You call this a capital city???

  Vientiane, Lao Peoples Dem Rep
Wednesday, March 7, 2007

Best $62 I have ever spent! I caught the Lao Airways flight down from Luangphrabang to Vientiane instead of taking a ten hour bus ride and I am soo happy I did. One of my Israeli friends from the Purim celebration, Liron, was on the flight too so I had someone to talk to and someone to distract me from that feeling you get on a smaller plane that is constantly going up and down. Anyway, we made it and caught a tuk-tuk to the ghetto fabulous Sihom guesthouse....this place looked like the front for some kinda back room casino until you got out back to villa, which is also currently under construction. Its a place to sleep, so eh, who cares.



Liron and I went for a walk around town and had dinner on what would've been the bank of the Mekong River if it wasn't the dry season. Actaully the deck we ate on, we later found out, would be under water during the rainy season, which is kinda crazy since the river looked to be a good 500 meters away and 15 meters below us. We had some good food and just talked for a while about life and told each other stories from our past to get to know each other. After dinner we hit up the nicest place in town for some live music and a couple beer laos, and then headed over to the bowling alley for some western fun. (Note: Don't worry, I bowled left-handed. I may do some dumb things, but I do know better than to throw a 13lbs. ball with a possibly still tore UCL. Oh, and I bowled a 119 left-handed so you all can be impressed....haha jk)



The next day, Liron and I rented bikes for our lazy man's walking tour of Vientiane, which began with a trip to their fake Arc de Triumphe, which was one of those things that looks good from afar, but is far from good....kinda like Siena's baseball field when I was there. From there we biked it up a "slight" incline, which since I'm out of cycling shape might have well been the Pyrenees, to a golden wat, which was supposedly a big attraction, but you know, at this point I have seen so many wats, that unless it actually contains buddha himself, I am just not that impressed. Don't get me wrong, it was purdty to look at, but I enjoyed joking around and hanging out with Liron for the day more than the stuff we saw....like I've said before, its about the people more than the places.