Thakhaek is a town about 5 hours away from Vientiane by car. There are buildings from the French colonial period standing along the Mekong River. But unfortunately, with no repairing, they have been left to fall into decay. Looking at the modern concrete buildings across the river on the Thai side, I had a dinner at a restaurant by the river. There is a Thai comedy show on the TV. It is very similar to a TV show in Japan. I heard that Lao TV broadcasting cannot be received in Thakhaek. What they can watch is only the Thai broadcast.

In 6 hours from there, by going through an unbelievably bad road, which made me hit my head several times against the ceiling of the car, at one point on the way, I arrived in Pakse, a city with the second largest population after Vientiane in Laos. I crossed a bridge constructed by ODA from Japan. I like taking a walk in a new place, but Laotian people do not stroll about a town. They take either an automobile or a bicycle. At this time also, my husband and I were the only ones walking on the bridge. I remember that some young Laotians passing by us by car looked to be amazed to see us walking.

On the following day, we crossed that bridge, went 40km on a mountain road, and arrived at the border to go into Thailand. Both Thai and Laotian people were crossing the border to go into either country only by pulling or pushing a simple bamboo-made fence even without having their IDs checked. As we had a Laotian government official with us, we could pass on without documents. On the Lao side, there was a middle-aged woman who seemed to be farmer sitting down on the street, and selling some beautiful birds that looked like parakeets in a cage. Having a mat spread, another woman was selling fresh thin bamboo shoots from the mountain. And on the Thai side, lots of neat tented stalls were standing side by side. There was a shop selling cooked food, vegetables, and fruits, and another selling clothes. There also was a toy shop, and a shop selling music tapes as well. I heard that the Lao government has established a rule to limit the amount of money for shopping to be about 200 yen each time in order to suppress Laotians from going to buy things in Thailand. But with the fact that it is such an easy access, Thai products are better both in quality and variety, and, more important, the prices are low, it must be just impossible to restrain people from shopping there. It is said that, considering smuggling of fruits/vegetables from Thailand as an obstruction of the nation's financial income, the Government has been exercising strict control over smuggling. This must be such a trouble. It seems to me that the Mekong River, which divides Thailand and Laos, is very long, and that it is not difficult at all to row out a small boat into the river without making noise.

Then we went to the Bolovens Plateau on the next day. Such trees as coffee, gum, and bananas used to be cultivated here during the French colonial period, but they were neglected after the independence of Laos. Yet, recently, people resumed cultivation of coffee trees, and are shipping delicious products out to France now. I have expected to see a vast coffee field like the one printed on a coffee package, but what I actually saw there was coffee trees planted casually around a Laotian stilt house. There were green, hard-looking coffee beans hanging down on the trees. They must be pretty when they turn red.

Going about 2 hours to the south from Pakse, we went to see the Khone Falls. I heard that the Mekong River around this point is forking into several rivers, and dotted with a large number of islands. It is said that there are as many as about 4,000 islands, and waterfalls in a variety of sizes are dropping down between them. The Khone Falls is particularly large among them. Though it was the lower reaches of the river, the flow was extremely violent. As it was the rainy season, we have been having heavy rainfalls, making the waterfall streaming down furiously with spray. Under the whirling stream, there were large crags. It must be due to this group of waterfalls that Laotian people were barred their ways, and could not go out to the sea.

In Champasak close by, there is a temple called Wat Phu, which is said to be older than Angkor Vat. You have to take a ferryboat to cross the Mekong River to get there. It was no surprise that there was no timetable, but villagers at the ferry did not even know how many trips the boat would make each day. It seemed that a boat would not depart until it was loaded with as many automobiles, people, and goods as possible. In addition, as it was the time of the year when the river would be flowing high, the number of ferries seemed to be less than usual. Unfortunately, since we did not have enough time to spare for such a leisurely activity this time, we gave up the idea of visiting the temple. I am looking forward to going there the next time.

Finally, we went to Savannakhet. As there was no sightseeing spot in particular, we decided to go to the largest market of the town. There were lots of Vietnamese products. There also were many people from Vietnam. And what we often saw there were homosexual boys. They were wearing makeup and having long hair, and some were with ponytails as well. But it was obvious that they were boys. I heard that there was a restaurant managed only by gays in the town.

I saw something very surprising in this town. It was just when I happened to pass by a stall serving buckwheat noodles. A woman of the noodle shop suddenly yelled in a startling loud voice, and threw the noodles in a bowl on the table away to the street in front of the stall. And, with even louder voice, she cried "Vietnam...?" and flung money down onto the street. I caught a glimpse of a young lady leaving there in a fluster. The woman seemed to be unable to calm down that she kept grumbling for a while. But other people at the shop and shoppers were acting as if nothing has happened. Nobody took notice of the money on the street. Being full of curiosity and thinking "Who is going to do what with the money...?" I stayed there for a while, but the money was still left intact in the middle of the street. However, as I went to see some other places and came back, it was no longer there. Since I began living in Laos, I have never seen someone exploding his/her emotion so strongly like that. I was very astonished. And at the same time, I somehow felt a bit relieved as well.

Translated by Maiko Noda