Leaving Phapoun Mai Village

Following dinner, Julie, Hanas, our guide and I left the village chief to console his poor mother over the death of her horse.  As previously planned, we dropped in on the three school teachers for a second round of food.  After visiting the school, we'd gotten to know them a little bit.  There was the young lady who had only been in the village for a few weeks (and was still learning the local dialect), the strict woman who had scared me more than she'd scared her students, and a middle-aged man who had joined us when we dropped all the presents off at the villagers' homes.

I remembered our trek to the village earlier that day, when our guide had been catching all those jungle spiders.  Sure enough, he wasn't kidding - the spiders were right there, cooked and ready to eat.  Julie and the strict teacher had spent the late afternoon plucking their legs off, throwing their bodies in the pan, and adding a bit of salt and seasoning to them.

Yummy village food

Complementing the jungle spiders were grasshoppers.  We also had bean salads, a kind of spicy fish soup, and the middle bowl contains what I think was a kind of mashed fish salad.  All of this was in addition to another serving of rice and more rice wine.  I was a particular fan of the grasshoppers.  The spiders tasted okay, though strangely mushy.

Jungle spider on rice...

Although the flow of conversation was stunted due to the constant need for translation, it was more relaxed and enjoyable than our dinner in the village chief's home (not that that was formal by any stretch of the imagination...).  It turns out the strict teacher spoke a bit of Thai, thanks to her exposure to Thai TV back when she lived in town.  Despite her terrifying demeanor towards her students earlier (which, given the circumstances, had been necessary - and my fault), she was extremely friendly and we were able to chat without translation until both of us ran out of Thai.

When we left at about 8:30pm, the rest of the village was asleep.  Darkness had long since fallen, and the farmers' body clocks were synchronised with the sun.  It felt so late; within moments, I was asleep too.

As expected, we were up at sunrise.  I remembered about the village's lack of a toilet, and ventured into some undergrowth to take a leak.  I wasn't planning on being followed...

The friendly pigs forced me further and further away from the village for some privacy

I wandered the village with Hanas, taking photos.  Occasionally lazy clouds would stroke the hillside and plunge everything into fog, adding to the photogenic magic of this rare location.

Drifting clouds

Now you see me...

The smaller kids playing

No one was the least bit concerned about this bull

All the village kids love this bull

At the base of the village, most of the kids were playing a game with two sticks.  Setting one stick on the ground horizontally, they would then use the other stick to flick it into the air.  Everyone was taking it in turns and there seemed to be some kind of target, measured by steps to the stick, but I wasn't able to figure it all out.  They were all having incredible fun, though.  Remembering how wary the kids had been of my camera the day before, I decided to keep it in my pocket this time.

Then it was time to leave.  Our tour guide bought a present for his mother off one of the villagers - a live chicken.  He put it in this plastic bag and proceeded to carry it through the jungle all the way home.

There's a living chicken in that bag...

Last glimpse of the village

We took a different route for most of the trek back to Boun Neua, cutting through creepy-crawly jungle and rice paddies guarded by buffalo.

Phongsali is known for its "Sea of Clouds"

Creepy crawly

Rice fields

Buffalo guardian

It was early afternoon when Julie, Hanas and I made it back to our guesthouse, and we still had some exploring to do.  A couple of hours later, we headed out to see one of Boun Neua's local markets, and it was one of the smallest markets I've ever seen.  There were only half a dozen or so merchants - though granted, it was mid- to late morning by this time.  We picked up some kind of sweet potato-filled buns from the astonished (though friendly) locals, who were probably wondering why foreigners had come to their market, before finding some rice paddies to march through.

Julie and Hanas in the rice paddy

Then we headed towards the main road, where I bumped into a familiar face.

It turns out that Silvio, the Canadian who had accompanied me on The Bus From Hell, had also decided that it was best to take the plane south and avoid that terrible bus.  It's hard to believe that bus ride had only been three days earlier.  I felt like so much had happened since then.

This is when Silvio filled me in on the details of the bus accident that I was too sick at the time to absorb - most importantly that both of the men on the motorbike that had slammed into the side of the bus had survived.  You can imagine my relief at hearing this news, after days of not knowing.

Silvio, Julie, Hanas and I wandered around town and eventually had dinner together at a roadside stall.  My few words of half-Thai-half-Lao assisted the process of ordering food from the smiling young lady, as well as a bit of friendly small talk to smooth over the holes in my mesh of language.  Her food was delicious, and we all agreed that her noodle wraps (for lack of a better term) were amazing.  Then Silvio returned to his guesthouse, and Julie, Hanas and I returned to ours.

We would all meet up just one more time - the next day, for our flight south.

Sunset in Boun Neua

Another adventure ends...

The sun was intent on making everything look extra beautiful before the day ended, but as sad as I was to see this chapter of my travels nearing an end, my heart was brimming with happiness and contentment at the places I'd seen and the people I'd met.

Yes, the bus ride there had been terrible.  But my experiences in Phongsali Province were beyond worth it.