i'm a travelling fool

This was written when I was a month and a half pregnant, and was having wretched morning, afternoon, and evening sickness. I ever-so-intelligently decided to travel down to Pakse with Phet, and then to take a bus to Hanoi for Trung and Claire's wedding. When the bus schedule didn't quite work out, I made the brilliant decision to take a 10-hour bus ride to Vientiane, during which I didn't drink (not easy to stop a local bus and pee by the side of the road; also NO bathrooms aboard) and completely dehydrated myself. When I wrote up the story of the trip, I didn't tell anyone I was pregnant - in my fam we usually wait till the 3 month mark. See if you can find the clues, though...

Am now back ensconced in my office and trembling. With fear? Anticipation? Dengue fever? No - they're doing massive construction outside the building and my desk is vibrating. That may sort of sound amusing, but it is NOT after the first few minutes. I'm feeling kind of nauseated by it all and perhaps this letter may not get written all at once. My eyeballs are not able to keep focused on the screen of the computer. Ack-ack-ack-ack.

I hate to sound complainy but it is JUST TOO DAMN HOT HERE. Ok, I know that you guys will not accept this, but it is stupid how hot it is in this country right now. When we flew down to Pakse two weeks ago it was 38 degrees, and at Phet's Mum's place for the first couple of days it was impossible to do anything. Uh, hot noodles anyone? No thanks. Hot rice? Nope. Some nice steamy vegetables? Please God no. I ended up spending the entire visit daydreaming wistfully about summer food. I came to the conclusion that what I really wanted was a baloney sandwich on wonder bread with mustard. So you can see how affected my brain is by the heat! Kept thinking about marvellous things like salads...potato salad, greek salad, salad with arugula. And big heaping sandwiches. I even got on to this whole hot dog kick (ok, I know they're "hot", but there was something in me that with the mental heat level felt like it would only be satisfied by French's mustard...so I'm a loony, what else is new?).

Fortunately on the 2nd day it cooled off a teeny bit, and we actually had some clouds and breezes by the time we left. But really, you know it's hot when people here are hot. Suki and Kwan were sleeping outside on the balcony, and no one (except us) slept in their beds - they were all sprawled out on the linoleum under the ceiling fans.

After visiting the fam, we came back here to Vientiane and it was so hot on the bus and the next day that I think I dehydrated myself. It's a fine line: drink too much on a Lao bus and your bladder is in for some serious pain; don't drink enough and you get heat stroke. So in retrospect I think I was dehydrated - as much as I drank after I arrived, I felt like I was still thirsty and my teeth were dry. Yuck!

This morning it was actually cold in Hanoi (maybe 18 degrees) and I had some bare hopes that Laos might have been affected. But: no. It is about 39 today, and even in the office with the air con on, it is still warm. It is just unbelievable. I have never evah been so hot.

Meanwhile, the trip to Pakse was fine - everyone is well and healthy. Suki is adorable as always, Kwan is very pregnant with #2, Long is planning to become a tuk tuk driver, Meh is good and keeping busy, Ling and Ing are good, and Ming is taking care of his roosters as per usual. The new years celebrations were somewhat muted by the lack of vehicle...we didn't have the truck so the best we could do was fill a bowl with water and walk down the path to the local wat to douse the neighborhood kids. Not quite the same as the usual bombardment mania.

The one time we did go out, we went to visit relatives who live near a ferry that takes people to Wat Phu, and I got all dressed up and then ended up soaked to the bum and covered in lipstick and cornstarch and beer (all popular items to spray / throw / paint on people at Bi Mai). Whoo-hoo!

We'd been planning to get a computer for the kids, but the price was really high in Pakse, and also Phet's Mum thought the money would be better spent on a tuk tuk, so that's where it's gone... though I think we'll take a comp next time.

On the way back we figured we'd go by land to Hanoi from Pakse, but things worked out slightly differently. We flew to Savannakhet (in the middle of the country) hoping to catch a bus to the border from there. We arrived at 10 am, and then the bus wasn't until 10 pm! And for some reason, the people in Savannakhet were not very nice and were unhelpful. Very cranky. That whole: I will help you as little as possible and never look you in the eye and pretend I am preoccupied with vitally important buisness thing. Very infuriating. Plus a tuk tuk driver tried to rip us off. So I was just like, let's take the bus to Vientiane (8 hours) and then fly to Hanoi tomorrow. Phet agreed, so we paid our $3 for the 8 hour ride and go on. Much dehydration, pain, and suffering later we got home...about 10 hours in total, going at the speed of molasses and goats. Actually, a goat could probably walk faster than our bus, and it wouldn't have been as crowded with itinerant Vietnamese workers.

Vientiane turned out to be - as mentioned - fiendlishly hot, and not much of a respite at all. Still, we were happy to fly and get into Hanoi speedily.

Getting into Hanoi was great: it was overcast, cloudy, and cool. Everything was mad as usual, with the forty bazillion people and eight hundred quadrillion motorbikes. That night we just took it easy - treated ourselves to a pho, some shrimp cakes, and then a coffee at a fancy cafe. The next day (the day before the wedding) we both had wretched stomachaches, and I had a fever. I was terrified that I was going to have dengue again, but so far (knock wood) so good. Mind you, it was a miserable few days. I could barely drag myself out to see Trung and Claire and her family.

However, the wedding was a great success and everyone was happy about it - Claire wore a funky red Ao Dai and had red roses in her hair. Trung looked very proud and happy. They had a big lunch for 360 people at Trung's parents house and then in the evening a party for friends. Mind you, the actually marriage bit had taken place in government headquarters a couple of weeks ago, so everything was more for fun and family. Claire's Dad came from Nouvelle Calendonie, and her 2 sisters, Mom, and sister's boyfriend from France. They were all quite nice, and the 3 sisters look quite similar to their Mom. The lunch was all cooked by the family - fish, stuffed squid, stir fried beef, veggies, rice cakes, rice and lots of other goodies. We were treated very, very well by Trung's family, who always introduce us as "the people who invited Trung to their wedding." Aw...

I didn't go to the evening party cause I was sick, but Phet went and drank on my behalf and said it was lots of fun. Trung claimed that the particular brand of rice wine they served was hangover-free. Hm! On the weekend we headed out to Ha Long to rent a boat with the fam and everything was good - nice sunny weather, not too hot, a big haul of crabs. There was a wee storm at night, but not too bad. The only downpoint was we got bit by some evil kind of ocean fly, and Phet looks like some gross example of leprosy out of a dermatology textbook. Me, I'm all scratchy and twitchy but I look fine on the surface.

And so it goes!

This morning we got up and met T, C and her fam for breakfast at the Catherine Deneuve bakery in Hanoi (they've got pics of the owner w/CD). I had a marvellous breakfast of croissant, sliced awesome creamy French cheese and yummy jam. The whole week in Hanoi after the bowl of pho I have been on a western-foods-only kick. I think this will perforce end abruptly now that I'm back here! [Laos-23-April-2001]