Save Will

Monday, February 20, 2012

Woke up at 4:30 a.m. Flew to Siem Reap, Cambodia. Jake, from my hostel, picked me up at the airport. Checked in, showered, and ate lunch. Arranged a private tuk tuk for seeing the ruins the next day with Jake as my driver. Spent the rest of the day napping and relaxing. Ate dinner with another guy from my dorm named Robin (from Germany). Went to bed early to get up early the next day.

Saturday & Sunday, February 18–19, 2012

Didn’t do much. Again, I felt tired, and mostly remained inside and ate at nearby restaurants. One evening I walked to the Mekong River’s edge to see the night market there and watch the local people. Ran into a few more people from the group I was with at the river near Vang Vieng. Met a girl in my hostel that I’d met before at my hostel in Luang Prabang. Feeling the bandaid on my face was a constant reminder of the river, and I think it put me in a bad mood.

Friday, February 17, 2012

Rode a bus to Vientiane at 10 a.m. Walked around with a couple looking for a guesthouse or hostel. Checked into a hostel called Asian World. Ate a croissant for a late lunch and drank a couple Cokes to cool down. Read my guidebook about the city. Ate dinner at a pizza place and ran into a couple from the group I had hung out with at the river at Vang Vieng. Felt sick after eating dinner and went to bed early.

Thursday, February 16, 2012

Ate lunch at a Friends restaurant. Went to the inner tube shop, then rode a tuk tuk with a group of others, including two girls I’d met at my hostel in Chiang Mai, to the river. Hung out with that group there for an hour or so, drinking a beer.

I’d heard stories about how dangerous it was inner tubing there, how people had died falling on rocks while riding zip lines over the river, or how inner tube riders had been hit by bottles attached to ropes that locals working at riverside bars throw at them to reel them in. I’d decided to stick to beer only to stay safe, since I was on my own.

We got our inner tubes and floated into the current, which took us around a bend where a platform had been erected on which a couple guys were trying to reel in inner tube riders. I kept a wary eye on them to make sure they didn’t hit me, but also glanced back at the rest of the group to see whether they were going to stop at the next riverside bar, which was just downstream of the first and rapidly approaching.

I was paddling to be closer to the others when I was struck in the face with a bottle thrown by a guy from the second bar. I hadn’t seen him winding up. I remember there being an abrupt change of consciousness; I had been paddling, and then my eyes were closed and I was leaning back and the side of my face felt hot. I can’t remember if the impact had torn my sunglasses off, or if I took them off when feeling my face, but in either case, they were lost to the bottom of the river, never to be seen again. Slowly I realized what had happened. My hand fell on the rope and closed on it. The adrenaline started pumping, and I was really pissed off.

I started to pull and yank on the rope, and I rolled off my inner tube into the water. I think I was trying to get the rope out of the guy’s hands out of some sort of vengeance, but I wasn’t thinking too clearly. I ended up pulling myself to the river’s edge near the guy and started screaming at him somewhat incoherently. I’m not even sure he spoke English or understood a word I said. At some point some white guy stood next to the guy who’d thrown the bottle and was yelling at me. I didn’t know who he was, so I just screamed at him too. Sometimes tourists find jobs at these kinds of touristy places so they can afford to stay there longer, so maybe he worked there?

I probably would have gotten out of the water then and escalated things, but I grew aware of my things starting to float away from me. I gathered my inner tube and a flip flop floating nearby, and looked around for my other flip flop. One of the bar employees pointed me to it across the river, and I swam with the inner tube to get it. I kept feeling my face and saw blood on my fingers, so I knew I had to get out. I paddled to a nearby ladder and pulled my inner tube out of the water. I didn’t see anyone from my group, so I walked out of the bar to the road and flagged down a tuk tuk and rode it into town.

I returned the inner tube, then went to my room to see the damage and clean the injuries. There were several small cuts on my right temple, and a small but deep cut on my right cheekbone. I looked up online when to get stitches, then walked to the hospital. There was a guy there who’d also been injured at the river that day. He’d been riding a zip line drunk and somehow hit his head when entering the water. He’d gotten sixteen stitches in his forehead without anesthesia. A doctor saw me right away and a nurse gave me two stitches without anesthesia. I’d never had stitches for an injury before. I was told to get them removed in a week.

I went to a Friends restaurant and spent the rest of the afternoon and evening there watching TV and trying not to think about anything. I wanted to move on, so I bought a bus ticket to Vientiane for the next morning.

I ran into several people from that group later in Vientiane who were sympathetic. One guy said he was reluctant to go on the river afterward.

Thinking back on it, it was a good thing that I didn’t get out of the river when I was mad. I was alone and unsteady and didn’t speak the language. Getting into a fight with a local, and possibly some douche bag tourist, would have been a disaster. If I had been thinking straight, I would have had the guy who threw the bottle take me to the hospital and pay for everything. If only I hadn’t been hit in the head with a bottle. One of the tradeoffs of traveling alone is that no one has your back.

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Still felt tired, so I stayed inside mostly and kept to myself. Ate lunch and dinner at restaurants that played Friends. I’d forgotten how funny Friends is.

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Moved my things to a private room at the Chilllaos hostel about a block away. Ate lunch at one of the restaurants playing the TV show Friends. Felt very tired, so I stayed in my room all day by myself. Ate dinner at the same place.

Monday, February 13, 2012

The tour started at 11 a.m. All four of us rode a private minibus to the three Plain of Jars sites. “Plain” is an exaggeration; “fields” is perhaps more fitting. The first site (called Site 3) was a five minute hike from a parking lot through some dry rice fields and rolling hills. Fortunately, the area had been cleared of land mines. I’d seen all I wanted to see after about five minutes. They’re just large stone jars, some sunk in the dirt, some tipped over, some chipped, some with holes, some full of dirt, some full of water. Aside from the mysteries of their origin and how they were transported, there wasn’t much else to them. I could have lived with just seeing some pictures in a guidebook or online. Oh well. The second site (Site 2) involved a moderate hike with a beautiful view of the surrounding valley and hills, but it had fewer jars. The third site (Site 1) was the biggest, sporting around 300 jars and a neat cave with a hole in the ceiling that you could hike to from outside. Seeing just Site 1 would have been enough. The weather was very pleasant all day. Actually, come to think of it, the weather was very pleasant all throughout Laos everyday. Returned to the guesthouse and ate some dinner, then all four of us rode a tuk tuk to the bus terminal and rode a “VIP” sleeper bus toward Vang Vieng. Arrived there at 4 a.m., and Vincent and I got off and rode a tuk tuk into town. We walked around and found a guesthouse to get a few hours’ sleep in. We shared a room, as before. Vincent had to leave around 9 a.m. to ride a minibus out of town, so we said goodbye as he left the room. I let myself sleep in until I had to check out around noon.

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Rode a minibus to Phonsavan for six hours. Stopped at a small town on the way for lunch and ate with another guy from the minibus named Vincent. Shared a tuk tuk with Vincent and two girls from the Phonsavan bus terminal to the center of town where all the guesthouses are. Vincent and I shared a room with two twin beds. It was cheap, but the wifi sucked. We looked around at a couple of tourist agencies and all four of us finally booked a tour of the three Plain of Jars sites for the next day. I ended up deciding to ride a sleeper bus the next evening to Vang Vieng. We ate dinner at a local place about a block away, then went to bed.

Saturday, February 11, 2012

Woke up earlier than I expected, at about 8:30 a.m. Read my Laos guidebook about the northern area to plan where to go next. Decided to go to the Plain of Jars next, and then to the wild debauchery of Vang Vieng. Walked around town with my guidebook and saw all the temples that I had missed the day before. Met a couple novice monks, Joy and Sing, and talked with them for about an hour. Sing was 19 and wanted to quit the temple life and enroll in a university. He wanted tips for flirting with girls and wanted to know about my dating life. It was very amusing. In the late afternoon I felt tired, so I returned to my hostel and rested for a bit, then went to the night market for dinner. Ran into Michelle and her friend and I ate with them and a guy from Australia who also sat with us. Bought some more banana bread on my way back to my hostel. Caught up on my blog and got my stuff ready to go in the morning.