Monday, 30 July 2012

BAN LUNG


The bus was hectic, from 6 am until 7pm I sat at the back sandwiched between the locals, the seats didn’t recline and the floor was covered in garbage and fruit peals.  As soon as I stepped foot on land I got swarmed by people offering places to stay at. I couldn’t even move, there were too many of them. All the foreigners of the bus ended up together, all 6 of us got shoved into one tuk-tuk with all of our luggage. When we got to the hostel, Victoria and Fran, two hilarious English girls realized that their passports and bank cards were missing. Instead of freaking out as expected, they joked about it… if that was me I would have gone crazy. I shared a room with Rosemary, a girl from the states. We played a few games of pool on an extra large pool table and had a few beers before calling it a night.

The next morning Rose and I rented a motorbike and set off to see the landscape and find the Beung Yeak Laom volcanic lake. It is a beautiful turquoise lake in the middle of a mountain, and it was formed hundred of years ago by a volcano. It is 800 meters in diameter and 50 meters deep. The water was refreshing but not cold. We met a couple of people and swam around for a couple of hours. We also met a 16 year old Malaysian girl who invited all of us to go clubbing with her hehe. As we were leaving we also met two really cute kids. They ran up to us and were all laughs and hugs. After lunch we tried to search for some waterfalls but the roads were awful so we just went back to the hostel &had another pool match with the English girls who didn’t have any luck as the tourist police closes on Sundays…



The next morning I had booked a 2 day trek. A guy came to pick me up at 8am. He gave me a hammock and 2 big bottle of water to carry. We drove 30 minutes out of town and stopped in the middle of no where. Out of the bush came a young guy who turned out it be my guide. He was only 20 years old but he knew a lot about the minority people, agriculture and the use of different plants in the forest. He also seemed to know everyone that we passed by. We ran into some people washing a pig by a stream, after talking to them he told me that they were preparing feast in honor of someone who had recently passed away. Later on, we passed by a hut where they were making a box like structure out of bamboo. He explained that someone in that family was sick and they were preparing and offering. Once the box was finished they would kill a chicken and place its heart and liver along with some herbs and offer it to the spirits.
The first couple of hours we were walking up and down rolling hills through small villages along a narrow clay path. In front of each hut they had a vegetable garden and either rice, cashew trees, potatoes or eggplants. Chickens and pigs were running around loose. A few meters after the last hut, the forest begun. Lots of flowers blooming under the shade of large trees. The path was almost non existent. We had lunch by a small creak, and an hour later we arrived at a majestic waterfall in the middle of the jungle. We went for a swim. There were no signs of civilization, not one person around. We climbed to the very top, it was about 20 meters high. It was getting late so we had to continue. If it were up to me we would have camped there.
After an hour walk we arrived to another village where we would spend the night. We set our hammocks in a stilted hut which was the village’s meeting house. When someone had an important announcement they would hit a metal ring 7 times and the village would gather. Bing (the guide) got started on dinner singing his heart out as he fried some eggplant. We had various visitors who came by, stared at me and smiled… we ate on a plastic tarp on the floor but the food was surprisingly delicious. As the sun went down the children gathered outside, running around and shooting each other with bamboo guns. The all played together, younger and older, girls and boys.

 I went to bed early but woke up at 11pm, and I really really had to pee. The only problem was that I had no idea where the toilet was and Bing was sleeping. I walked outside trying to keep quiet. The moon was so bright that I through that there were lights outside. I went around the corner in the shade hoping no one would see me but as I was going to do the deed a massive pig woke up and started running towards me. I booked it back inside… lesson learned.
I woke up the next morning at 6, Bing was already making breakfast, veggies and noodles. We started walking at 8ish and after an hour we stopped at an abandoned hut at the edge of the forest. Bing showed me every day items and traps used by the minority people. When we entered the forest the path disappeared completely. I wondered how he knew where we were going, but we surely made it across. As we left the forest it started raining, I don’t know how to describe it but everything was so calm and beautiful under the rain. As we reached the top of the hill I felt like I was on top of the world.
We arrived at his house by noon and he started preparing lunch with his mom. He told me that she has been around during the Khmer Roughe. He also told me about his family and how his younger sister had been killed by a curse. He said younger children are the targets of curses because their spirits are not as strong. At 2 pm the guy from the hostel came to get me. The roads were slippery and that’s when I had my first motorbike accident. We didn’t fall hard but I was covered in clay.
That last night at Ban Lung was fun; I had drinks with the English girls who had finally managed to get a police report. We watched movies on a massive flat screen TV and we saw a gigantic gecko. 



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