when I went to publish the internet wouldn’t work. When I refreshed the page, none of my edits saved over the three hours. I went to bed disheartened, but hoping that whatever glitch was going on would be resolved in the morning. It was not. Thankfully, I had written some of the post in a Word document when I didn’t have internet access, which meant I didn’t have to completely start from scratch. So… here is my second attempt at my first Laos post written in the airport.

... and I had internet issues again, so this post was finished a few days after I returned to Thailand.

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I know I haven't finished my Australian Open, Kuala Lumpur, or Bangkok posts (What emoji do I insert here to that represents feeling embarrassed, ashamed, anxious, and also like I don’t give a shit?), but I've decided to forgo all semblance of a timeline and post as I can.

I struggled with living in Bangkok a lot and was happy to leave it a few days ago. I worked on an important step in my textbook development, but it doesn't look like much yet to be honest. I have a lot of anxiety around being able to actually accomplish this and have it be a productive contribution toward my promotion. To combat my lack of confidence I’ve been trying to use positive language and change my mindset around it. I set the goal of working at least three hours a day, and I know that doesn't sound like much, but my daily tasks were tedious. Plus, one component of a sabbatical is to rest and disengage a bit. Maybe there are differing philosophies, but I don’t believe the purpose is to work as much or even more than one usually does, just on different pursuits. I spent my month in Bangkok developing a survey for sport and social media professionals, gathered over 1000 contacts, and then started administering the survey. My hope is that this survey will help inform the content of my book. One of the worst things that could happen is for me to spend all this time developing a textbook that isn't relevant, or one that has gaping holes in it.

Getting the 1000 contacts was boring, annoying, and actually somewhat challenging at times. There is no magic list out there of the people I want to target and many organizations don't have complete, or sometimes even any, staff directories on their websites. When there is a staff directory there is rarely an email address associated with the individuals, the only exception being college athletics. I understand why professional sports organizations and agencies do this, but it's annoying when you're trying to contact people for a constructive, professional reason. All in all, it probably took me legitimately at least 20 hours of work to gather all of these contacts.

After I pilot tested my survey with a few people I started sending out the invitation to participate for real. I am sending out personalized messages, so even though there is some element of copy/paste it still takes a while. I've sent 100 of them so far, but I ran out of time in Bangkok. My internet connection has been inconsistent in Loas that it makes internet-based work more frustrating than worthwhile. The progress feels slow and I am nervous about returning home with very little work product, but I know this is an important step in the process. (Cue my insecurities about others judging me for not being a workhorse over sabbatical and writing this entire book in the span of 6 or 8 months.) Of course there were a few not-so-supportive messages that came back, but I've also gotten a lot of really positive responses from people in industry. There are a lot of people interested in participating further and willing to help me in my development of this text. It's also confirmed for me that the idea I have for the book is a good one, and I believe would really be embraced. There were a couple practitioners who talked about their experiences adjuncting and confirmed for me that there is interested in this book. If anything, that’s going to keep me going. I can always ground myself back in that sentiment when I start to doubt myself.

I'm telling you all of this to explain that Bangkok was difficult for me because I felt really isolated. On top of doing this tedious work that wasn't feeling very rewarding and made me question my approach to writing this text, I had a really hard time not being connected to anyone. I’m sure every non-white person in America is about to say, “Duh!”, but it’s also really difficult being the only face that look different than absolutely everyone else. It's one thing to travel and stay in hotels and have experiences around other tourists, it's another thing to live in an apartment in another country, have very little interaction with others, and be different not just in physical appears but also in customs and norms. It’s something that you can know intellectually, but living that experience is something else. I have a lot of travel time left and I'm not going to say that I'm not going to stay in any apartments moving forward, but I'm considering mixing up apartment stays with hotel stays so that I don't go that long in an isolated situation again. Financially it can be very beneficial, but I think it contributed to a less than positive experience in Bangkok. My challenge is to find a happy medium with interaction with others and the ability to get some work done day to day.

Coming to Laos for four days was the best choice I could have made. It kind of a whim and worked out quite well for me. Coming in to Bangkok and getting a visa on arrival I knew that I could be asked to produce documentation that showed when I was leaving. Even though my plans were open-ended I needed to have a plan, especially in case I didn’t get a visa extension. My original plan was to stay in Thailand for two to three months, but has since changed. In order to be prepared in case I got asked this questions, which now going through the process I’m 99.9% they never actually do, I found the cheapest flight out of the country I could so that if I decided not to use it, it wouldn’t be a major waste of money. That’s how I ended up in Luang Prabang. For your reference, here’s a map because if you’re anything like me you’d never heard of it until you read these words. The blue dot shows where I was.

I had no idea how much I would fall in love with this country. It’s so peaceful here. It’s ridiculously beautiful; it’s mountainous and somehow feels lush, even though it’s the dry season and all of the trees look almost dead. It’s weird because the trees remind me of New York winters, but the temperature reminds of my North Carolina summers. Speaking of temperatures, I happened to be visiting in Laos during quite the hot spell. Every day the high temperature was at least 100 degrees which I believe is a little bit warmer than normal at this time of the year.

I chose to stay in a place called the NamKhan Ecolodge in Luang Prabang. I found this place on Hotels.com and I couldn’t be happier. It was a bit of a risk because it’s a good 15-20 minute tuk tuk ride out of town, but it was well worth it. A tuk tuk in Luang Prabang is like a pick up truck with a canopy over the back and two bench seats. Think of a red neck covered wagon. Aside from motor bikes and then vans that take tourists to a few key destinations, that’s the only transportation I saw. There’s something both exhilarating and terrifying of riding in the back of a truck like this with the wind blowing in your hair down a dirt road to a place out in the Laotian countryside.

The Ecolodge is the funky open-air type resort with cabin rooms and canvas tents available to rent. The Mekong river goes through Luang Prabang, but so does the NamKhan and it’s that river that curves around the resort. Some aspects of the resort have a more rustic feel – like the fact that the rooms don’t have air conditioning, despite the fact that I realllly thought the ad said it did. Even though I don’t have A/C, I have a wonderful overhead fan and late into the night it gets quite cool outside. I learned to open the windows at night to cool off my room, but I do still wish I had A/C. I haven’t slept that while since I’ve been here and I think being too hot is one of the reasons why. It is a little weird because anyone could walk past my room and basically look directly in on me sleeping. I don’t feel uncomfortable about it though because the resort is fairly empty because of the coronavirus hubbub.

The ecolodge is a beautiful property. The riverbank is dotted with canvas tents that are more “glamping” tents than anything else. I stayed in one of the cabins that have beautiful wood ceilings, floors, trim, and furniture. It’s all got that super glossy finish of a new build. The lodge opened about 4 months ago. There is a very nice open-air reception area and restaurant. Breakfast was included in my stay and it’s been yummy and satisfying for me. There’s always eggs, cereal, fresh fruit, salad, yogurt, coffee, tea, juice, toast with all the accoutrements, etc. etc. I’ve eaten in the restaurant a few times aside from breakfast and have been pleased with the selection and preparation of the food. While it’s much more expensive than the street food in town, it’s still much cheaper in the US. For example, the other night I had fried spring rolls for an appetizer, pad thai, and a lime daiquiri all for $23. The portions were also quite plentiful.

In addition to the housing and the restaurant, the lodge has a beautiful garden that you’re welcome to tour. Much of the food served comes from the garden. The pool was beautifully situated, but the water looked almost like it had a lot of sediment in it. I’d say it was about the same color of the NamKhan which is a light jade color – quite clear in some spots and less than that in others. That’s to say I didn’t use that pool at all. There’s a second café/ bar at the entrance to the complex. There are lots of activities at your disposal – pony riding, hiking, tubing on the river, morning and afternoon yoga, basket-weaving with a local, movie nights, and I’m sure a lot more things that I can’t think of right now. One thing I wish was a bit different was the small fees associated with the activities. I paid $8 per session of yoga, which is quite cheap for the US, but a bit expensive for and activity Laos. It felt a little bit like getting nickeled and dimed because the advertisements for the resort talk about all the activities and make it sound like they’re included without overtly saying that. I paid $9 for 30 minutes of tubing down the river, which was AWESOME, but we all thought we got to go 2-3 times down the path from one edge of the property to the other. It turns out that once you go with the guide and pay, you can then take a tube and go on your own at any other time. That wasn’t sufficiently explained to us so instead of doing that with the guide early in my stay and then tubing more later, I did it late in my stay and didn’t. Going even just twice would have justified the $9 more. What is great about all that they offer is that it’s easy to stay on the resort property and just relax. It’s good to go into town for cheap food, more variety, and the night market, but it’s also really not necessary if you’re not interested.

"Me" is one of the dogs that welcomed me to the lodge. "Me" means "bear" in lao. It turns out there are black bears in Laos, but they are poached and the population is being decimated so there are some black bear reserves. The dog population in Laos is quite high, but when I checked in, the receptionist explained to me that there used to be a major problem with wild, roaming dogs so the government cracked down a few years ago and now they require that the dogs are cared for and have their shots. They are mostly friendly, or if anything they are just disinterested and don't pay attention to people they don't know. None of them have tags of any sort, most don't have collars, and all of them definitely don't get regular baths.

This is the view of the lodge property from reception. In the distance on the right side are the gardens and on the near left is where the restaurant is. My cabin was on the near right side.

I want to tell you about the amazing people I met while at the resort, but before I do that I need to tell you about the two American women I met in the airport. Before my arrival in Laos I did one of two things – either got bad visa information or didn’t remember to follow up on the initial information I did find. Honestly, I can’t remember which one it was. I had it in my head that I didn’t need a visa for Laos. That was absolutely not accurate. I was supposed to have a passport photo with me and 35 American dollars to pay the fee. Once we landed and I learned this I thought I would be ok because in every airport I’ve been to in Asia there were accessible ATMs before I had to go through immigration. I also randomly had a passport photo in my carry-on from my immigration saga in Thailand. (I know I didn’t post about that yet, but I will. I promise.) What is crazy is that I considered packing those photos in my suitcase, but for some crazy reason at the last minute I moved them to my carry-on. Once we entered the airport and went directly into immigration there were no ATMs. I have no idea what they do if you don’t have money. I don’t know because Linda, an amazing New Jersey nurse taking a holiday after working with Nurses Without Borders, gave me the $35 I need. I was exactly in the right place at the right time. Honestly, I’ve learned that the Laos people are super nice and things are quite lax here, as in Linda’s friend Grace who was already in Laos was chatting with us over a barely-there barrier while we were in immigration. Despite there being “security” no one stopped her from walking in and no one was concerned. I suspect that if you don’t have the cash they walk you to the ATM outside of baggage claim and wait for you to get it. Honestly, they might just direct you to go and trust you to come back. Anyway, I tried to pay Linda back, but by the time we all got through immigration and I got my luggage and found the ATM, she and her friend had already left because they had an impatient tuk tuk driver. So, where ever you are Linda – thank you for being my guardian angel and taking care of me! The videos below are of me telling the story to a few friends on Snapchat.

The third American in the mix was a 23-year told named Jackie who was from the Buffalo area and actually went to RIT! So here I am entering Laos, stressing about getting my visa upon arrival and one of the people helping me figure out what to do is a young woman who knows exactly where I lived in Rochester. It was crazy! Before we all got separated Jackie and I exchanged contact information and set up plans to meet for dinner. I got settled at the ecolodge and then headed into town on the ecolodge’s tuk tuk shuttle. It had a pretty decent schedule, but put me in town an hour and a half before I was to meet Jackie. I spent my time by walking around, looking at a temple, and catching a happy hour beer at a restaurant on the Mekong river.

Jackie was easy to talk to and we had a lovely meal of super cheap, but good quality street food together. Jackie, along with several other people to come in this story, talked about how a lot of the food was very similar if not the same as in Thailand. I can tell you that I ate a lot better food in Laos than what I had in Bangkok. The food in Bangkok wasn’t always bad, but the meat was often lower quality. I liked the spices most of the time, but the gristle got to me a lot. The food in Laos seemed better, of a higher quality. The flavors were delicious – garlic, chili pepper, and I’m sure much more but I just don’t know! After our meal we walked around the night market in town and then parted ways for the night.

Jackie and I made loose plans to go to the Kouang Si Waterfalls the next morning. We both almost bailed, but then stopped hesitating and met up to go. Jackie had to catch a bus to another city in the afternoon, so we went a bit earlier than is normal and it totally paid off. The waterfalls were gorgeous – again, the water was the beautiful light jade color. We were both on the same page of “let’s get in, take some photos that will look great on Instagram before there are too many people, and then we can just relax and enjoy.” That’s basically what we did. There are four levels and we took the advice that someone in Jackie’s hostel gave her and we started from the top and worked our way down. When you arrive you enter at the bottom level so people tend to be in awe taking pictures and going for a swim there. By starting up top we saw what I think are the more beautiful areas, but also got an opportunity to take pictures with fewer people around. When we went to the second area we were alone for a good 15 -20 minutes. Let me write that in a different way. We swam in a naturally occurring beautiful jade-colored pool with a waterfall with no one else around. It was amazing! I almost can’t believe we did it! The water was quite cool, but not too cold to enjoy. There were lots of fish nibbling our toes and in many areas it was short enough to stand up or sit on a rock.