Family visit and trip to Vangvieng

When I came home from Infield, my big sister Ingrid had come to Laos. So.. the vacation didn`t stop with Infield, I had one more week of fun and relaxing. All though I did some teaching during the week, it was mostly relaxing and hanging out with Ingrid :)

During the week we`ve done lots of different things. We started with checking out Vientiane city, where I live. There we did something I`ve did very little of during my three months here. We looked at buddhist temples. The buildings and the monks are fascinating, and it was really fun when we came to talk with one of the monks. He talked about being monk, why and how it was. Would it suprise you if I said that mane mane monks here have phones. Maybe it`s me not knowing, but isn`t that against the basic buddhist monk rules?!Buddha statue from a tempel in Vientiane

Btw, this week I reseved my christmas present from Norway, stuffed with the best things I could imagine. That made my day, sort of speaking:P

The gifts from home. Even christmas soda from Hamar:)

That week we were hit by a wave of sickness. I started at Khamla`s, and finished 6 hours later at my own bathroom. This is my first time in being really sick in Lao, and it was as fun as it always is when being sick. Both Kristian and Ingrid had their turns to the toilet during the night, and the following day became kind of lazy. But a couple of days later we where all fine, so me and Ingrid took a trip to Vangvieng. The place where we had infield. After a shaky trip with lots of loud Lao music, we arrived. We headed straight to a guesthouse, before we went to lucy cave. The cave was really large and beautiful, and in the end of the cave, there was a lagoon. Really cool:) Our guide was btw drunk, and his guiding consisted of spitting out the few english words he knew, in a very fast and direct order: oh yes very beautiful in cave, oh yes wow beer Lao! He made the trip memorabel, though in a different way. After the cave and some food we went tubing. This time, ass well in infield, the tubing became a cold experience, but man... the nature in Vangvieng is so beautiful, and just lying there in the tube, floating down the river. I wouldn`t miss it for the world.The lagoon inside the cave. Not the best picture, but anyway:)

The trip home from Vangvieng was also a experience in it self. We started out at 7 am with a local bus, and soon we were off. Here in Lao, the buses follow the time tabel, something we from Norway really appreciated. The first km we drove really slow, and the driver honked the horn all the time, in case anybody had forgot or missed the bus. It`s a good thing to do, but kind of enoying for the tired Eirik. The bus soon got filled up with shouting Lao people who seemed to be friends, but shouted to each other in a way I would look at as fighting. Well well.. The best part of the trip, besides to up and down, and going from side to side in the seat, was when the mother and her child in the seat in front of us, started trowing up. All over themselves and the seat. Just been sick myself, so the smell and the sounds were a bit disturbing. But as the tuff and hard viking I say I am, I stould (sat) my ground. So did Ingrid.

Well back from Vangvieng, we waited in Vientiane for some hours, before we met Kristian, and we were all ready for a trip to Bangkok. I will tell you that story later, `cause I`m still in Bangkok at Silje and Elses place.