After having an amazing time in Northern Laos, my new friends and I were ready to enter Thailand and redefine what the Thais thought was misbehavior. But lo!!! There was a problem! After my buddy Brian was sequestered in a private room, it turned out that the Laos customs officials in Pakse forgot to stamp his passport when he flew in from Siem Reap, Cambodia. "So what?" was our reply. "That's your problem, not ours!" (Our theory is always to go in guns blazing, otherwise you'll end up getting taken advantage of and let's face it, no one likes to get pushed around.) The prick at the boarder told him flat out that either Brian hands him over $100US or he has to go back to Pakse and get his passport stamped. Pakse is about a three hour flight away. Boarderbitch then went back to watching tv. My friend Brian tried reasoning with the guy but he refused to even pay him the slightest bit of attention and even worse, he KEPT WATCHING TV!!!
Boarderbitch: "You pay me $100US or go to Pakse!!!"
Brian: "Why should I have to go all the way back to Pakse for YOUR government's mistake?!? That's ridiculous!"
Boarderbitch: "You pay now or go to Pakse!"
Brian: "Listen, you seam like a reasonable guy, let's think this through. Here are my tickets with my name on them. It is absolutely impossible for me to have flown from Cambodia into Laos and not gone through customs..............do you mind turning that off? I think this is a pretty big deal and I'd appreciate it if you'd at least pretend you're paying attention to me...........hello?..........like I said, I'd of had to go through customs so just because someone on that end forgot to rubber stamp my passport I don't think it's fair that I pay to go all the way back to the southern end of your country."
Boarderbitch: "You pay now!!!"
Brian: "Go fuck yourself!!!"
This was where things started to slide downhill. I walked into their office and between myself and Brian we got Boarderbitch and a couple of his little cronies into a screaming and swearing match. There were threats on both sides and I think the fight ended when Brian and I looked at each other and flipped Boarderbitch off. (Note: Apparently some languages, most notably sign language, are in fact universally understood.) At this point I think it is also imperative to mention that $100US is a completely arbitrary number and quite obviously this boarder guard is an asshole who's just trying to extort my friend. If he'd quoted around $20US and not been such a greedy little shit he might have gotten away with it. As it stands we were not about to succumb to this guys will any longer. Let me continue now with a brief description of the physical objects that were in our way at this point........besides the border guards of course.
The town of Huay Xai is located on a river which separates Laos from Thailand. If I really got a hold of a good drive I could probably place a golf ball squarely on top of the Thailand boarder patrol office from the Laos boarder patrol. The only way to get across the river is to pay a long-boatman to ferry you through the current. So, the logical conclusion.......is we somehow can get across the river without the Laos boarder guards noticing or caring.......we'll be in Thailand and there's nothing they can do!
So we were all standing on the side of the river trying to figure this out. Three of us had our passports stamped, (although only one of us had paid for it, my other friend and I got them stamped and then when the commotion started we grabbed out passports before they noticed and then the guards forgot to ask us for the money,) one of us did not. The boarder guard actually stole Brian's passport, which I'm pretty sure is a breach of international law, and refused to give it back. Our mini-bus was leaving from Thailand in less than ten minutes so if we were going to do this we'd better make it quick! The three of us jumped into a longboat with our bus driver while Brian walked back up to the Laos office. Since Boarderbitch was too busy watching tv with the volume turned up, he didn't notice Brian casually sneaking into his office and swiping his passport off the desk! Brian then bolted down to the boat and we told the Laos guy let 'er rip! A few of the guards looked up as we sped away giving them the finger but they laughed at us because how could these crazy tourists get into Thailand when one of their passports was in the Laos office? Ha ha ha.....stupid felang!
We had to hurry. If the Laos guards noticed what was going on and called the Thai office we were beyond fucked. We jumped off the boat and ran up to the guards with all our stuff. Brian made a good point that if he never officially entered Laos then he couldn't officially leave either! The bus driver was with us and we told him to tell the Thai guards to please hurry as our bus was about to leave. We were all smiles, very polite, and by some act of god we all manged to clear the customs office in under a couple of minutes. We sprinted into a mini bus that was already to go and after a few minutes when we were sure that we weren't being followed we exchanged high-fives and laughed hysterically when we pictured the Laos Boarderbitch realizing what had happened!
I awoke a few days later with a vicious hangover. I rolled over and told what's-her-name that it was time to hit the road as I'd signed up for a Thai cooking course and hangover be damned I was going to at least make an appearance! Two of my friends had some bad Thai food the night before and compounded with the case of beer they swallowed they informed me that they would do the cooking course the next day. Fine. Pussies. I met up with my buddy Matt who was with two girls and the four of us took a tuk-tuk to the cooking school.
At this point I think it's important that I stress how hungover I was. I was VEEEEEERY hungover! When we arrived, the chef told us that since the market was closed, we'd be doing a vegetable carving course instead. Uh oh. Here I am, barely able to stomach a glass of water, coping with a nasty headache while trying to keep the alcohol sweats and shakes down. And I'm about to work with knives. Eep!
When I pictured a carving class I just assumed that we'd be cutting up cucumbers with a massive butcher's knife. Not so. Instead we were given what looked like a scalpel and told to carve a variety of veggies into something that Michelangelo would have sculpted. I'm not kidding, I think the chef just assumed we all had a degree in advanced neurosurgery.
This was what my dish was supposed to look like. I took a picture of the chef's dish because the area around my cooking station looked like someone had just had a head on collision with a produce truck.
After I had cleaned up the vegetable floor platter it was time to get down to business. First up we were going to make a spicy curry dish. Little did I know that we had to sit there for the next half an hour and actually grind up all the spices into the curry paste. By the end of the half hour, I was sweating profusely, I was covered in curry, I still reeked of booze, and everyone in the classroom was edging away from me ever so slowly. This was turning into a bad day.
Next it was time to cook up the chicken. Now, I don't claim to be the world's best cook but having lived in a house for three years with some of K-Town's best chefs, I figure I've picked up a thing or two. We even had a deepfrier for awhile which is what makes what happened next seem all that more unbelievable. The Chef could see I was having trouble lighting the stove, (truth be told I was having enough trouble just standing up straight,) so he came around and lit my stove. Which was nice of him. Obviously if you just plunked the chicken slices into the bowl they will instantly burn to the sides, hence some sort of lubricant is needed. I looked around and saw a bottle of cooking oil near my work station. Forgetting that the gas was on full blast, I dumped a generous portion of oil into the pan. The oil instantly boiled and promptly shot into the air, rocketing skyward before it came to land on the arm of the girl working next to me. I still think she overreacted but I guess that oil was pretty hot.
Finally we sat down to eat. Holy shit this stuff was spicy!! What they say is true, (it usually is in some form or another,) Thai people really do triple their spice compared with the tourists. I was so hungry I didn't care that after one bite I could see through time and Matt and I polished off both our dishes at record speed.
Time to cook another dish! I forget what this one was but I do remember being slightly concerned at the amount of spicy food I was to contend with that day. We were to cook a total of five dishes over the course of a few hours and combined with all the beer and whiskey/redbull buckets that I had the night before you can guess what resulted. I was sitting there polishing off some soup when all of a sudden I felt something manifesting itself in my lower intestine. That first spicy Thai dish was about to reek havoc so without a word I hobbled to the bathroom. I hurriedly grabbed the side of the thrown and let loose with a toxic substance that came out with the speed of a late night locomotive. For the next ten minutes or so I alternated between crying and turning on the faucet so no one could hear me punishing the toilet. When I finally emerged everyone was really quite and I'm pretty sure they put two and two together when they saw me walking bow-legged while the smell from the bathroom slowly wafted into the kitchen.
When the class was finally over I felt like I was going to puke. I'd eaten more then I ever thought possible and I prayed that the burning sensation in my crotch was the result of my curry fingers touching my penis while peeing and not due to the encounter I had with what's-her-name the night before. I've had better days.
When I finally sobered up the next day, I decided it was time to get some exercise and get some of that touristy crap out of the way. Damian, Brian and I signed up for an all day bike/elephant ride/ white water rafting excursion that proved to be a lot of fun!
Elephant's are awesome!
While elephant riding is really fun, I have to admit that I wasn't all that impressed with the way they were treated. All the elephants have gaping holes in their heads that's covered in some sort of iodine solution. When the elephant stops to eat, the rider takes out a stick with a hook on it and beats the elephant until he keeps going. That might work at home with your wives guys but show some respect, this is an elephant!
The day was capped off with a little whitewater to finish everything off. 'Twas a great time had by all!
