North to Phongsali
by Paul Greening

Please read this first

Unfit, unprepared, poorly equipped, lacking information, flagging enthusiasm, and giardia: a typical start to one of my trips. As far as I knew, no one had ever cycled from Luang Phabang in Northern Laos to Phongsali up near the Chinese border -- probably because there are no roads.

Before I left Laos' capital city, Vientiane, I got lots of advice from the Australian doctor treating me for the amoeba who had been enjoying the hospitality of my intestines. "Don't go! There's no law and order up there... it's wild country... there are bandits... there's no medical care." Paranoia? Unfortunately not. Bandit attacks are common and rumour says they have rocket launchers. I could already hear them sniggering and drawing straws as I wobbled into view.

The 15 minutes to Vientiane airport was the easiest part of the trip, so that on arrival in Luang Phabang I felt quite pleased with myself. I tinkered with the bike for a few days to delay departure but eventually left, heading north. Well, actually west. But I thought it was north.

I cycled powerfully through the town to impress the locals, and rested on the outskirts. Ten minutes further on, my left pedal fell off -- a fortunate twist of fate, as it happened, as it meant that I met a helpful passing local.

"Hello," he said. "Where are you going?"

"North to Phongsali."

"No you're not: you're going west to the airport."

Back en route, the road soon deteriorated into a dirt track. The potholes grew larger, the dust thicker, my back wheel spun and, dripping in sweat, I pushed the bike up hills and struggled through surprised grasshouse villages.

By sunset, when I could have been sitting with a cold beer overlooking the Mekong River in Luang Phabang, I was hot, caked in dust and exhausted somewhere in Northern Laos with only biscuits to eat. Almost every nut was loose on the bike and every muscle hurt. In my tent the cold kept me awake... I had decided that a sleeping bag was excess weight.

Cold, stiff and tired, I rose and left at dawn. I passed saffron-robed monks smiling and waving. Villagers either grinned and pointed or stared open-mouthed. I fell off frequently and a branch sprang up to spear me between the toes, adding an infected wound to my bruises.

With relief I arrived in Nambak, a town constructed of grass and bamboo with the odd tin roof. There was also a hotel, a large wooden building overlooking the town. Surprisingly it had buckets of cold water, a toilet, mosquito nets and not too many rats. That evening, at a salubrious wooden bench in one of Nambak's three noodle shops, I consumed three bowls of rice noodles with dubious meat and raw vegetables.

The town died at six. The cockerels did not. Anticipating dawn by three hours, they woke me at 3am. Later that morning I set off on a Chinese-built road. (People say the Chinese built their roads in Laos strong enough for tanks just in case.) There was a tribal village on every hill. Most were Hmong, famous as big opium producers and for aggression and banditry.

Because it was the time of the opium harvest, I had been warned they would be particularly hostile. Just what I needed. As I battle dup hills, hordes would charge out and surround me. But rather than attacking, some stared, young girls giggled, boys ran beside my bike laughing, old women in black turbans chuckled and men smiled, gesturing for me to stop and rest. I stopped occasionally to chat to hunters carrying long-barrelled home-made guns. Their gunpowder is also home-made: saltpetre, chilli, and sticky rice are some FO the ingredients. Missing eyes are common.

Bends at the bottom of hills concealed potholes, herds of water buffalo and children, of which I hit only the potholes. However, I was careering down one hill when a child did not move. My brakes failed. I swerved and the child moved the same way. Parents screeched. My heart sank. I missed him: one moment he was under my wheel and next he was over my shoulder, with his mother shouting and smacking him in relief.

Muang Xai, a provincial capital, has one dusty street and no architecture of note. However, it has a large Chinese population -- meaning good food and a market. I spent a few days not eating noodle soup, watching tribal people watching me in the market and making excuses not to leave. One of my better excuses was not knowing the way to Phongsali. The only road is through China and I did not have a visa. A man in the market told me of another road: "Well, not really a road. There will be a road in two years, I think. They are starting to build it."

The first 60km were not bad, in that mud in the potholes cushioned my falls. I asked locals the way to Phongsali: eventually, a man, shaking his head and frowning, pointed to a dirt track heading north beside a stream.

I took it. The stream dribbled past, hills rolled north in the heat haze and the track was a joke. I was investigating a burnt-out shelter in a poppy field when voices from over the next ridge startled me. Afraid I might be taken for CIA, I quickly cycled on. At the top of the ridge I came face-to-face with five military-looking men with semiautomatic weapons and suspicious packages wrapped in banana leaves. No warmth: their eyes showed surprise quickly changing to hostility. I shouted "Sabadee, sabadee, sabadee" ("Pleased to meet you," sort of) and shot down the ridge before they could decide what to do.

In contrast, shy tribal women stood at a safe distance until I passed. Striped Hmong (hill people who wear mainly striped clothing), with baskets on their backs stacked with vegetables or wood, stared or turned their backs until I passed. I noticed the characteristic head-dresses of the Akha people, another hill group. Teenage boys spotted me and came down to the track to wait to see me. Once, about 30 people just stared in silence as I drew near and younger children ran way. I greeted them in Lao and smiled a great deal while thinking only of food and a warm place to sleep.

A tall likely lad with a raucous laugh came down to talk to me. Displaying a ridiculous lack of subtlety, I asked if I could stay in the next village. "Stay here," was the reply I had hoped for. With lots of excited kids pushing my bike I climbed up to the village. Then my friend disappeared and I found myself standing in the middle of the village with most of the tribe watching. I asked a man, "Where can I sleep?"

"Here," he replied without hesitation, and led me to his house. He gave me water to drink and wash, put my bike securely in the corner of his one-roomed bamboo house and shared his food with me.

People returning from their fields came to observe me. "Where are you from?" they asked. "England," I replied.

"Are you Thai?" was their next question. Luckily the chief, a sickly, intelligent man, arrived and saved me from a difficult geography lesson.

He invited me to a wedding ceremony in his house. I sat next to him with the elders on a platform. Rice spirit was plentiful and disgusting and as a guest I was plied with the best food: large chunks of pig fat and bowls of fresh, spiced, congealed pig blood, which was surprisingly good. We ate and drank late into the night until the rice whisky became almost palatable. Then the opium came out. Refusing, I watched a couple of old men smoke before retiring to a warm, dirty bed.

In the morning I was awakened by a group of children watching me from the end of the bed. After finding a quiet place just outside the village to relieve myself, and supply a couple of dogs and a pig with a late breakfast, I sat and watched the village in the early morning mist. Sacred gates elaborately decorated with charms to ward off evil spirits guarded each end of the village. From one gate a dog's head snarled at evil spirits. Human sexuality also frightens spirits, so next to the gates were statues of small males and large females with exaggerated genitals, copulating. The famous giant Akha swing, quiet and mysterious in the half light, dominated the village. So, with some rice and chilli wrapped in banana leaf, I sadly left.

A muddy churned-up track followed heavy road-building machinery. Chinese road crews speaking neither English nor Lao waved and even cheered when I dragged the bike over particularly large mounds of earth. Lines of Akha women wearing silver head-dresses were carrying baskets cautiously past yellow bulldozers. Nine hours of mud and sweat brought dust but no village. I stopped at Chinese road camps but everyone was already drunk.

It was dark, and I and my head torch were both fading, when I finally found a more welcoming camp. A Chinese man shrugged and gestured for me to sit. A pint of tea in a jam jar arrived. Then to my delight he rubbed his stomach and pointed to his mouth.

From nowhere came soup, rice, vegetables and meat dishes with some strong white spirit to aid digestion. I could have cried. Using the few words of English one man spoke, I found they had heard of England and a few Western countries but had never met a Westerner. Eventually he said, "You bed," pointing to an open bamboo platform. I shared their communal bed under a thick quilt.

In the cold of early morning he said, "Goodbye, my England friend."

"Goodbye, my China friend," I replied, shaking a young calloused hand.

Another day of mud and I joined the road from China. The junction was not exactly a hub of trade and industry, but the town did boast a few wooden shops and of course a noodle shop. It was dark as I struggled into Phongsali, capital of the most northern province of Laos. I shuffled into the hotel, dirty and exhausted. The owner did not even look up from her dinner. I asked for a room three times before she sighed impatiently and nodded for a girl to show me a dirty room of unwashed sheets and rat droppings. I bathed outside with cold water from a tank in the dark and ate an unpleasant meal. As usual, I was left grasping memories in the anticlimax of arrival. I wished myself back with the Akha.