What you get for your Baht!

Our view of what you pay for in a Thai guesthouse!

Staying as cheaply as possible is sometimes cramped, dirty and loud. You can wake up in the morning with a few more itches you just can't scatch, your bag half emptied and a stench from the leaking water source down the hall.

But when you find a ripper you are stoked and often find yourself staying longer than you first intended. (Well we seem to anyway)

Opium Trade

“After France annexed Laos in 1893, opium monopolies were established to finance the heavy initial expense of colonial rule. The French imported over 60 tons of opium per year from the middle east.”

Opium poppy cultivation expanded in South East Asia during the 1950’s mostly due to the suppression of Chinese people and a decline in imports from the Middle East due to them becoming increasingly expensive.

Today Thailand is opium free and Laos no longer supplies to the illicit drug market. The Laos government has been trying to eliminate poppy crops for the past 8 years but unfortunately the crops have been wiped out faster than the farmers can find alternative sources of income. Therefore the cultivation continues but on a much smaller scale than in the previous century.
Harvest continues in remote mountainous and poor areas in the northern provinces of Laos.

Addiction usually affects middle age to elderly men, often making them incapable of contributing to the family income and well being. Lao women unfortunately bore the task of working the field, waking early and walking for many hours up steep mountainous terrain to tend the crops. Labor is very physical and trying for these often frail women who then have to return home to opium dependent spouses.

Guesthouse Improvements

Due to up coming events; 2009 SEA games and 2010 celebrates the 450th anniversary of the establishment of Vientiane. Changes in guesthouse standards are on the rise, unfortunately so too are the number of tourists and the amount of noise.

Gone will be the days of sharing one squatter loo with 20 people!

From the 10th June guesthouses must have at least 15 rooms with adequate facilities. Guesthouses are being evaluated for upgrade or shutdown. Those that do not make the grade will most likely be guttered and turned into restaurants or mini markets.

The capital currently houses 5000 hotel and guesthouse rooms, by 2009 it will house

10 000.

Improvements will lift many prices outside the range of budget travellers, forcing them further from the city centre (not that it's a big city) to the outskirts, for a different Laos experience in Vientiane.

Chicken on the run!

Best chicken in town is how the locals rate it. So keen to try KHU VENG FRIED CHICKEN, I raced down on my bycicle licking my lips. As I pulled to a hault in front of the store I noticed the shutters were drawn and the empty space where the chicken lady sells to the masses. I WAS GUTTED!

I stood in bewilderment, motorbike after motorbike pulled to the curb 2,3 sometimes 4 people with similar displays of disappointment.

I'll try again tomorrow!

From 5pm til sold out (most nights) the chicken lady has a line up past the two giant woks bubbling away and onto the street.

For 6000 kip ( 80c AUS) you get a piece of crispy southern style chicken and a handful of house cut chips. Bagged chilli and tomato sauce is your choice.

Dine in or take away.

Located on Thanon Khu Vieng (look for the line up of people, you can't miss her).

What the!

Is that a turd in your hand? Are you seriously going to eat that? What the!

NO, IT'S A SOAKED BANANA!

It may look like something you wouldn't even pick up, let alone put it in your mouth, but this soaked dried banana is actually a delicious treat between meals.

The banana's are soaked in a rich dark sugar syrup for a couple of days then placed on racks of bamboo to dry. The process takes about five days depending on the weather. The result is a chewy, sweet, tangy sensation that gives a warming to the belly and leaves a rich caramelized flavour in your mouth.

Often seen around town in a lighter shade of brown, the darker almost blackened banana's came from the organic market. To my mind they are a better product than the lighter non organic, due to greater care being taken as they are not mass produced or maybe the banana's themselves hold better flavour (characteristic of organic produce) and a higher sugar content.