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Arriving in the capital of Laos we felt a little like we were back in Bangkok.. very built up and lots of traffic again! We were dropped off in a random street and had no idea where our hostel was, but luckily found it after my ears pricked up at the sound of a British lad who happened to be staying there thankfully! Straight away our hostel came across as a very chilled and sociable place with lots of backpackers coming and going, and we were very enthusiastically greeted by a Vietnamese guy working there called Huan, who was extremely happy to help.... maybe a little too much.
I obviously hadn't had a blonde moment for a while as on arrival it turned out I'd booked us in for the following day instead... DOH!! Luckily there was a double room free so after our long day we settled down for a skype with both families...... during our call with my mum and dad we heard what sounded like mice scurrying above our ceiling (which was wooden planks with every single joint taped up -not leaving us with too much hope!) ...... BUT.... after managing to get off to sleep.... 4 o'clock comes and BANG SPLAT! Me and Billy had THE most horrible awakening - and the initial thought was that it was dead mushed up mice being spat out at us from the air conditioning. What in actual fact happened is that the air con exploded! The thought of it makes us both cringe every time we think about it! Ha.
After our lack of sleep we had a chill out day in the TV room and watched a couple of films then explored the city in the evening... which we weren't that impressed with. There was little in the way of food stalls, shops, restaurants and nightlife, and it took us a while to find a yummy Pad Thai stand after some confusion involving baby shrimps!!
The night market was nothing like the others we had seen in Chiang Mai and Luang Prabang, although it was nice to be alongside the river. We moved into our first dorm the next day since starting our travels, with a pretty cool bunch of people.. French, Australian, Canadian and Swiss. The best thing about Vientiane for me was the COPE centre - which for anyone who hasn't checked it out on the internet, is all to do with UXO's (unexploded ordances/bombs).
During the Vietnam war there were 580,000 bombing missions; many of which happened to fall on Laos in 'free drop' areas, as sometimes the planes would not be able to take undropped bombs back to base. Many of these bombs did not explode - some still haven't - but thousands have, injuring and killing Lao locals. COPE has a team of trained specialists who locate the UXO's using detectors, then mark and detonate the bombs so that they're no longer dangerous. The other side to this amazing centre is their rehabilition service they provide to victims, who have lost limbs and are now disabled. Prosthetics are made and fitted on a daily basis. The exhibition was so interesting and inspiring, and I could have stayed in there for the rest of the day.. The work this centre does is incredible and it really opened our eyes as sadly we didn't know anything about this before coming to Laos.
Temple after temple after temple (there are LOADS here) we decided to check out some of the historic sites that are in the city, including the cultural hall, the presidential palace, the national museum and..... the Pataxai, which is Laos' very own Arc de Triomphe replica! Although not quite finished because of the country's history, it is still a beautiful building and very much like the original. It had a really lovely French feel about the place and was very picturesque seeing the sun set behind it aswell!
Our final day in Vientiane took us 25km away to Buddha Park. Basically what it says on the tin... a park full of Buddha statues which are different shapes and sizes, some impressive, some not so much! It would have been better had there not been a whole load of school kids running around the place.... but one of the young monks came over to talk to us, wanting to learn some English for his homework, which was really interesting! We'd been debating all week whether to get the 24 hour bus journey to Hanoi, or catch a flight instead.... it took us up until the day before to make the decision to wimp out of the bus and fly - best decision ever!! The airport was really nice, straightforward and easy check in, and we landed in Vietnam 50 sweet minutes later..
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