the bus ride into northern laos wasn't quite as bone-rattling as we expected. the newly sealed road made for a smoother and faster arrival into the small town of luangnam tha, our first destination in northern laos. we easily settled into the khamking guest house, which is run by a lovely lao family. the squeaky clean room with a hot water bathroom, satellite tv, and daily maid service qualified as our best valued room as of yet at 60,000 kip, or $6.60 per night. after a much needed meal, we decided to (quickly) walk the one road town and make a visit to the local tourism/trekking office. this is where we learned about the 3 day tai dam festival that was currently taking place only 15km outside of town. the festival is held only once every 5 years and was created to celebrate and preserve the cultural traditions of local ethnic hilltribes for future generations. we made plans to attend the festival on the following day - it's third and final day. while at the office, we also booked one of their full day guided treks to the surrounding countryside and ethnic villages. additionally, the tourism office also directed us to mrs. chin, the black market currency exchange lady that lives around the block - as there are no official currency exchanges in town and the one atm machine that we saw does not display our card logo. unreal. after a bit of neighborhood charades we located mrs. chin, a friendly, round lady that was counting huge stacks of money with no apparent fear of being robbed. we accepted her fair rate, exchanged some dollars for kip, bought some pink thread, and we were on our way. before getting back to our guesthouse, we stopped by a place that rents scooters by the day to inquire about a rental on the following day. with full bellies, a pocket full of kip, and our plans in place, we headed home for a relaxing evening and a good night's sleep.
festival day:
the man renting the scooters tried to be nice when telling us that due to our size we would require the largest and most powerful 125cc scooter. within a few minutes we were motoring along with a powerful (enough) scooter and ill-fitting helmets. our first stop was the market. we were hoping to see ethnic villagers dropping off their wares, but didn't see any. we presume you need to be there really early in the morning when the market is opening. we did see fruit and vegetable vendors, rattan items, along with lots of buffalo meat for sale. there were also about 10 vendors all selling the same soup, khao sawy - a couple of large bowls made for a satisfying breakfast. after the market we headed out to find the tai dam festival.
the festival took place in the phiengnam village, with several ethnic tribal groups from the luangnam tha province participating in the festival. we watched the large groups dressed in their traditional clothes perform their native songs and dances. they walked on stilts, played big drums, and competed while playing their traditional games. ladies sold their hand-made clothing, scarves, and headpieces. out of the couple of thousand people in attendance, we noticed only a few other tourists present. a couple of times we noticed ourselves being videotaped and photographed by the locals! we made sure to smile as big and goofy as possible. the people were so nice and welcoming.
after the festival and some dinner, we set out for a ride in the countryside. we passed many green rice paddies and beautiful mountain vistas. trying to find a remote waterfall, we stumbled upon a black hmong village. the ladies were wearing their traditional clothing and headpieces. two cute little boys ran to us yelling "sabaidee!" (hello) . we had a nice conversation with them, even though they spoke lao and we spoke english. they were happy to pose for photos and were excited to see the digital photos we took of them. as we left the village we saw many people carrying huge loads wood and water back to the village.
we completely enjoyed our day and our interactions with the ethnic peoples of the region. we are even more excited now to take our guided trek tomorrow and explore more of the surrounding area and the local people.
alina
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