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| 4000 Mekong Islands, Vientiane |
D'iles en capitale, notre parcours se poursuit. Les iles du Mekong nous ont tour a tour decus puis enchantes: decus, nous le fumes par Don Khone, ou l'on voit trop de tourisme de groupe et un tres mauvais rapport qualite prix. Quelques petits incidents causes par ma maladresse legendaire (dont je garde le recit pour la version anglaise, teasing oblige) ont en outre pimente quelque peu la situation. Bref moins de 24h apres notre arrivee, nous traversons le pont francais qui relie Don Khone a Don Det - un bon 5km avec les sacs a dos sous 40 degres, je m'etais dopee au cafe Lao en prevision! Et la c'est l'enchantement. Depuis le confort d'un hamac sur notre bungalow riverview, nous passons des heures a observer le spectacle sans cesse renouvele du Mekong: ici des femmes qui lavent le linge, la un pecheur solitaire qui jette ses filets sous le soleil couchant, et partout des dizaines d'enfants qui s'amusent. Tres apaisant.
Il nous faut malgre tout quitter ce havre de paix et poursuivre le voyage direction Vientiane, la capitale du Laos. Et la tenez-vous bien: chers parents, chers amis, nous songeons serieusement a nous installer a vie ici. On y trouve en effet le meilleur de deux mondes: l'esprit francais avec les croissants au petit dej, les menus degustations dans des restaurants huppes, et meme le Monument a la Victoire, reponse orientale a l'Arc de Triomphe. On y cotoie aussi l'esprit Lao avec le rythme de vie au ralenti, la gentillesse, l'absence de circulation meme aux heures de pointe et les milliers de bouddhas dans des temples majestueux. Cela dit nous realisons qu'un arret definitif a Vientiane signifierait a terme la lente mort de ce blog, alors pour eviter un tel sacrilege, nous poursuivrons sans doute notre chemin d'ici peu, direction Luang Prabang... Stay tuned!
From a myriad of islands to a Capital city, every day we go a little bit deeper into Lao culture and we learn to enjoy every bit of this wonderful country. It's not always been a bed of roses though - and I feel I have to share with you all, especially with you Asim, a couple of anecdotes where my legendary clumsiness almost ruined our trip. In less than 24 hours:
- I managed to break Alexis' brand new camera screen, by deliberately throwing a Maglite at it. Obviously I did not initally mean to hit the screen, but rather the cushion which lay next to the camera, but somehow it got diverted. Anyway, Alexis' pictures' admirers, and there seem to be many, will be happy to know that the camera DOES work perfectly well, albeit with a slightly broken screen. We went to Canon Vientiane who told us we could only get it repaired in Bangkok - which is bad news as we do not intend to travel to BKK.
But moving on to my second, unrivaled so far, achievement,
- Oblivious to my own strength, I managed to break the sink in our bungalow on the very first morning: I simply leaned on the sink and it fell and broke into dozens of pieces on the floor. The guesthouse manager, although initially not very understanding ("sink very solid, made in China. me don't know what you did with sink" - well, neither do I) eventually accepted to grant us a significant discount, my guess is he was only too happy to see us leave immediately.
Anyway, the latter accident proved a benediction, as indeed it forced us to move from Don Khone to Don Det, where we found much better vibes, a basic but fantastic bungalow complete with hammock and riverview, and amazing food.
We are now in Vientiane, staying at another great guesthouse which is also home to 8 cats and 3 dogs (you do have to love animals to like the place). We find Vientiane to be extremely relaxing and easy going, so much so that we decided to celebrate and blow the budget with a 5 course, matching wines meal in a French restaurant... well worth it!
Hey Guys
RépondreSupprimerThe picture with the monks walking to the temple is amazing alexis. The orange is popping out. did you use a filter of some kind or was the light just right?
Gaelle you cracked me up with the sink story and i guess you cracked the sink literally:-)
the funny part for me is that since we share a certain level of clumsiness, this has happened to me in Pakistan too. Same situation and no reason why the sink fell on me but it happens coz the walls are made from sand and spit :-)
I am getting worried about this staying in laos plan you guys are talking about... keep us posted ;-)and try throwing us readers a frikkin bone here and tell us some not so fun stories , otherwise we'll start beleiveing yoru in paradise and give up our days jobs too
ok i used the wrong pseudo but you must have guessed it s me
RépondreSupprimerAsim
Dear Yunus Perveez,
RépondreSupprimerThank God it is you Asim, I almost threw you out of the subscription lost. And thanks for trying to make me feel better about the sink - my next challenge is to break a european loo. I'll have to hurry up because the more we go north, the fewer normal loos we encounter;and it will be much more difficult to break a squat toilet.
Anyway, after consulting the artist, I can tell you that he cheated a little bit and used Picasa to slightly "enlighten" the pic of the monks. I normally don't let him do that - mostly because we lack time!
Err, not so fun stories, let me think... Ah yes, we almost ran out of money yesterday when all the ATMs in town were empty, and we thought we'd have to go to bed without dinner. But eventually we found a working ATM and a great Lao BBQ restaurant. Is that not fun enough?