right outside the lazy gate of winters summer home

MY NEW RENTAL HOME IN LUANG KAO, CHAMPASAK PROVINCE, LAO

      I departed Bangkok, early one morning, and headed to southern Lao. I spent the day traveling by taxi, express train, another taxi, international bus, and finally, saam-laaw (motorcycle with sidecar), to my favorite guesthouse in Pakse, Lao. A long fourteen hour day, but I made it in time to get the last available bed in the dorm room of the Nang Noi guesthouse. Here, I met a man from Mexico, and a man from Brazil, and we went off to my favorite Pakse restaurant, Dao Linh, where we had dinner with two French women. The next day, I got my own room, and settled into Pakse to celebrate my 50^th birthday. I met a woman from Slovenia, and after days wandering around Pakse, we walked out to my friends house, who was throwing me a birthday party. We ate and drank with many foreigners working for various NGO’s in the area, a few living in Pakse, the rest moving on after their contracts expire. We returned to Pakse around midnight, and the fireworks started lighting the sky. My birthday was the same day as the Chinese new year and Vietnamese new year, and the next few days, I just made into a longer birthday celebration.

     Early one morning, I took a boat from Pakse downriver to Champasak, my choice of town’s to settle. I got a room at my favorite Champasak guesthouse, Vong Paseud, and began my house search. That first day, I looked at my future rental, but it was the first place I looked at and I wanted to compare others houses and prices. My guesthouse owner took me to look at various rentals, and after five days looking at eight houses, I chose the first place to rent. The house is located a bit south of Champasak in the village of Ban Vat Luang Kao. This small town is the subject of archaeological restoration, as it is the ancient city of nearby Wat Phou, a Khmer religious complex which predates Angkor Wat in Cambodia. Luang Kao, about 1500 years ago, was the capital of the Mon-Khmer Chenla kingdom. Little remains of this original city, but I am thrilled to be able to live here!

     My rental house is owned by Simone, a spry 85 year old Lao woman who spent many years living in France. The house had been empty for years, and needed a good cleaning. I was willing to clean and furnish the place, but while we were working out the financial details, Simone had the place cleaned top to bottom, and furnished. I now had a home with beds, bedding, tables, chairs, fridge/freezer, propane stove, water pump for the well, shower, and toilet. Everything was ready for an easy move-in! The downstairs is one big room, with tiled floor, and plenty of windows with wooden shutters. There is an attached kitchen and bathroom out back, that looks out into a big back and side yard. Upstairs are two rooms, with enough windows to allow a good breeze throughout the day and night. I like the tile-floored front porch, where I can watch the world ease by. It is still winter, yet is 30-40 degrees Celcius (90-100 F) during the day, and I can sit on my porch and look through the lazy gate of my winter’s summer home!!!