The Voss Dufour World Tour

The ride turned out to be 26 hours long, after being told it was 18. I have been on a bus for 24 hours before. It wasn’t that bad. It’s just a matter of expectation and managing it. We were all going stir crazy at about hour 18 and wanted off that bus so badly.

Sleeping on the bus was, well better than trying to sleep on the previous buses we had  been on. We drove until about 1am at which point we pulled into a parking lot and sat for about 4 hours. With the bus turned off. This meant no A/C, turning our bus into an oven so sleep came and went for me. I woke around 6am in a very sweaty state, feeling not too tired, but not too rested,,  somewhere in the middle. Then at 6:30am or so the lights and music came on as we began again on our trip. Pretty much everyone was trying to sleep at this point so it wasn’t good timing. Around 7:30am, we arrived at the Laos-Vietnam border which apparently opened at 8am. We were about the 5th tour bus in line to cross and people were just milling around.

So James and I got off to stretch our legs and check out the situation, wandering into the Laos departure checkpoint office. The Post Office in Mattapoisett is more organized and secure than this place. It was a long corridor about 30 or so feet long, very drab inside and poor lighting. We were the only foreigners in the building surrounded by a handful of Laos people. Until they started to gather in droves.

Apparently there are a couple methods of getting your passport stamp when leaving Laos. The first one  involves pushing your way thru a crowd from 1-4 people deep who are in front of some sort of window. Most likely you have more than one passport in your hand (your fellow passengers’?) and a wad of cash which, as you elbow your way to the front of the line, gets thrust in the open window, into the face of an Immigration officer. The other option is similar except your end destination is the open door next to the immigration officer and instead of throwing the passports thru the window, you hang on the side of the door frame, swinging into the office with official documents and cash in hand. Those are your two options.

But once your passport is in front of an Immigration Official, that doesn’t mean you sit back and wait for them to call your name or anything once you get stamped. Oh no. Every couple minutes, you push your way back thru the crowd (who is also trying to push their passport thru the window) and see if your passport has moved from wherever you left it. Once you find it (how they do that is beyond me as there is no way to distinguish…..but I digress) you can either pick it up and relocate it on the counter, yell at the Immigration officer or shove it further into their face.

As if that’s not funny enough to watch, the counter and window are a little below neck height of an average Laos person . This  forces them to stand on their toes as they are at the counter if they want to see anything. How did that happen? I would assume that someone from Laos built the counter for the Laos people…Oh well. There I go trying to make sense of something in the 3rd world.

So we stood at the back, or well pushed to the back of the line, for a bit taking this all in. Was there a window for foreigners? Was there a drop off and pick up window? Was there any order? Turns out there wasn’t, so we joined in. This is where it helps to have a tall boyfriend, especially when he becomes really tall next to the locals

James gathered the passports of the four of us and easily strode his way to the front and put them thru the window. They immediately got shoved to the side by the Immigration guy. Perhaps it was because we were foreigners you might wonder; except that other non-locals were leaving their passports here, getting stamped and getting their passports back. Hmm….

We tried the tactic of rearranging them. That didn’t work either as other passports got piled on top of ours while other people got theirs processed. Eventually it just took lots of standing around and waiting and we eventually got our stamps, the last four in the corridor. Now we had to walk 10 mins to Vietnam and get processed on that side. Not as chaotic, but still leaving a lot to be desired in the infrastructure and organization department

All the time, we are getting hustled by the bus workers back towards the bus. As if it’s our fault we got processed last after being the first there! Eventually we made it to the bus and were on our way again.

But only for a couple hours until for some reason, which no one knows, we stopped by the side of the road at a bridge for 2 hours. There appeared to be a traffic jam on the bridge and we happened to be on the other side of the road ie not on the right hand side with the proper flow of traffic, but along the left side. Now, to drive on the other side of the road isn’t a big deal, but nobody could figure out why we were parked there. Our bus driver disappeared and then police arrived and he spent the time with them. We all had our ideas about what happenned–he hit a moto, a pedestrian, they were arresting him, the list went on. Granted he was driving like a bat out of hell and using the horn incessantly.

Finally we got back on the road, only to stop for another 30 minutes on the side of the road with cop cars next to us. All this just past a sign saying 80 km (~50 miles) to Hanoi, all of us counting down until we were off the bus.

When we did get on the road, it was as if the driver wanted to make up for lost time. He drove like a mad man, pretty much laying on the horn for about 45 of every 60 seconds, making for a very chaotic ride.

I view that ride as a lost day of my life I will never get back!

When booking tickets we were told the bus had beds. Yes, beds. Of course being told many many things about other bus experiences that didn’t come to fruition, I didn’t hold my breath. How can a bus have beds? Well believe me when I tell you that they can and they do.

Promptly as told we were at our guesthouse at 5pm for our transfer to the bus station. There were 7 of us from this particular guesthouse, getting to know each other as we waited. 5pm came and went. As did 5:15 and 5:30. At one point, a young woman was picked up by a minivan, saying her goodbyes to friends at our guesthouse who told us she was also going to Hanoi. Hmm, but I didn’t think much of it because trying to inject common sense into things in the third world just isn’t worth the fustration.  Then around 5:40pm, a tuk tuk,, with 4 other people in it, swings by and loads up our luggage. We take off for a tour around town, picking up 4 others in the process. Yes we are now 15 or so people, all with big backpacks jammed into a tuk tuk. But that’s how they roll in SE Asia.

We drop some guy off at one bus station, but not ours. Apparently he’s headed to Bangkok. 15 minutes later, we swing into a side alley road where there is a big greyhound type bus waiting for 3 of our passengers. After all this, we hit the road again, wondering when we will arrive at our bus station. Then I recognize where we are, pretty much a couple blocks over from where we were picked up. Perhaps not the most efficient system, but to each their own. Kyra and I look at each other and raise our eyebrows wondering what’s going on. So eventually, close to an hour after pick up, we pull into a bus terminal, to be greeted by the young woman that was picked up from our guesthouse earlier that evening.

Before getting off the tuk tuk, we exchange our paper tickets for “proper” tickets, complete with seat or bed assignments. When our reservations were made, we were told that we were all together. Riiiiiiiiiight. Our seats didn’t seem to indicate that, but we figured we would sort it out on the bus. Why try and explain that to some guy who didn’t speak English and just stared at you as if you had 12 eyes?

Turns out our bus departure time was 7pm and about 20 minutes before, we board, but only 3 at a time, removing our shoes and

putting them in a bag as soon as we stepped onto the first step of the bus. I am not really sure how to describe the bed/seat arrangement, but will try.

There are 3 rows, going down the length of the bus. Each “seat” is about 5 1/2 feet long (I know sbecause I fit into it with no problem! Yay for being short!  The head and back part of your seat can go up and down like a beach chair and your feet, from the knees down fit under the head and back part of the seat/bed in front of you. In between some of the beds, is an attached metal shelf converted into a bed with the placement of a padded “mattress.” Those people miss out on the moveable head and back part. Oh, and there are people whose seats are 3 inches off the floor and then an upper bunk, about 5 feet up. An efficient use of space, but bummer if you are short.

Upon boarding, we were directed to our assigned seats. Turns out Kyra, Matthijs and James were in the middle section of the bus while I was in the very back next to the toilet, which smelled just as bus toilets do when the door opens up. Like petunias. The bus is split, about half Laos people and half foreigners like us. Well, at least the top bunks are as I can’t see down below.  I caught the attention of one bus guy, pointed to my ticket, indicated the bunk next to James and said some basic words in English like “friends, boyfriend etc” hoping to get my point across. He stared at me and then shook his head in a manner that indicated no-way-will-I-jump-into-that-burning-fire-of-poisinous-gases-with-you. One English guy didn’t like his bottom bunk, complaining how he couldn’t stretch out, so he moved into the open bed next to James where I was eyeing to move.

Immediately 2 Laos men descended on him, yelling at him in Laos and furiously pointing to his original bunk, probably demanding he moved back, but seeing as how none of us spoke Laos, we can only hazard a guess. Words fail me on how to truly convey the intensity of the yelling and their anger that he had moved. I haven’t truly been yelled at much in my life, much less in another language, but I would imagine that to be yelled at in a Romance Language, well it might be possible to suss a couple words out, perhaps communicate your point. But not in Laos. No way shape or form.  Watching this unfold was quite entertaining and made me think my chances of moving were diminishing.

Then some other bus guy came all the way to the back of the bus and yelled and pointed at me. Again, seeing as how I don’t understand Laos I had no idea what he wanted or why his anger was being directed at me. Turns out, he wasn’t angry, or perhaps he was, but he was just yelling for someone to grab the mattresses which were located behind my seat. So another Laos bus guy climbed up the ladder and pretty much onto my lap. Again, keep in mind, I still didn’t know what was going on at this point. I am kinda moving out of the way, but without a place to go as I have two people sitting, or laying, directly to my left, about 1.5 inches from me.

He then starts to reach under me and as I didn’t want to get groped by a Laos guy, I moved onto the lap of the nice young English woman next to me. The bus guy starts to pull mattresses out from behind us and toss them forward. They hit our heads as he swings them out and knock the guy in front of me. There were about 8 mattresses. We couldn’t escape their trajectory.

Meanwhile as all this is going on, 2 people, on separate occasions,, walk to the back to use the bathroom. Another Laos bus guy comes back, again, yells at them in Laos (Prior to this, I wouldn’t think the Laos people were so into yelling….what did I know.) and points to the door, with an angry shake of the head. As if that’s to indicate why they couldn’t use it. Each woman looks mystified and tries to explain that they really need to go. To which the Laos guy again yells, shakes his head and points to the door. The women look at me, shrug and walk back. (Eventually the bathroom was opened for business. Thank god.)

So that brings you up to speed. I didn’t get to move. The guy who is next to James got to stay there. That’s what I get for playing  by the rules I guess. Next time, I will just have to throw my weight around.  I hope the rest of the trip is eventful, but do know that if it isn’t, you will have a first hand play by play of whatever goes down!