Who wants to be a millionaire?

9/27/2006

Today marks a major achievement in my life; I became a millionaire. Well, not quite. I only have 999,600 dollars. However, that's in the Lao currency of the kip, which is just slightly weaker than the US dollar with an exchange rate of about 10,000 kip to 1 US dollar. I guess I'm not that rich, but at least I got to hold a huge wad of cash for once in my life. I was reminded of Germany after one of the world wars where inflation was so bad that people had to make purchases with literally wheelbarrows full of money, and apparently it was cheaper to use money as toilet paper than to actually buy toilet paper. Maybe I'll keep that in mind next time I'm at one of the Asian squat toilets and there is no TP. Just kidding, of course.

Today was an epic travel day compared to yesterday. We left the guesthouse early in the morning and took small boats across the Mekong River to get to Laos. After getting our visas and our money exchanged, we split up into two 4x4 songtaos and embarked on a long, bumpy ride that lasted estimating from 10 am to 6 pm. The roads were mostly dirt and pretty bad. We only covered 120 mi (or km, not sure). One funny thing that happend was a big construction truck travelling in the opposite direction got stuck in the mud in front of us, which blocked our path since it's pretty much one lane. Fortunately, there was a crane next to it that was able to give it a nudge with its robotic arm thing. I was too slow to get a picture of it, but it would have been a good shot. The ride was incredibly bumpy, but at least it was very scenic. Laos is a beautiful country. I'm not sure if it was just the sunglasses, but the grass and open fields seemed much greener than anwhere else I've been. Also, every time we drove by little villages kids would come out waving and screaming "sabaidee," which means hello in Lao. Most of the country is extremely untouched and undeveloped.

The guesthouse we stayed at was called the Boat Landing Guesthouse, which has one international awards for its committment to ecotourism and green living. The place was largely started by this guy named Bill with whom I spoke for a bit at dinner. After graduating from college in Colorodo, he worked in the Peace Corps. After that he pursued a career in international development basically doing Peace Corps type stuff for a living. He came to Laos around 1990, fell in love with the country, and hasn't really left.