Day 26 - With Apologies to Roald Dahl

Ken and Dave had to leave the next day for their 24 hour bus ride to Hanoi, but I was flying the next afternoon so we would get their at close to the same time. The bus though wasn't until later in the day so we had a lot of time to look around Vientiane before they had to go. We went to get some breakfast at a little bakery right on one of the main squares called the Scandinavia Bakery. I think it may have been part of some chain I have never heard of, but it was really good. They had sandwiches and all sort of things made with really good bread that just tasted better than any sandwiches I've had in a long time. The weather was also fantastic. It had been too hot at some points but we were now about half way up Vietnam and it was still warm, short and t-shirts weather, but it wasn't really hot anymore. We were located right in what was pretty much the center of the city so we decided to go walk to see a temple that was famous for having something like 10,000 depictions of Buddha in it. I think I tend to be more interested in temples and what not then Ken and Dave so we didn't see a lot of them on the trip but this one was pretty interesting. It was a short walk down from the breakfast place along a fairly big street. One thing that was immediately apparent was how unlike in Vietnam the people who were trying to sell you junk weren't particularly pushy. In Vietnam there was almost nothing you could say to dissuade people but in Laos if you just shook your head they would give up and go back to relaxing. Laos is just a much more laid back country.

As we were coming up to the temple we came by what was apparently the residence of the president of Laos. It was mostly notable for not being all that well guarded. There was a car entrance that it seemed was almost unguarded and the whole thing looked more or less inviting. That's always something I notice about America, all our important buildings are guarded like castles, but in most other countries they just sort of hang out and assume no ones really going to bother them. The temple its self was pretty interesting. Around the outside were these walls with thousands upon thousands of little alcoves in them. In each alcove was a Buddha statue. The Buddha statues were in various states of disrepair, but the whole effect actually made it more interesting by making it look more authentic. There were also some very interesting sculptures of various terrifying looking sea creatures. The main temple, besides having a bigger Buddha, which frankly every temple has, had a old fresco of some sort of scene whose meaning was totally lost on me but was very pretty anyways. Nearby the temple was an old monument of some sort that looked like it was mostly destroyed in the past but was still kept for historical reasons. The guide book said that according to legend that when the city was invaded a dragon that lived under the monument appeared and defended the city, though it seems to have failed at protecting the monument itself.

We got a ride in some sort of open air taxi not unlike the things that I saw in Bangkok. This taxi though seemed to be struggling to get us there. The three of us in it didn't come anywhere close to filling it up we some some with about 12 locals in them, though the three of us probably weighed as much as five or six locals. Also we weren't exactly going up hill. At most we were on a small gradual incline that I almost wouldn't have noticed if the taxi wasn't struggling so hard to get us there. Honestly I've seen people in China peddle taxis with more horse power than this. Finally he just managed to get us to a central Buddhist structure that you could see for some distance thanks to its golden dome. When we got there I had to go to the bathroom, paying a small fee to a person who may have in reality just been standing there having no connection with the bathroom at all. When I got out the place seemed to be closed and there was a sign on the door to that effect. We stood there for a moment deciding where to go next until we discovered that people were in fact still going in and out. I'm not sure why this exactly was allowed but sure enough we essentially knocked on the door and they let us in. Inside was, well, unimpressive. The structure looked much less impressive the closer we got to it until the gold paints just seemed to be chipping everywhere. It was big certainly but lacked the detail we had seen in a lot of the earlier places.

We then headed off to a big Arc de Triomphe sort of structure in the middle of town. It was nick named "The Vertical Runway" since the money for the construction had been given to the government of Laos by the US during the Vietnam war for them to add another runway to the airport, but in a fit of what can only be described as innovative city planning, the Laotians elected to build a gigantic monument with it instead. I'm not even sure what that symbolizes. Wasteful government spending? Putting art over practicality? Thumbing their nose at the US? Or they just really wanted a big Arc de Triomphe and though that this was their only opportunity. The arch also had a series of stores in it selling all sort of tourist crap on every level, which honestly isn't that surprising in this part of the world. The top offered a view of the city which was less than impressive. There was just essentially nothing to see but some neighborhoods and some small buildings. Vientiane, despite being the capitol of Laos is more on par with Wollongong than DC. The last thing we saw that day was also probably the most interesting. I had heard of park somewhat outside the city that was supposed to have all sort of wired sculptures in it and after a while I was able to convince Dave and Ken to go.

We took the bus that the book recommended, despite being able to find no other proof that this was in fact the right bus. I'm not sure what exactly we would have done had the bus been taking us completely in the wrong direction but it got us there in the end. The place we ended up was a sort of sculpture park built by some religious order all supposedly by blind people under the direction of a mystic. There was a small fee to go in and another fee to use a camera, not that I think they had any way of checking up on if you used a camera once you were inside. Most of the park was covered in big sculptures of terrifying deities that more or less resembled Hindu art besides a gigantic reclining Buddha. The oddest piece though was a big hallow shepere with a tree coming out of it, all made on concrete like everything in the park, which was supposed to symbolize heaven and hell. You could enter the sphere through a gaping hole in a huge mouth at the bottom and climb up though a series of stair cases to the top where you emerged at the top of the sphere reminiscent of James and the Giant Peach. If instead of flying that giant peach to England James and flow it to Hell, this is sort of what it would have looked like. Inside there were all sort of ghoulish looking statues and what not and it sort of took on a maze like effect. Add to that the fact that the whole thing was supposed to have been built by blind people and I was a little worried the whole thing was going to come down on my head. On the top I constantly felt like I was about to fall off and could barley get up the near to stand up.

Back on solid ground we caught a bus back toward the city again by mostly sticking out our thumbs. Back in the city I moved to a slightly nicer hotel for the last night spending something like the shocking price of $22. I wanted a room with a bath tub but the only one they had open like that was for three people. Seeing that I was about to leave they offered me that room for the single person price so I ended up with a room with three beds despite Ken and Dave being on a bus. The person at the counter took so long filling out some forms when I came in that I was worried I would miss dinner with the American guy and Canadian girl from the previous night. I meet up with the Canadian girl, but the American guy was late so we just sat around and talked for a while. Ken and Dave had gotten the sense that she might be a missionary from the way she was dodgy about what she did in China so I pressed her on it. She said that she wasn't but something about her answers were still evasive. Finally I just asked who she worked for and she simply refused to tell me. I asked her a couple of times if she minded if I asked some more questions and she said she didn't so I continued to press her on it. What really got me was just how good she was at not answering my question.

Most people if you press them on something long enough will give you some sort of an answer or let something slip, but she was very steadfast. In about a thirty minute conversation all I was able to gather was that the organization she worked for was known to the Chinese government but she still wouldn't tell me the name. I pressed her on why if the government knew who they were she still wouldn't tell me if they weren't missionaries. She essentially seemed to indicate that they were probably tied into some organization that the Chinese government wouldn't be so OK with. The other clue I noticed is that she used the term "mercy work" to refer to non-religious things done by religious organization which seems like a pretty specialized term to use if you're not usually connected with them. Whoever she worked for they really must have drilled it into her head not to say anything. We eventually met up with the American guy and went to the French restaurant from the other night which turned out to be really, really good. It was even better than the one in Nanjing, though it was also a good bit more expensive.