Tropic Thunder

My favorite war movie?…Tropic Thunder (yes I’m being serious).  That’s about all I’ve seen of the jungles and mountain landscapes of the golden triangle (for lack of a better term), until now.  Laos is by far the most far out, unfamiliar place I have ever been in my life.  Bamboo bridges over long blue and green rivers that weave through the mountains around them, dusty dirt roads where an entire family rides on one small motorcycle together, opium dealing tuk tuk drivers, packs of water buffalo crossing the roads in front of you, name any cliché of what you imagine south east Asia to look like – its here.

Don’t get me wrong there are a lot of tourists here.  A LOT.  This has been very surprising to me.  I didn’t imagine Laos would be such a tourist destination.  As I write this I am at a local coffee shop, “Joma”, that serves breakfast burritos, bagels w/ cream cheese, and Iced lattes.  The over population of tourists and lack of interaction with true locals has probably been the most disappointing aspect of Laos for me.  Its unfortunate such an un-eclectic population of people travel the world.  I swear if I see one more guy with a pony tail, drinking coffee and smoking a cigarette, reading some random book or another white girl with dreadlocks I’m going to yak (Ok, that’s all the ranting I’ll do for now).  The local people of Laos are more reserved than the locals I interacted with in Thailand.  Occasionally you will meet a local that is excited to meet and interact with a foreigner, but for the most part you get a blank stare and a polite “Sa bai dee” (“Hello” in Lao).

The lack of enthusiasm for tourist may be due to the fact that Laos was conquered by the French, and until recently was under their control.  Thailand on the other hand has never been conquered by another nation, and always remained independent.  That being said, the French influences have led to a very interesting food scene in Laos.  There are a lot of bakeries that produce fresh breads and incredible pastries/desserts.  This was a welcomed change from Thailand where I saw very little bread, but not so good for the weight I felt I was losing and good shape I was getting into on this trip.  Overall I would take the food in Thailand over Laos any day.  Its much more light and healthy.  I miss having noodle soup and fried rice for every meal.  You also see a lot more “American” type of meals like burgers and fries and pastas in Laos, which I’m not a huge fan of (I’ll eat enough of that when I return and its not particularly good here anyways).

All that being said, I had an incredible experience at an Elephant camp in Laung Prabang, Laos this week.  We (My dad, my dad’s gf’s son Loren, and I) arrived at The Mahout Elephant camp early Wednesday morning where trainers and elephants were awaiting our arrival.  Within fifteen minutes of us arriving at the camp and meeting some of the elephants and staff, we were riding elephants through the jungles of Laos (I have some awesome videos from these rides).  We cruised through the bush and into the Nam Kham River, across which our lodgings were located.  Ultimately we found ourselves back where we originally arrived.  We took a short boat ride across the river where we settled into the cabins that would be our homes for the next two nights.

The Mahout elephant camp is more like a camp for people.  The visitors staying overnight stay in these very nice log (or something like that) cabins, there is a common dining area for all of the guests, and there is a strict itinerary with different daily activities for the camps guests.  Shortly after settling into our cabins, and putting on the required “mahout uniform” (by far the most ridiculous outfit I’ve ever worn in my life.  And that’s coming from a guy who used to wear a multi colored gino green global hoodie and dressed up as the jolly green giant one year for Halloween), we were whisked away, back to the other side of the river where we attended “elephant school”, and learned the commands to ride and direct an elephant.  After school each of us was given our own elephant to ride (with assistance from one of the mahout trainers).  We rode through the jungle on our elephants again and back down to the river where we participated in bath time for the elephants.  This mainly consisted of the trainers shouting commands for the elephants to get us as wet as possible.  The elephants did seem to enjoy this as well and produced some awesome pictures (see above).

The next day Loren and I got up early to see the Mahouts retrieve the elephants from the jungle (where they stay each night).  Side note: Waking up in the jungle sounds like you have a Native American tribe howling and charging at you from far away, or better yet an alarm clock that plays 10 of those nature sound cd’s on top of one another.  The elephants are chained up in the jungle overnight, with plenty of room to move and eat.  Fun fact: elephants only sleep 1-3 hours a night, and eat about 300kg a day!  Apparently a couple of the elephants broke their chains that evening, found their way to a local farmers sugar cane field and had an awesome midnight snack.  The mahouts were not too pleased however, because their company has to pay the local farmers when things like this happen.  We took a short AM ride with the elephants, but today’s main activity was a trip to the Kwanzi waterfall.  We took a 30-40 minute van ride (also very camp like) with some other couples and families that were staying at the camp to the waterfall.  

On this van ride I saw more of life in Laos.  As we passed local villages outside of the city I saw groups of kids playing in the streets.  The kids of Laos are currently on vacation and have some very interesting ways of spending their time off.  One group of boys I saw had made a fort, literally in the middle of the road.  Another group of kids seemed to be playing tag along the side of the road with cars whizzing by them.  Finally I saw a young boy pushing a tire along the street with a stick.  A much different world.

Our time at the waterfall was amazing.  There are different areas of the waterfall you can hike to.  One of the lower points is a crystal blue pool with a smaller waterfall feeding it.  The water is so blue because of the limestone residue from the waterfalls.  There was also a rope swing where you can fly and jump into the water below, which is not as warm as its tropical appearance suggests.  Further up the path is a steep climb to the top of the main waterfall.  Loren, my dad, and I made the 20 minute trek to the top with a couple of periodic stops so the big guy could catch his breath.  I must add that for 70 years old (shhh don’t tell anyone) he can really hold his own with us energetic 24 year olds.  The top of the waterfall was incredibly scenic.  You could see down the waterfall to the pools far below, as well as look out to the tremendous mountain landscape of Laos.  These views were truly some of the most magnificent vistas I have seen in my life, and undoubtedly one of the highlights of my trip.  While Laos may not have provided the rich culture (and great food) I experienced and loved in Thailand, the views, and images of the landscape I have in my memory more than make up for it.

By the time we got back to the elephant camp it is was nearly time for dinner.  I kind of over did it with the fried foods at dinner that night.  I had done a lot of exercise that day so I figured I could indulge a bit.  I had the Lao version of onion rings that basically were whole fried onions, fried chicken, and a whole deep-fried fish that I ate just myself (getting sick just thinking about).  To go from such light meals in Thailand to such heavy fare in Laos really set me back the last couple days.  I’m starting to feel better now and will be taking it easy my last two days in Laos.

I can’t believe my trip is almost over.  It has been less than three weeks, but it feels like I have been traveling for much longer.  I’m definitely ready to come home and see my friends, my kids at work, get back to playing ball US style, drinking tap water, etc.  On the other hand, I’m going to miss the time with my dad, the relaxation of this vacation, and the weather.  I predict a major heat wave when I return.  See you all soon.

-Sam

Elephant Camp - Day 2

Elephant Camp – Day Two

The morning mist over the River Khan reminds me of every SE Asia war movie and all of the SE Asian war newsreel footage I have ever seen.  The villages we pass all look like My Lai, with thatched huts, squatting peasants, rice paddies and water buffalo.  I can hear the explosions and see the fires in this part of the world whose populations and geography proved far too resistant and vast to dominate, but not so vast they could not be tortured and torched, as extensive areas of them were.  Still, we live in a time of relative peace in SE Asia, Laos has been open to foreign tourism for fifteen or so years, and Sam and Loren, strong white unarmed twenty four year old American invaders lovingly and joyfully ride their elephants into the misty river that feeds the Mekong at dawn. 

Later in the morning we go to the very impressive waterfalls at Kwanzi, the summit of which proves to be so steep an ascent that Sam has to hold my hand and literally help pull me up the slippery footholds on the way to the top of the falls.  Like the elephants, I place each foot down with great care and precision. 

It is odd to find myself a sweaty panting seventy year old man whose hand is being held by his twenty four year old son, who is literally helping pull him up a mountain: a little embarrassing, and far more real and necessary than symbolic, but symbolic, of course, and, of course, immensely moving.   At the summit Sam and I get a little lost and disoriented and I remark about how comfortable we each seem, not wanting to jinx ourselves, but also wanting to explicitly note the moment.   It is here that Sam declares he wants to return to live in Chiang Mai to teach, and whether that happens or not seems to me to be no more important than the fact of his declaration.

We stop at a Hmong village on the way back to EC.  It is pathetic.  Sam calls these tribal visits, where dozens of inevitably filthy kids and their mothers are hawking identical woven trinkets, to be his least favorite part of his trip.  Still, he actually engages the Hmong children, and while refusing to have his picture taken with them, is Pied Piper-like in his ability to evoke their genuine smiles, to ask their names, to high five with the small and the tall.  When I comment on his skills and gifts with children he says it is a benefit and a curse.

Back at Elephant Camp I am doing yoga at sunset when a thin tiger-stripped green eyed cat walks up the steps onto the deck of my bungalow and, with a dancer’s precision, steps carefully on, over, and between my limbs, another creature watching his every footfall, who, as I lay down on my back, climbs up onto my stomach, lays down, and rides my in and out breaths, much as I rode the elephant’s neck and felt the rise and fall of her shoulders, much as I lay with my head on the tiger’s expanding and contracting rib cage listening to her breathing.  The cat lies on my abdomen as I lay on my back for a long period of time, each of us breathing slowly and rhythmically in and out.  And while I “know” this is “just” a stray cat, and an “accidental” visitor to the deck I am doing yoga on, I also see the cat as a spiritual guide who has come to remind me of something I need to be reminded of, to manifest something which I need to have made explicitly, perhaps about the experience of being visited - as the elephants and the tigers were visited by me - by a creature from another species who finds me gravitationally attractive, and/or about the ability of love to manifest itself, whether in cats, humans, tigers, elephants, tree branches that support old and young people as they climb and descend mountainous, butterflies in mountain leas covered with yellow flowers, butterflies at dung heaps, the slimy trails of land snails, the darting of fish, or the strong helping hands and hearts of our sons. 

The cat reminds me that it is simply undeniable we all emanate an energy that draws others to us, much as we are drawn to others: electronically, atomically, molecularly, and as a primary magnetic principle of the laws of physics and of spirit, one mass is gravitationally drawn towards another mass, that is simultaneously gravitationally drawn back in response to the other’s mass, ad infinitum.  The cat reminds me of the need, and of my desire, to watch my footsteps and to move consciously and mindfully, not as a caution, but as a manifestation of my reverence about life, and the breath of life as manifest even by mountains and stones, who just have more subtly manifest and slower respiration rates than we.  And as I write these words in the dark still night a stray bullock wanders near the bungalow, the bells hung around its neck to help locate it when lost ringing like the bells rung in temples, clattering like chimes blowing in the wind breathed through the temples, commanding that I respond to the messages and the manifestations of spirit everywhere, to feel and to know their call as they welcome me, and are drawn to me, and as I am drawn to them.  Listen, they say.  Bend your knee.  Sohng!  We have pulled on your ear and already mounted you.  Now go!  Pbai!

-B 

Elephant Camp

Elephant Camp

After leaving our packs and the bulk of our travel gear at the guesthouse in LPB, along with Myles’ ashes to watch over them, we arrive in Elephant Camp, which proves to be all that it promised and that I hoped it would be, and more.  The people who conceived the camp have organized it very well and it exists as an extension of the village it is located in.  Camp workers and their families live on site or in the village on the Nam Khan River banks, where children bathe in the afternoon and women pound their washing.  The elephants are berthed for the evening in the jungle surrounding the village.  The cabins are beautifully sited, and everything has been laid out in a way so that it does not feel like a tourist venue as much as the home of a tribe of elephants living in a well considered, ecologically respectful environment, in a typical Laotian farming village. 

The elephants range in age from the very young to grandmothers in their seventies.  They are well trained and very present.  Immense.  Gentle.  Personable, to a degree.  Diffident.  Even skittish and shy.  They actually hear and respond to verbal commands from strangers with atonal accents, who can’t even hear no less make the sound in between the “b” and the “p” that the Lao speak.  Sohng! Sohng! we yell and the elephants respond by lifting their immense forelegs such that we three immense American men, each weighing over two hundred pounds - people they’ve never met before - can use the elephant’s right knee as a stepping stool, to then pull on the cartilaginous tops of the elephant’s ears with our full weight (which apparently doesn’t phase them) in order to swing up onto the elephant’s neck and ride.  Pbai!  Pbai! we “command,” Go! Go!  And, amazingly to me, they do go.

The elephants take their every step and place their every foot down carefully and considerately, their ability to see the uneven ground quite poor.  When you ride bareback on the elephant’s neck, your knees tucked in like a jockey’s high knees behind the elephant’s ears to help brace you, the souls of your feet warmed by the elephant’s mass, you hands pressed in behind the elephant’s supra orbital ridges for balance and support, you can feel the upper aspect of the elephant’s scapulae rising and falling, rotating up and down as they walk, right rear, now right front, left rear, now left front, right rear, right front, left rear, left front, the rhythm of their shoulders massaging your sitting bones, rolling your shoulders as the elephants roll their shoulders. 

The elephants wade cautiously through water above their bellies as they cross the Nam Khan with you on their bare backs.  They submerge their trunks and their immense heads completely under water, something I cannot envision any land mammal other than humans doing, holding their breaths for a very long time, and then, snorting to the surface, splashing and dunking you, rising up and down almost oblivious to your weight, urged on by the joyous and encouraging shouts of the mahouts.   Maybe even laughing.  Certainly appearing to be having a very jolly time.

I marvel at the elephants, from their amazing feet and toes to their miraculous trunks, how they can take huge thick pineapple stalks and leaves and crush them with their feet before stuffing them into their mouths where they briefly chew and grind them into swallow-able form, giving roughage new meaning, the sound of the crunching sweet and moist, the action of their tongues pushing their dinner deep into their throats quite visible.  How they can take a snout full of tiny rice grains and literally blow the grains into their mouths.  How they stand almost weightlessly. 

The Thai mahouts who spend the day with the elephants are knowledgeable, playful, and mostly patient.  Sam and Loren each have a wonderful time.  Bruce has a wonderful time.  And although it is a little weird at night, alone in the silent dark of my bungalow, it is an adventure, and how is one to feel on an adventure after all?  In this regard I am reminded by the silent starry night that it is not God I see in the elephants, but that God is the elephant, as god is the pineapple plants the elephants thrive on, the cigarette-smoking mahouts who ride them, and even you and me.

Laos

Laos

We experience a distinctly different slice of the SE Asian cultural and geological experience.  Luang Prabang is far more rural, rustic, and quaint, than Chiang Mai, a town rather than a small city. And Laos is not Thailand, its total population less than the population of Bangkok, and there are no obvious sex workers to be seen, no high heels, no open bars, and no short skirts.  There are more people riding bicycles, more monks, more children playing in the streets, more mountains, and dirt roads everywhere.  The Mekong River and the Nam Khan River are visible boundaries to the town.  The markets are smaller.  You can find fresh French bread and pastries.  The prices are slightly higher.  The area surrounding the town is comprised of subsistence agricultural villages. 

Joy’s son Loren meets us at the one runway airport in LPB and we drink a Lao beer to celebrate our trio’s unlikely connection. We take a cab into LPB and mark our arrival with a group photo as the sun settles over the Mekong.  We drink a Lao beer (one beyond my usual quota).  The guesthouse we choose to stay in has a very family-like feel to it, with pictures of kids, and weddings, and an old black and white of Uncle Ho Chi Minh in 1925 standing with a group of other men, some of whom the guesthouse owner names for us, but whose names and faces I do not recognize.  In town some older buildings bear fading red hammer and sickles on their facades.  A quite adequate room for the three of us in the guesthouse costs 20$ a night, with free bananas and Nescafe in the morning.  We take off our shoes on entering all buildings except the post office and a coffee shop named Joma’s.  We go out for dinner and drink a beer. 

When I reflect on these first two full weeks - only two weeks?! – of travel I cannot find an integrated sense of what I am doing or seeing.  I am “in” the experience for sure, but I cannot describe what it is other than “travel,” or why I am doing it, or what it is doing me.  The long overnight fourteen hour train ride from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, for example, an experience I had anticipated and focused on for at least a year because of the psychic and symbolic significance I ascribed to it, and that in fact absolutely thrilled and enthralled me, is now as if but a memory.  The mountains in the mist brought my tears have passed.  The company of my son, emerging ever more fully from his chrysalis, and the many, many gifts I have been given are all present and real, but also somewhat intangible and occasionally surreal, feelings and sensations more than things that can be possessed.  In LPB Sam finds yet another engaging basketball game, Loren a massage, and I start reading The Alchemy of Desire, whose imaginary main character compels me.