Right this second...

My life right now at 9:05pm on December 4th, 2009:

Reclined as far back as my seat will allow (not that far), sitting next to my blonde-hair-blue-eyed-Kelly Gray-lookalike-isreali friend, Saha, I am about an hour and a half into my 24 hour bus ride from the capital of Laos to the capital of Vietnam and patiently waiting for my sleeping pills to kick in. I am wrapped in two sarongs from the chilly air con, have my sleeping mask ready on my forhead and am sporting my glasses since my contacts were driving me crazy today- just looking like a champ. I have been on at least six buses/minibuses since 10:30am this morning and am now riding an overcrowded local bus that was parked next to a nice and shiny VIP bus at the bus station. Though our tickets say VIP on them, we were assured that the nice bus was not ours and would cost us an additional 230.000 Kip (our original ticket was 170,000) if we wanted an upgrade. We boarded our pathetic looking bus at 5:45 (supposed to leave at 5), only to wait another 1.5 hours as the employees kept walking back and forth to the rear of the bus to do some kind of repairs. With no apologies or explanations, we sat as the bus was sporadically driven about ten feet forward and then backwards and then parked and turned off again (the AC being turned off with the engine). After a few more false starts though, we were off. After we made a few more stops along the way to pick up some oversized pillows, a few more locals and some bikes and sand bags, we are finally out of Vienetiene- only 3ish hours late. Now I sit hoping that the pills hit hard, that the only toddler on the bus that decided to sit in front of me stays quiet, and that the woman sitting in the asile right next to me does not switch sides as she is currently asleep on my neighbor's shoulder. Oh and did I mention that they are playing a movie of some Lao standup comedy and that the speaker is right below my seat??

Please god... Let my sleeping pills hit hard and fast.


My life at 7:24am on December 5th, 2009:

I have no idea how many hours I have left on this bus but I feel a bit releaved to say that we at least made it into Vietnam. Border crossing was...wow. All I can say is that it was an experience that made me both homesick and so grateful for the functionality of our country. After our 4 hour stopover to sleep on the bus, we reached the border rather quickly. Were told to get off and pointed in the direction of the passport office we had to go to. It's about 6:30am, foggy and slightly raining. Get into the office after a little hike in the rain and enter into the building which apparently has no elecricity as the place is lit up by candles. Ask a few Aussies standing in a corner what I'm supposed to do. They tell me to drop my passport at that free-for-all at tgat window and then pick it up at that one, pointing to the next window over. There is no line, just a bunch of stinky people trying to shove their way into one of the three departure windows. I follow suit, keep a tight hold on my purse, push and shove, drop it off and try to get out of the mob with the least amount of gropping as possible. Then wait at the back of the next mob and listen for my name. There is only one window here and there is a huge group outside of it and I'm done touching and being touched. Get my 10,000 Kip ready and hand it over as some Asian lady calls out 'meegan from Texas?'. Done and done there. Don't know where our bus is but waived on by the friendly Vietnamese soilders and assume they are further up the hill. We don't see anything at all but the soilders just keep waving in that direction so we go. Finally find our bus after another good walk in the misty rain and are told to find our bags which are unloaded onto the ground and to go inside. Have to fill out some more paperwork, pay a dollars worth of dong I just exchanged my Kip for, wait again for my name to be called and then sent through an exray machine with my bag, temperature body reader thing and one last check before heading out again. Our bus moved again so continued to walk and found it again. Get on to discover my shoulder bag is gone... Shit! This has my copies of my passport and credit cards, my lonely planet, my camera cards, camera charger, etc all in it. I flip out. I'm one or the first back so i start asking our drivers who just look at me and shrug. I go back on and start searching when another employee knocks on the window and has my bag with three others that were apparently unloaded with our big bags and were not picked up- I had assumed he just got the ones under the bus... Anyways, everything was in it and I am just spent since that. After little sleep, way too much closeness and that shifty border experience, I would really enjoy a shower and a proper breakfast and maybe a quick nap in my own bed...