Travelog
This diary tracks our progress along the Silk Roads, with episodes appearing in date order, most recent first. You can get to earlier entries by turning pages at the bottom of the screen.
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- Written by Ellen Winter
- Category: Travelog
As distant parts of your memory may know, Laos (and Thailand etc) are renowned silk producers. Luang Prabang night market is stuffed full of the most lovely hand woven scarves and wall hangings in beautiful colours . And you might know, silk is one of my favourite things (along with dewdrops on roses, whiskers on kittens etc). But...
Now you might think I'm being silly, but silk is not vegetarian. Really. The silkworms (moth pupae) are boiled alive to get the silk from their cocoons. Lots and lots of them die to make one scarf. True, they are not "wasted" because they get eaten - they are a particularly popular street snack in Korea - but that's not the point. The point is that I am very, very tempted to buy some of the beautiful silk on offer.
And as Andy pointed out, it is almost certainly better for the environment to buy silk than cotton, because of the huge quantity of pesticides used on cotton. Which is a very good reason.
I have been wrestling this one since we arrived in China really, but mass produced Chinese silk doesn't have half the magic of these individually produced pieces. I haven't bought any yet.....
Update: whoops! My concience lost, but with style.
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- Written by Ellen Winter
- Category: Travelog
We have had some existential problems in Luang Prabang, some little difficulties with time and space.
Take the problem with time. Apparently this is a well known one here. Where does all the time go? We have been in LP since the 19th Dec, but it really doesn't feel like it. I can believe a week, we have done a few things after all; but almost 3 weeks??? The days are best described as languid, but tranquil could equally be applied. 'Ideal' also springs to mind. The upshot is that we are almost at the end of our Laos visa. I strongly suspect it will get renewed.
The other, allied, problem was one of space. We booked into our guesthouse until the 29th but after experiencing the above time-related paradox, we found ourselves running out of accommodation over New Year.
Luang Prabang is a very small town. It has a lot of guesthouses, but it also has a lot of visitors. Many times we saw, at our own guesthouse and others, people being turned away, and signs saying 'Full'. Luck, of the Andy variety, was definately on our side.
He got chatting to a Japanese lady, Sachiko, who turned into a very interesting and amusing friend over a few days here. We explained our predicament, and she arranged, with almost no effort on our part, for us to stay in her extremely nice and reasonable priced room with balcony in the centre of LP, while she was away for New Year in Thailand.
If only I had known at school that physics problems could be so fluently resolved!
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- Written by Andy Stone
- Category: Travelog
We chose to do the 2 day mahout training activity (mahout: elephant handler) and it was a really special experience. On the down side we had not a huge amount of time with the elephants, and our guide was not able to educate us very much about them, but on the plus side we got to spend time with elephants! I cannot tell you how awesome these animals are, each with very distinctive and usually pretty cheeky personalities and with a delicacy and tenderness that is in no way hinted at by their massive bulk. They have these huge soft feet and graceful poise, and if they wanted to pass unseen along a trail though even quite dense forest they would certainly be able to. Amusingly they don't really care too much for subtlety except when they are trying to sneak some off-limits shrubbery when they think their mahout isn't looking, and instead choose to leave a trail of destruction through seemingly indestructible bamboo stands just for the hell of it.
I had reservations about riding them: it did feel exploitative in a way and is not the kind of thing I would normally feel comfortable with but as part of an underfunded conservation project this is probably the easiest and most comfortable way for the elephants to earn their keep. Generally they were well-fed, healthy and seemed really happy although one elephant did show fresh cuts on each temple suggesting that at least one mahout likes to use his hook enthusiastically. We spent the first part of the program riding on seats high up on the back of the elephants while we got used to the gentle swinging motion, but by the end of the session Ellen had moved up to the top of the neck without any kind of seat. We eventually left them in the forest so they could eat for an improbably long amount of time, and trekked back to base: a bamboo hut on stilts near to the plush lodge that we could've stayed in had we not been born awkward.
The next morning we woke at dawn and walked back to collect the elephants, this time having one each and both of us riding 'bareback' on the neck. This is so much better a way to ride because you get to fully feel the graceful power of them, and the view is something else. After a while we arrived at the river and it was wash time; the elephants went in up to their necks and we scrubbed them clean, all the while getting pretty soaked ourselves. Fortunately the water was nice despite it being 7 a.m. at midwinter and the elephants didn't decide to go for total submersion, and for me this was the highlight, it really did feel like an honour to wash my elephant and I wonder how many generations after me will be afforded the same privilege?
Retuning to the centre after feeding the elephants a ridiculous number of bananas and shoots (however wonderful they are, elephants must have the most horrifyingly ugly mouth of any mammal I have met so far) we ate and were ready for our return to town, a 15 km kayak journey along a mostly calm river though the beautiful valleys west of Luang Prabang. I have been wittering on about canoeing for weeks, remembering it as great fun from my childhood, so it was time to give it a go again. From the first stroke it all came back to me and from that point until I fell out some 4 hours later at the end point I was completely blissed out. Can there be a better way to travel under one's own steam than to slice through clear waters meandering their way lazily through lush tropical forested hills, with the sun beaming down through the gentlest of breezes? It was a truly amazing day and as I said to Ellen the only thing better than riding an elephant is riding an elephant followed by kayaking on a fine day.
By early evening we had arrived at our guest house, which we had found through yet more good luck (this is certainly a blessed trip): we had met a Japanese lady called Sachiko some days earlier, and upon explaining that our accommodation ran out on 29th December but that we wanted to stay on in Luang Prabang she exclaimed that such a thing was impossible, that the whole town was booked out (this is true: there were literally no spaces left during new year as this is the busiest time by far here). Seeing the slightly worried look on our faces she just chuckled and said that as luck would have it she was leaving for Thailand on 29th for 10 days and of course we were welcome to use her flat. Hurrah for having the luck of the devil, who saw fit to throw a wonderful sunny balcony into the equation complete with stunning palm-fringed views.
Well, arriving back from the rather too strenuous activities of the day it was time to hit the town. After a few wrong turns involving trashy ex-pat western brashness and rather heady Mai Tais we ended up happily ensconced in a wine bar that was able to keep me supplied with rather good gin and tonic all evening. We met some interesting characters as usual, broke curfew by several hours and finally wobbled home to bed; it goes without saying that I woke late in the morning pretty much unable to move due to all the kayaking, and fairly unable to either keep anything down or see anything in even vaguely bright light due to the prodigious number of drinks still swashing about in my system for pretty much the whole day, enabling me to reflect that on the whole this has been a thoroughly well celebrated, albeit very strange, new year indeed. Long may the silliness continue.
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- Written by Ellen Winter
- Category: Travelog
Temple/Monastery complexes are called Wats in Thai and Thats in Laos. Leading to much silliness
Which Wat? That Wat. What that Wat there? No, that That there. What, that? No, that That. Oh, that Wat. No, we're in Laos, it's a That.
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- Written by Ellen Winter
- Category: Travelog
We had a lovely Christmas day. Presents in the morning - lots of great Laos textiles from Andy to me, including a gorgeous scarf, and a kayaking voucher from me to Andy. He's been going on about kayaking for years, but is in serious danger of lunching it out, so we ARE going. Sometime...
We went to the Floating Buddha photography exhibition at the National Museum (the former royal palace), which was very interesting, and almost made me want to chuck my camera out in despair.
We had lunch at L'Elephant, just down the road. We met up with some Thorntree folks as arranged and had a very amusing and delicious meal. I wore my new siin (traditional Laos skirt) - made to measure by the lady down the road.
I don't know where the day went. To be honest, lunch went on quite late, and then I spent ages yakking to my folks back in Blighty (Hello, Folks!), before wandering off to the night market again. This time I managed to track down the lady with the blue hands I had been looking for, but her hands were pink now. Shame, it would have made such a lovely photo, but we had a good chat with the help of a passing volunteer translator.
I bought a Thai dam (Black Thai) headscarf and then got talking (communicating...) with another Thai dam trader who showed me a another bit of flat piece of material technology, the traditional headwear. I ended up with the traditional hairstyle - all knotted on top, and skewered with a 6in silver nail-and-chain effort. We had a great time with her showing me how to put the headscarf on and taking photos of me. I looked up and there was this little crowd of traders and tourists watching the proceedings with amusement. It was a wonderful episode, and extremely nice to have some interaction with the locals - I miss being able to spend time with HC hosts, but we have contacted all the ones in Laos and not had a reply, sadly.
Laos in general is a most wonderful and beautiful place, we are totally spoilt and privileged. Luang Phrabang is mostly World Heritage site on the banks of the Mekong and ideal dawdling territory - as packed with exquisite goodies as Japan, and that's saying something! The only down side in Laos (dodgy history aside) is the bushmeat trade and the occasional example of animals getting a rough time of it. In Asia, dogs, especially the ones due for eating, seem to get particularly bad treatment. I've been looking at the animalsasia site to get more information. That said, I have seen many people who obviously love and care for their pets.
One of the wonderful and threatened things about Laos is that almost all the noises you hear are natural. There is very little artificial noise. Especially at night - wandering home after curfew (midnight round here) is almost totally quiet. Even the most enthuiastic of cockerals hasn't yet started, and all the good people of Laos are early to bed before getting up at 6am for the alms giving ceremony with the monks. As you gather, curfew isn't enforced with any degree of vigour. In fact I don't remember seeing a single policeman in Laos.
Tomorrow we are going to help out at the Language Project, which I am looking forward to, although a little bit nervously.
Right, am hungary now, and quite fancy either a banana fritter (ha, rice flour!) or a scrummy rice/coconut thingy from one of the street stalls down the road.