Julian2 Posted February 8, 2007 Report Share Posted February 8, 2007 To Lao and Back All of my three years residency in Chiang Rai, Thailand, have been spent as a visa runner. It was the easiest option; get up one day every month, drive the eighty kilometres to Mae Sai, walk across the border, buy a few pirate CDs and DVDs, get another exemption stamp in the pass port and go home; doing the fortnightâ??s shopping at Big C on the way. An English friend who spends six months of the year at Ko Samui, spoke to me rather unkindly when I mentioned that the changes to the visa system would discommode me. People like me who abused the system were the cause of rising costs to legitimate visa holders like himself he said. I couldnâ??t think of a sharp retort at the time but later decided I should have pointed out that if a visa was just a matter of posting my passport off to the nearest UK Thai consulate with a few bob I would have been only to pleased to oblige. If he had to fly to France or Germany and stay a couple of days for a Thai visa he may have joined the ranks of the visa runners also. So I decided my best option was the Royal Thai Embassy in Vientiane in the Lao PDR. I knew the city well and how things worked there. Flights were booked on Air Asia which would allow me a night in Bangkok and I explained to my wife that because of the uncertainty of the length of time to acquire a visa I would play the return trip by ear. I would almost certainly take the bus home. She drove me to the airport with a carload of family kids and they saw me off. Bye bye Loong. At the Savarnabhumi airport someone shot me with a hypodermic dart containing a drug that allowed an airport tout to lead me away from the crowded taxi rank to a waiting â??limousineâ??. Nine hundred baht, not an auspicious start to what had been planned as a budget trip. I was quite pleased to be having a night in Bangkok however, my stays there in the last few years had involved arriving on a late international flight and connecting with an early domestic the next morning. Hardly an opportunity for a bit of nightlife even if I had felt like it after two or three plane flights over a twelve hour period. The wife also had a habit of putting me through my paces after any extended absence, possibly judging from my performance whether any recent infidelities had occurred. Oh ye of little faith! I had a six oâ??clock flight to Udon Thani so it wouldnâ??t be too late a night, but enough to get a bit of that old Bangkok excitement crackling through the veins again. My regular hotel signed me in cheerfully and after a quick tub I headed down Soi 11 to Sukhumvit Road. First stop Soi 4, straight past the fabled Nana Plaza to Steak1 for a hamburger and the first beer of the night. Money well spent. Back to Nanaâ?¦ too early, so I moved on to Soi 7 which had developed into a major â??entertainmentâ?? area since I had settled down peacefully in Chiang Rai. I settled into a small outside bar where I could watch the action on the street. At the table next to me a large fat man in his sixties and a tiny teenage bargirl smooched and petted like teenagers at a drive-in movie. I was glad I had already eaten; not that I disapproved, both were obviously content with the events occurring but I had lived in rural Thailand long enough to be unused to public displays of affection. I realised someone had joined me at the table, it was a smiling in-house girl inquiring where I was from and what my name might be. She knew I was no new comer to Thailand, my two baht chain and amulet screamed it as effectively as a neon sign. But the night was young and things were still quiet and if you donâ??t try you donâ??t know do you? â??Julian, from Chiang Raiâ? I said. â??Chiang Rai?? My home Chiang Rai, near Mae Sai!â? â??How long you work bar?â? â??Only eight days.â? â??No no, not here, how long you work Bangkok?â? â??Only eight days.â? â??You speak English very good.â? â??I learn when I work factory Mae Sai.â? She saw me watching the lovers at the next table. â??You like young girl?â? â??No, I like woman, not girl.â? Funny how quickly you start speaking bargirl-ese again, I never talk like this with my Thai wife. Ecstatically, â??I thirty five, you like me?â? Sure I liked her, but I had six oâ??clock flight I explained and bought her a drink, a small bottle of Chang which I approved of; I hate spending money on soft drink for girls. Wasnâ??t a bad price either, one hundred and ten baht for a lady drink that was actually a real drink. We had a couple more and I moved on; the lady boy population on Sukhumvit had increased dramatically in the last few years I noted disapprovingly. How do they do it? Maybe theyâ??ve worked out a way of breeding. On reflection I decided I didnâ??t want to find out. Back to Soi 11 then a nightcap at the AV Pub with itâ??s fifteen hundred baht barfines. Were they worth it? I took a girl out many years before and yes, she was. I had a drink with the manageress, an old friend, a slim, sexy, fifty two year old. One beer for me and I bought her a vodka. More than three hundred baht without tip. Back to the hotel and requested a four oâ??clock wake up call before turning in. I woke at twenty to four, Iâ??ve had an internal alarm all my life and was showered and packed when my wake up call came through. The hotel car driver looked asleep on his feet but got me to Savarnabhumi in record time; the tollways practically deserted at that hour. Six hundred baht but no stuffing around looking for cabs in the street with a bag in your hand and a plane to catch. I was in Udon Thani by seven thirty and took the airport mini bus which dropped me at the Thai/Lao immigration point outside of Nong Khai, a distance of some fifty kilometres for one hundred and fifty baht. I moved through the Thai immigration without incident but the Lao side was fairly crowded. I had resurrected an immigration form from a previous visit but there was another form I had forgotten so I was held up filling that in anyway. Thirty US dollars and a photo was handed over, less for some countries citizens, more for others. Americans pay the most. As I left immigration a Lao man approached me offering transportation, we decided on two hundred baht to the Thai embassy. I waited while he got his car and pulled up in front of me. My God, a Toyota Corolla that may have once been white. Twenty eight years old he proudly told me when I inquired. We clattered down the twenty dusty kilometers into Vientiane that I must have traveled fifty times before. I wondered if Da , my first Asian girlfriend was still around. I hoped not it would be a complication I didnâ??t need but if she was and wanted to see me sheâ??d know that I was there quickly. Vientiane was a very small town for Farangs. It soon became apparent that I was a late arrival at the embassy, at least a hundred people lined up at a trestle table set up outside the main building. Several Lao men approached me at the gate and offered to do the visa for me. I knew how this worked as I had used similar guys for my Lao visa when I had lived here before. It would save waiting and they would have the passport for me the next day. How much I inquired, three thousand five hundred baht. Sorry, Iâ??d wait a long time to save two thousand five hundred when I could do it myself for a thousand. My taxi offered to wait and take me to my hotel for another fifty. OK, bor pin yang. Not a problem. He grinned at the Lao phrase, he had realised that I wasnâ??t a newcomer to Lao. I chatted to a friendly German from Udon Thani and we compared visa run notes. Finally we got to the table with our filled in forms and were sent to the embassy building to pay the thousand baht fee and leave our passports. More waiting then finally free, like school boys at the end of term, we headed for the street. A drama unfolded at the gate, a security guard had closed the main gate and was letting people leave through a side gate. A large man was attempting to enter and was being told that visa applications were finished for the day. He began to shout at the guard. Some members of his race are sensitive to what they consider to be type casting of their countryâ??s citizens so I will only say he was from a land between Canada and Mexico; a fact that he began to loudly inform the security guard of at the top of his voice while trying to push him out of the way. I waited in anticipation, if the guard was Lao rather than Thai he would soon produce his baton and teach the guy some manners. My taxi pulled up and tooted impatiently. Goddamn. The Saysana hotel is not the most luxurious in Vientiane but I have built up a loyalty to it over the years. I had forgotten how steep the stairs were but for three hundred baht a night for an air conditioned room with hot water I wasnâ??t complaining. There is also a nightclub in the ground floor where ladies are available as dancing partners. I suspect that another form of activity is available as well. Free lance prostitutes of both sexes gathered there nightly but it wasnâ??t really my type of scene, Iâ??m getting hard of hearing and conversation accompanied by loud music is a waste of time. I showered and headed for the Mekong, the sun would set into Thailand soon and I wanted to see it one more time. A massive sand bar stretched nearly across the river, a reminder of the huge dams upstream in China that were taking more and more water every year. I had a couple of bottles of beer Lao at an outside bar and watched the sun disappear and headed for Kop Chai Der, the up market beer garden and restaurant a couple of hundred metres away. The draft beer there was as good as ever but I was getting hungry and after one glass I started back to the river front. A Tex Mex restaurant was a new addition to the street and I went in and ordered pizza, Thai and Lao food are all very well but hamburgers and pizzas were a treat when you lived in rural Thailand. The pizza was fine but far too large so I gave half to a young backpacking French couple at the next table drinking draft beer. They accepted thankfully and allowed me to play the old Asia hand in return, telling them how to get to Phnom Penh and then across to Saigon, interspersed with little stories and anecdotes about Lao life and customs. I finished up and headed for the Samlo Pub. Once owned by the legendary (infamous?) Paul Bounds I had stolen his favorite barmaid many years before. He had sold it to his business manager, a Cambodian called Put, whoâ??s mother had carried him to Lao from the Killing Fields of the then Khmer Republic of Kampuchea as a baby. Iâ??ve never seen a Mekong River pirate but Iâ??m sure that they look like Put, hard faced, hard eyed, homicidal. He broke into a smile when he saw me though, we had got on well in the past. He came over and chatted in perfect English for a while. Nearly every one I knew from the time I lived there was gone, down to Thailand, up country to the projects or just disappeared. I was surprised to see the same three or four attractive girls there who had been there on my last visit three years before. The Samlo girls work, they serve at the bar, wait the tables and no one leaves before closing time. What they do afterwards is their business. They were always stand-offish with me, they knew I had been friendly with Paulâ??s girls who they had replaced. The original girls had hated Put and he got rid of them the minute he took over, and I suspected some hard feelings had eventuated over the change in staff. I remember Da and her workmates looking at Paul with contempt while he yelled at them to call Put â??Mr. Putâ?Â. Too much Beer Lao later I negotiated the stairs to my hotel room determined to sleep late in the morning. The embassy gave out the visas after one oâ??clock which would give me time for a look around the Talaart Sao, Vientianeâ??s morning market, which is open all day. Needless to say I was awake at daybreak seeking cold liquids and food so after several pints of bottled water I headed once more to the riverfront. People who claim Beer Lao wont give you a hangover havenâ??t drank as much of it as I have. I sat in a small café where I could just glimpse the river and ordered poached eggs and bacon which came with a warm crisp baguette. A passing Englishman walked up and peered in until I pointed at the food and gave him the thumbs up. He sat down and we spoke briefly but I wanted to get to the market, always a favorite of mine in Asia. I found that pirate DVDs had established a large section since my last visit and was pleased to find two to add to my collection. Iâ??m a fan of war movies and found two classics, the black and white â??The Desert Ratsâ? with Richard Burton and Chips Rafferty and â??Mr. Robertsâ? a long time favorite with Henry Fonda and James Cagney. Back to the hotel buying two bottles of Pastis, to which Iâ??m partial, on the way for a third the price they were in Thailand; I was packed and at the embassy forty minutes early. There were only half a dozen people in front of me so I settled to wait. Two young teachers, both working on tourist visas in Bangkok, struck up a conversation. I slipped easily back into my old Asia hand mode and regaled them with tales of the Mekong. One was American and the other was Afro-Anglo. Who knows the correct term for a black Englishman these days? Both were fine young men, seeing the world and giving something back. We discussed Premier League football until another American, around my age, approached and asked if any of us wanted to share a tuktuk to the border. His girlfriend who was in her twenties was seriously cute. We all looked at her appreciatively while she preened, fully aware of her cuteness. The boyfriend was unsure of our appreciation, for Godâ??s sakeâ?¦who would want a girlfriend no one else wanted to look at? He quickly found a way to tell us she had never worked bar, she was an Isaan girl who had worked in a Pattaya factory. I spoke to her, she too had learnt good English in her factory. The gate opened and in minutes every one had their visas, while at least another hundred people trooped in behind us. I accepted the tuktuk invitation and after a good ten minutes argument involving less than twenty baht a passenger we drove off to the border. Nong Khai is possibly one of the best towns Iâ??ve seen in Thailand. It consists of two parallel main streets and an excellent long market that runs along the riverfront. I booked into the Pantawee hotel after leaving immigration in the comfort of a taxi, leaving my traveling companions to argue with another tuktuk driver. A hundred baht to the hotel and I never even bothered discussing the fare. The Pantawee is a nice clean hotel that starts at eight hundred baht a night. Since my last visit they had put internet into every room, built on extra rooms and put a small pool in. Swearing moderation I headed out to take in the market, anticipating a meal and a quiet medicinal drink at the Danish Bakers, a bar restaurant I knew well. As I entered one of the main streets I saw a sign pointing into a side Soi advertising a guesthouse and bar called â??The Meeting Placeâ?Â. Distant memory bells rang, nearly five years ago I had talked to an Englishman who had been on the verge of opening this establishment. I had promised to look in someday and decided to do so after the brief shopping trip was over. I found a small, comfortable traditional bar with an English pub atmosphere. Most surprising of all was the presence of a middle aged European woman behind the bar. She was from Aberdeen and I called it â?? the blue granite cityâ?Â, pleasing her I think, with the knowledge that I had been there. I searched through my social skills for the â??communication with Western women not related or married to a mateâ? file. Very rusty, so I sat back and listened to the bar conversation, the other patrons mainly expats with a few travelers. I informed the hostess that it would be my last drink as I was off in search of food only to be offered sustenance there. Liver with bacon, onions and mash was a house specialty but the fish and chips were also highly regarded. The cook was off but the pretty young Thai girl helping behind the bar was filling in. I accepted and was more than pleasantly surprised when a large battered fillet of fresh local fish with crisp chips and frozen peas arrived. I love frozen peas and Ilene, as I now knew her, told me that Lotus sometimes got them in and she stocked up. A superb meal which will be repeated on every return visit. By this stage the night was a total loss and once more worse for wear I finally staggered back to the hotel. Earlier I had discovered the Chiang Rai bus left from Udon Thani in the early evening so, fearing heavy booking during the holiday season, I left Nong Khai about eleven the next morning to be sure of getting a seat. My wife had already rang me making suspicious noises about the length of time I had been away. The Nong Khai to Udon bus was about thirty baht and I arrived at the Udon bus depot to get a ticket in plenty of time. I got a tuktuk to a nearby Lotus mall to kill a little time and wandered around until the Christmas muzak drove me out. I found myself seated next to a Finn who had a restaurant at Chiang Khong, the only other Farang on the bus. I like Finns, I knew one well, years ago, and based a character in a novel Iâ??m trying to write on him. We chatted and time slipped away and twelve hours later we were in Chiang Rai, me futilely trying to ring my wife to come and pick me up. She was still asleep as far away from her phone as it was possible to get in a large house. Finally, an â??only in Thailandâ?? incident. The bus stopped and picked up about a dozen people who had to stand up, one guy had a kiddy he was carrying and moved to the front of the bus and sat on the step that led down into the driverâ??s area. The two â??stewardsâ?? told him to get back up the back of the bus in no uncertain terms, it was unsafe. At the next stop we picked up a couple of teenage girls who promptly sat in the same place. Nothing was said and the â??stewardsâ?? and driver spent the next hour chatting and flirting with them until they got off. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Encore Posted February 8, 2007 Report Share Posted February 8, 2007 Nice report, Julian. But did you really spend all that time away from home without sampling the ware available in BKK, Udon, VT and Nongkai? Hard to believe... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cavanami Posted February 10, 2007 Report Share Posted February 10, 2007 Nice report, Julian. But did you really spend all that time away from home without sampling the ware available in BKK, Udon, VT and Nongkai? Hard to believe... Need to know basis...we don't really need to know, do we? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Julian2 Posted February 10, 2007 Author Report Share Posted February 10, 2007 Learned friends, I'm 18 months off 60 years, I've mongered with the best of them, now I enjoy watching and reporting the antics of those less experienced in the ways of Thailand nearly as much as I used to enjoy getting my leg over my self. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Encore Posted February 10, 2007 Report Share Posted February 10, 2007 Onlypulling his leg. I can, since I'm his elder by 6 months. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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