December 2007
Vientiane, Laos
Laos was a last minute change to our little trip without Holly. A lot of fellow backpackers said that Laos was a must-see and that we couldn't pass up the chance of missing it.
After flying to Vientiane, Laos and driving in a cab into downtown Vientiane, we decided to eat at Makphet.
As we talked with the young waiters and waitresses that worked there, we learned that they were hired so that they could go to school. The restaurant took in young teens and children and trained them to become good waiters and waitresses. The children then earned to go to school.
After checking into our hotel (which the person who ran it nicely said for us to pay later when we had the correct currency), Amanda had gone out and exchanged our dollars for the currency in Laos which was called kip notes.
Unlike visiting the other places that we had gone to like Kiminini, Kenya and the Shraddha Ashram in India, we were enjoying our earthly pleasures in Vientiane, Laos. Amanda and I just shopped around and ate gluttonously.
When we thought it couldn't have gotten any better, we heard there were massages. We took a tuk-tuk (auto rickshaw) to Wat Sok Pa Luang where the massages awaited us.
After the driver dropped us off, we wandered around and asked a few of the monks to show us where the massages were held.
After wandering for a while, a person came out and screamed out if we were looking for massages. We were and followed that woman in the building.
We relaxed in the outdoor sauna and then received massages. Even though our bones were popping in ways that we would have never known could pop, it felt so relaxing and refreshing. It felt amazing!
We stood outside the building and waited for a tuk-tuk driver to come and take us back into the city. We met a French couple and a fellow American named Carter. We all decided to go to a bar when we returned into the city.
We returned into the city and watched in a little restaurant as the sun went down into the Mekong River.
As we all returned back to downtown Vientiane, Carter had asked us to come with him to a small mountainous town in the north called Vang Vieng.
When we returned back to our hotel, Amanda had told me she had an appointment with the lady who did her massage the next morning in our hotel. She said that the woman (named Noy) would take her to see her aunt who started up the whole spa place. She didn't want to leave me here all by myself, but I told her that I was fine and that I could wander around the city for a while. Amanda wanted to write an article on some of the herbs that the people used at the spa, so I told her to go for it. She wanted to ask Noy's aunt about those herbs.
We all talked it out and decided that Amanda would go with Noy the morning after that night and then we could somehow make it just in time to go to Vang Vieng with Carter the next day.
Streets of Vientiane, Laos
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