This could be heaven or this could be hell.

On the front cover of today’s Vientiane Times is the news: End Of Buddhist Lent, A Time For Celebrations!

So it’s official. People can get drunk again. Riding through the city has become a labyrinth of party to party instead of street to street and path to path. Everywhere you go people are dancing, singing into microphones, setting off firecrackers and drinking. And drinking.

And drinking.

And driving.

It is also the season of the boat races on the Mekong. The entire country closes down for two days for the boat races. I’m sure it’s really exciting and the boats are surely very colourful, but please don’t expect and photos from me: I don’t exactly suffer from enochlophobia but I am increasingly finding crowds and official celebrations to be unpleasant.

It is nice, though, to awaken to blue skies and watch as the rains become rarer. In one month the city will be scorched again, red and thirsty, and I will miss those tropical storms but in one month it will be snowing in Canada, and I do love a consolation prize.

Marie-Do and I took advantage of a lull to go biking along the Mekong today; from Kilometer Eight up to Kilometer Four to pick the kids up from the École Hoffet. On the way we stopped in a few temples and enjoyed meeting an American Lao who has come back to the Motherland to do his stint in the monastery.

We also fell upon this wonderful fresco of Lao heaven and hell. You’ll notice that the folk in heaven are not just counting American dollars, they’re counting Ben Franklins! The folk in hell come complete with three dimensions and chains, handcuffs and a comic book demon who looks like he’s saying, “Holy Anathema, Batman, look who’s not fornicating anymore!”

Spring is indeed in the air.

Yom Kippur in Chiang Mai

I needed a break and thanks to the Hebrew calendar I got one. I am sick and tired of going to Bangkok for the fast, although I have a warm spot in my heart for Chabad Bangkok and R. Nehemia. But I just couldn’t take the traffic and the pollution again this year, so I decided to fly to Chaing Mai instead.

The Udan Thani airport does not have the charm of small provincial airports I have come to love, that miniature copy status that makes small airports so cool. But you do have a wonderful sense of adventure when instead of being shuttled to your aircraft in a bus, you walk out onto the runway. The airplane has propellers and looks more like a big insect than a supersonic half-way-across-the-globe-streamlined affair. Still, as you climb the stairs you hope that the same care was given to this little bumblebee as was to the great transcontinental eagles.

The flight to Chaing Mai takes about an hour and a half. On-flight refreshments are nuts and water – perfect for the land of elephants!

Placing my trust in the Guide du Routard I had reserved a room in thankless Wiriya House. 600 bhat for a room with a one speed air-conditioner and you have to pay for non-functioning internet to boot! In the morning, the sleepy guys downstairs had no idea about coffee or breakfast and could only say, in reference to their boss, “Madame No!”

I walked down to the Israeli quarter to check out the Chabad house and see if a closer alternative existed and there I met the kind of travel agent you dream of. Israel Yehoshua is a problem solver: if you’re late he can turn back the clock and if you’re early he can make the extra time worthwhile. His staff is wonderful and friendly. His agency is called Israel 669, 189/14 Changklan Road Phone number is 053-820902, cell number 087-1841642 and if you’re calling from Israel or have an Israeli phone in Thailand call 039-707333.

He booked me into a splendid hotel just around the corner from there for only 700 Bhat, internet included.

Yom Kippur was Yom Kippur. You fast and feel a little hungry for a while but that soon wears off as the importance of the day hits you. Moments of reflection and spiritual accounting give way to the ecstasy of the moment. The Rabbi was not feeling too well the day I met him but he was heroic on Yom Kippur. Also, as always, it is a pleasure to mix with Israelis again, speak the language and revisit through memory the places of my youth. I met a young singer-composer from my old neighbourhood of Nachlaot נחלאות in Jerusalem and together we spent hours mind-walking up and down the white stone streets and through the courtyards of that wonderful quarter. The village wells, stone walls and vaulted windows came alive for me, the old women bringing you chicken soup when you get sick, the marvellous kube restaurant on Agrippas Street, the way the water would evaporate off the Street of Steps רחוב המדרגות after a late spring rain sending a ghostly sheet of white steam into the blue vibrant sky. Further on the cries and pulls of Machaneh Yehuda Market שוק מחנה יהודה . We were locked into the sweetness of it, the fraternity of it.

Chiang Mai also has a large French community and the day after the fast I had a delicious magret de canard at La Terrasse, 59/5 Loi Kroh Rd. Washed down with a carafe of red from the South of France and Jean’s pommes de terre sautées, it was worth fasting for.

Another wonderful thing for a weekend in Chiang Mai are the bookshops. Backstreet Books has two locations and is simply brimming over with English and French books. I was able to find books I have been looking for for years: the poetry of Rumi and Yeat’s collection of Irish Mythology. I even found the classic Portnoy’s Complaint to help Marie-Do understand the origin of certain disorders.

In Vientiane there are few vestiges of the Glorious Past, but Chiang Mai still has some old walls and Great Gates. Nice again to touch that history and see old bricks. Otherwise here in Asia it is all too easy to forget that there is a past.

Even if you do live in Southeast Asia and are used to it, it’s nice to stop and visit a temple and let the calm of it invade you.

Chiang Mai, we know, is the gateway to Thailand’s northern tribal lands. Next time…

L'Adresse Cuisine By Tinay

In my two other entries on eateries in Vientiane I spoke about our local soup place and the Vendôme.

The soup place is the colour and fabric of the city, and the Vendôme is an easy place to eat and chat and feel a kind of post-colonial high: French music from the 80’s and a clock showing the time in Mont de Marsan.

But L’Adresse is a totally different experience.

Vientiane is the kind of place where you don’t have to dress up nice to go to a nice restaurant. But the food and refinement of L’Adresse make going there an occasion, a rare pleasure and a treat. You want to dress nicely.

The interior is refined and every detail has been carefully considered. Back in the day, L’Adresse shared the front lobby of a hotel and it was good. Damned good.

But now Tinay has his own walls and he is stepping out: the dishes are delicately proportioned and the cuisine is French. Now, I know that ‘fusion’ is all the fashion but I wouldn’t call this fusion food. Not at all. But there is, at the very back of the palate, a shadow, a whisper of an echo of this great Southeast Asia. It haunts you like a garden spirit, you hardly know it’s there and yet you are sure of something supernatural.

Desserts are sumptuous and made from scratch.

Even the walls are beautiful with exposed brick showing ancient vaults over the windows.

A wonderful selection of wines, reasonable prices and a very satisfying lunch menu that changes every day. If you want to receive by e-mail their daily menu just go to their Facebook page and sign up.

I would reserve by calling 020 56 91 34 34. Visa accepted.

Back to the Swamp

It is difficult to describe the pure physical pleasure I derive from just being here: it is as though the city, hot and humid, has been raining and steaming in our absence just awaiting our return.

Weather reports assure me that it was as hot as hell here in August, and raining steadily almost every day.

The effect is galvanising. The Mekong is swollen like a ripe fruit and there is a light scent of mildew in the air. Many tree tops are crowned with boughs of dark brown and our dirt street is a slippery, puddle-filled obstacle course.

Our certified crazy neighbours’ yard which is usually a boiling and barren expanse of dry dirt is now covered with green.

More outstanding than any of these physical features, however, is my joy in being here. I don’t start work (at the school which shall go nameless) for another few weeks and my latest translation work I can do on the road so it is difficult to resist the temptation of just taking off and opening my arms to the open (preferably paved) roads of the country.

As I turn my back to the Mekong and look Beyond, I can feel the country looking back at me and saying, “I’m waiting”.

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Landscapes of the nearly forgotten city:

The light play caused by ceiling fans, a gentle strobe on the shower wall.

The freedom of the motor scooter on nearly deserted peri-urban roads.

The rough and tumble of the street when you climb the hill just before Watnak Noi; gravel, stones, bricks…anything to replace the mud.

Families of chickens saunter into our garden. A string of chicks learn from their mother how to search for worms.

In the evenings smoke from neighbours’ cooking fires slants into our garden light.

The ugliness of cement is everywhere. It is hideous, hard, omnipresent.

 Novice monks in evening prayer play with their i-phones when they think no one is looking. Despite this, their saffron robes give them the stink of sanctity.

Everybody is smiling, all the time.

During a visit to the brand-new Lao Stock Exchange I laughed with delight at the empty foyer. Opening a brokerage account was as easy as one, two, three.

Did I mention the heat? It is everywhere like molten metal, as heavy as lead; bearing through the clouds and wearing down the will. My limbs are lethargic and my mind is cotton. Luckily I have translation work (with its world of syntax, meaning and deadlines) to keep me on a target.

Are the children happy to be back? It is difficult to say. At any rate they are happy to be in school and I am grateful to their teachers for the enthusiasm with which they head off to class every morning and their joy when they come home.

Did I mention the rain? It soaks steady now, an all-night, all-day sort of rain; beating on the rooftop, drowning our thoughts. Drops in their own rhythm, as heavy as the heat, a mirror image our own type of tropical insanity. The next day the unpaved roads are as slippery as ice rinks.

Some thoughts on a trip to France

Somebody out there invented the two wheeler. Somebody out there likes me.

I was sick half of the time we were in France. Certainly not dying, but I couldn’t taste anything or smell anything and I complained so much I made everybody’s life miserable.

Many thanks to Madée who nursed me back to health, to Cléa who held my hand, to Nicole Smadja for pharmaceutical advice. And my deepest apologies to everyone who had the misfortune of crossing my path when I was under the weather.

In the bare few days my lungs cleared up I was able to accomplish one of my greatest desires this summer: a bike trip through the Great Southwest.

I took the old blue Raleigh that had been built for me by a student at FMC Sens, André David, out of storage at Moulin Rateau where it had sat for ten years. I had to scrape all the attic rust off of it and buy new ‘boyeau’, but André’s work stood the test of time.

Other than one day I had perfect weather and even that day, a drizzling windy early spring kind of day, was beautiful and mysterious.

 Once again I was able to taste the splendour of rural France and marvel at the perfection of her age-old churches and castles, canals and maisons bourgeois, village squares, century-old market places and sacred spaces.  There is poetry in a French garden, in-grown corners, places where fruit falls and musks, vegetable plots where generosity grows row on row.

Village cafés still maintain their sad look, tea is served without a smile: the owner is not happy to see you. Nothing has changed.

And yet riding around France I realised how much has changed since I left here. The roads and urban equipment are in first-class condition, the houses are well-maintained and the fields are ripe and laboured. There is no longer litter on the roads and the forests are clean. The entire country feels like quiet, calm prosperity, hardworking people and centuries of accumulation.

It is difficult to understand how such a country can be in debt, and facing increasing austerity.

Be that as it may, my love affair with France was renewed. One of the great things about biking in France is that wherever you stop you will sleep comfortably and eat like a king.

Also: how not to be touched by the massive and tender beauty of France’s sacred architecture? The delight of it is omnipresent and it would be foolish to just say that France is now a secular country cut off from its Catholic roots. I found a sacredness in every square inch of the country, a strength for people to lean on, an unchanging force; the pulsing heart at the centre of each village. Even if you never enter a church it is hard to ignore the vibrations emanating from generations of belief. There is always a candle burning in a side chapel; always a kindled hope.

Village Spirit Festival

The other day I was putzing around in the garden. The rainy season has begun and every morning the effects of the evening’s tropical storm have to be cleaned up: branches falling from the big old trees, leaves scattered everywhere. It’s kind of like cleaning up after a drunken party thrown by nature.

The storms are wonderful. For some reason, the spirits in this land have made everything perfect in that it only rains heavily once I am safely indoors. The nights are a cacophony of thunder and heavy raindrops, as loud as bullets, smashing on the roof. The sight is wonderful as the lightning opens up the tropical skies, throwing the tall standing palm trees on the horizon into a sharp, ghostly relief.

As the sun sets in monsoon season the crickets and birds in the trees go into high command and the jungle garden screeches with the life of them.

It rains in the house, too and our kitchen floor is like a swimming pool. Strangely enough, our landlord takes this seriously and promises to fix it, a first in Vientiane history if the stories of other landlords are to be believed.

So the other day I was in the garden, cleaning up pieces of branch when a very loud music started down the road. I say road, but if you have been following then you know it really is a dirt track.

The music was thankfully not the usual Thai pop music some neighbours like to play; computer generated emotions and mournful sorrowful voices, inspired by promises of quick sales and a place on the top ten. This was the real deal, instrumental music played on ancient wood and reed, and people ushering great strident lalalalalala’s out of their throats. The music was exactly what I love to hear – the repetitive percussion, the whirling Dervish quality, the hypnotic power.

And so I went down the street to see what it was. The people in the tenement house next to us probably thought I was going to bitch that the music was too loud since I bitch at them when they play their computer generated pop garbage at full blast.

What I stumbled onto was a spirit ceremony in which the village spirits are given homage once a year. I discovered that I had a Lao-American neighbour who explained all of this to me.

I had long wondered where the village Spirit House was and now I know. A large marquee had been set up and the musicians sat on chairs. The centre of the marquee was built into a kind of alter around which the people danced.

Tony Money (his real name) explained to me that people came from all around the city to dance. Not just anybody could dance, though, they had to be people who had a certain spiritual pedigree; a specific connectivity with the spirit world. Indeed, these spiritual supernovas were arriving en masse. They would dress in colourful shiny garments and start to dance until possessed.

Old ladies leaped around, their bodies like jumping jacks, their faces as passive as marionettes. When the spirit left them they would collapse, breathless, and wait for their own selves to return to them.

This was something I would expect to see way out in the countryside, distant tribes’ people worshipping obscure forest spirits. But this was in the centre of the city, the capital city. It was then that I realized that there were layers upon layers of culture and faith in these people who surround us, and a wall of mystery I could only pierce if I learnt the language.

Imagine that there is a group or a caste of sacred dancers throughout the city who go from village to village to be possessed and swept away by the local spirits. Once a month fortune tellers come to the village Spirit House to read futures. Holy men and women walk among us, invisible and anonymous.

In true Lao fashion, I was made to feel right at home. Beer, food, drink and conversation. During intermission they put on a CD of captivating music and when I expressed my admiration for it someone ran to give it to me.

Other than people indicating to me where not to step or stand I was more than welcome to take photos and films. Filming them I realized, and not for the first time, how privileged we are to live here among these gentle and unusual people. I can never thank destiny enough for having brought our steps here, to Southeast Asia.