Looking for Mr Thongdeng

John awoke to the fantastic news that Everton had beaten Manchester City.  In good heart, we planned our day starting with a trip to MAG.   

Lao is the most heavily bombed country on earth and the volume of unexploded bombs (UXO) and the damage caused, particularly to the local population is staggering.  Children regularly look for UXO which they can sell for scrap to dealers getting perhaps 10p per kilo, more if there are explosives present.  MAG devotes time to training teams to clear land to hand back to farmers and also to prevent the horrific deaths and disfigurements caused by US, British, French, Belgium, Russian and Chinese munitions.  Some of the sights were harrowing but we left with an appreciation of the bravery and dedication of the people involved.

On another sweltering day we set course for the Ho Phra Keo temple, the place that kindly let me use its toilet when in desperation I knocked on its door. The temple was the site of the Emerald Buddha until the Thais pinched it in the 1820s.  The temple itself has a half finished feel which is typical of Lao.  None of the temples are generally older than 100-200 years as the place has been sacked and raided many times.  It is so hot- well into the 90s, so we viewed most of the temple from the shady side and very little of the side in full sun.  Afterwards, for fear of dehydration we headed for a few cooling beers and a little food.  John wanted to visit the National Football stadium which is rumoured to house the local gun club.  This was too good an opportunity to miss and we eventually found the stadium. Just a reminder the map is still not to SCALE and we only got lost once on our way. 

We just wandered inside through the open gate past the guard – they have guards for everything although they do not appear to be providing any activity which could remotely be described as ‘guarding’.  John went on the pitch and we wandered about the stands – a few guys were training but no-one took any notice of us - imagine doing that at Wembley?  Unfortunately the shooting gallery was closed so we decided that a little light refreshment was required for health reasons of course…..

One of the stranger things we've seen, and we don't know if it's a joke or not, are posters for missing animals.  We were particulrly interested in the posters for Mr Thongdeng, a chicken which is described as 'Naughty and like fighting' and Mr Kuso, who is one year old and single - not surprisingly for a pig bound for the pot he is described as 'Don't think about the future'.  I was tempted to call the number and report that Mr Thongdeng may have inadvertently joined us for dinner.

When we got back to the hotel there was consternation amongst the locals as the order had been given that the bulldozers were moving in tomorrow to start a new road.   All the little Lao cafes started to dismantle their dwellings whilst the hotel owner’s main concern was about losing the trees which gave much needed shade.  Down the road, one guy was climbing up the trees to pick all the coconuts before the bulldozers moved in.  We will have to watch to see what happens.

Hotel to left - everything on the right is going

Fantastic sunset tonight was observed over a gentle beer.  We were just leaving the bar when we bumped into a couple from Derbyshire traveling to Cambodia in the morning who insisted we share a bottle of ice cold wine.  It would have been rude to decline so we spent a pleasant hour chatting with them before retiring to bed in our new room at the top of the hotel. Not sure why we have been moved but I suspect John’s snoring may have had something to do with it. Off to Thailand tomorrow so long day ahead. 

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Finally, Happy Anniversary Nic and Wayne - we're thinking of you xx