Basking in the Faded Glory of French Colonialism - Vientiane, Laos
Harmonie
Don and Anne Myers
Wed 29 Feb 2012 03:33
| 17:57.95N 102:36.18E January 23, 2012 - January 24, 2012 The first indication that we were entering a section of Laos completely different than any other, came when the four of us, in our tired minivan with the downshift-phobic driver, hit smooth pavement. Wow. Then the smooth pavement did the unthinkable: it turned into four lanes, with road markings, and signs (in Elvish), and some traffic appeared. Wow, again. Fifteen minutes later, we arrived in Vientiane. Upon arrival, we concluded that this fifteen minutes of real highway is all there is in Laos. To be honest, we don't know for sure if this is true. It did feel like we traveled through a vast expanse of Laos, but really, we covered only about 10% of the country, so we shouldn't assume Vientiane's highway is all there is (but it probably is). According to the Lonely Planet guidebook, Vientiane's history dates back to the 9th century. Originally settled by the Lao people, over the centuries the city was subjected to a series of invasions by the Siamese, Burmese, Vietnamese and Chinese (my, that's a lot of -ese's). In the early 19th century, when a Lao prince tried to assert his people's independence from Siam, the Siamese decimated the city, carted away much of the population, and left the place deserted. It wasn't until the late 19th century, when the French named Vientiane the capital of their Laos protectorate, that the city was rebuilt. In 1928, there were only 9,000 inhabitants of Vientiane, many of them Vietnamese administrators the French put in place to help run the Laos portion of their Indochina realm. After WWII, Vientiane's population started growing as the cold war revved up and first the French, and then the Americans moved in to keep the communists out. In the 1960's, the place crawled with CIA employees, but when the Pathet Lao communists took over in 1975, all the foreigners and many educated professionals as well as Vietnamese and Chinese merchants skedaddled. The rest, as they say, is history and Vientiane's current population is around 250,000. Small by comparison to other capital cities around the world, but big (the biggest) for Laos. Vientiane sits on the Mekong River and stares across the Friendship Bridge at Thailand on the other side. Built in 1994, the bridge is unique in that right-hand-side-of-the-road Laos drivers must convert to left-hand-side-of-the-road Thai drivers in the space of 1,240 meters (the length of the bridge), and vice-versa. What seems like a breeding ground for chaos, actually runs fairly smoothly. We know because the four of us took a shuttle bus across the bridge in order to fly out of Thailand's Udan Thani airport back to Phuket (hundreds cheaper than flying out of Vientiane), and the shuttle bus did not careen out of control into on-coming traffic. It simply followed the designated traffic lanes from Laos across to Thailand. If we hadn't known about the lane switch, we wouldn't have noticed. We stayed two nights in Vientiane at another exceptional hotel, and could easily have stayed longer. It felt nothing like the rest of Laos. Ok, maybe a smidgen like Luang Prabang because of the French colonial architecture, but Vientiane is bigger and wider with boulevards, a few tall buildings and a more eclectic mix of people. As much as we loved the rest of Laos and felt Vientiane was an island within the country, we loved the city just as much. Vientiane has none of the Bangkok glitz - no skyscrapers, no sparkling shopping malls, no subway, no traffic (or very little for a city), and certainly not 7.7 million people. In Southeast Asia, Vientiane is a baby city, one you can walk the length of and not get lost or mowed down by a motorcycle carrying a family of five. Vientiane has sidewalks - most of which don't have open trenches (sewers) when you least expect them. Ahhhh, the French. They really know how to build a city. Remind you of anything? Called Patouxai in Lao, which translates to Arch of Triumph, it was built in the late1950's to commemorate Royal Lao government casualties of war. All good except it was built with concrete purchased by the US for the purpose of constructing a new airport. Ah well, airport, schmairport, wouldn't you rather have an Arch? Vientiane from atop the Patouxai. Doesn't look a thing like the rest of Laos, does it? Vientiane is definitely the French version of an Asian town. As Michael found out when we climbed to the top for this view, the Arch isn't the only tourist attraction. His picture was taken several times by a few of the many Asian tourists there. We Western folk were definitely in the minority. Chinese New Year. The dragon traveled with its entourage to many Chinese venues around town scaring away evil sprits and bringing good luck. Note the lack of smiles. It's Chinese New Year! Where's the joy? The dragon in action. The story goes that if cabbage is offered to the dragon during the New Year celebration, and the dragon eats the cabbage, the cabbage-offerer and his/her establishment will have very good luck in the new year. Here the dragon is contemplating the hanging cabbage on offer. We ran into the dragon around town at several venues where this scene was played out, accompanied by a cacophony of drums in the background. Still no smiles. This is That Dam, one of Vientiane's oldest Buddhist stupas (religious monument built to encase some form of sacred relic). Known more for its missing layer of gold (said to have been carted off by the Siamese when they sacked the city in the early 1800's), it is located half a block from the US embassy. Built more like a fortress (what we could see of it), the US embassy occupies both sides of a quiet street and looks very forbidding with its giant rolling steel gates and pop-up bollards. We were warned by embassy staff not to take photos. We didn't linger. That about wraps up our Laos adventure. Vientiane and its luxuries were a good way to end our visit to Laos. We ate very well in Italian and French restaurants, and wallowed in the beauty of handwoven silks in the market and boutiques. All in all, a stop in Vientiane was a great way to bridge the wide cultural and economic gap between Laos mountain villages and Phuket beach resorts. Speaking of bridging the gap, what a shock it was to ride on a smooth highway with signs and lighting and markings for longer than fifteen minutes after we crossed the bridge into Thailand. Thailand appeared to us like the epitome of prosperity after ten days in Laos. It was like the first time we stepped into a supermarket in New Zealand after crossing the Pacific and sometimes shopping in small, dark, airless places with meager stocks of unusual canned goods stacked in pyramids on broken-down shelves. Lovely though. Laos was still lovely despite its infrastructure challenges and poverty. Like all such places, it will change. We're glad we got to see it before that happens. Next up: Back to Malaysia (again!) Anne |