Comrade Tony

Well nearly two weeks later and Mr Tony Writes Again. I've spent the last eight days in the People's Democratic Republic of Laos - my second "people's" dictatorship, after Cuba, and like Cuba it's not a place that puts the internet near the top of its priorities. Damn those Marxists and their modems. So I've waited till now, the Kingdom of Cambodia, before writing.

The republic of the people was a pretty special place. After a month in Thailand I was quite happy to leave, and so crossed the Mekong in the far north to a dirt-poor little village surviving on tourists like me. Spent the next two days floating down the same river to Luang Prabang, a beautiful World Heritage city of French colonial grandeur and extravagant Buddhist architecture, before making my way to Vientiane - probably the most chilled out, liveable capital city that I've ever been to.

But the incredible thing about the place wasn't the scenery or the history or the culture. I think Thailand's probably got more of all of those. It was the people. I'm a jaded old cynic these days, but I couldn't get over how friendly the people were. And this is a one-party state, where if you criticise the government you go to jail, there's a low-level civil war going on across the north of the country, and most rural people (ie most everyone) live on less than $2 a day. If I was them I'd hate tourists, particularly ones who spend most of their time getting drunk, taking magic mushrooms and watching bootleg DVDs in bamboo-neon bars (which covers most all of the tourists). Instead, everyone is really, really nice. The nicest country that I have ever been to.

Maybe the government/ party puts them up to it.

Pretty odd communists too. Shell, that Anglo-Dutch paragon of uber-capitalism, runs most of the filling stations and proudly flys the hammer and sickle; army apparatchiks drive round in flash cars in the capital; healthcare and tertiary education are effectively privatised. But I still had some qualms about travelling there; unlike a few people I met, who (bizarrely) have "boycotted" going to the US but apparently have no problems travelling in a country with one of the worst human rights records in the world. So at least I'm not a hypocrite, eh.


Anyway I have to dash. Next time I'll try to write something more interesting. But just before I go, if you ever wondered what Thai boxing looks like, the show for the tourists is a little bit like this.


(Meanwhile, I see that this blogging business is getting more and more problematic. Maybe I should "start a debate" too...)