Waking Up With Laos

While the Boha-girls get their beauty rest, I’ve been getting up early to run many mornings. Here’s a google album where I’ve had fun taking a pic to commemorate each run for anyone who wants to take a peek.

We had an overnight in Pakbeng after our awesome first day on the slow boat tour along the Mekong River. As has frequently been the case, we had two rooms at our hotel. Sarah bunked with Sadie and I with Paige.

Good Morning Pakbeng

6:00am, woke up, running clothes on and out the door quietly so as not to stir Paige. It was still dark outside, especially with a thick morning fog off the Mekong River. As with many of my runs, I have no idea where I’m going when I start, I just go. The things I’ve seen off the beaten paths have been a really eye opening part of the trip, especially this morning.

Small Fires

As I was running I smelled smoke, but hadn’t seen any fire yet. I figured it was a nearby farmer burning some rubble, but I turned a corner and started to see small fires in front of many of the Laotian houses. They were making coals, which they then brought into their homes, which I can only assume was used to heat the house and boil some water for a warm morning. Many of the doors were open and I could see into their humble homes.

Early morning fires in front of Laos homes and Hmong villages walked to the town market with produce.

"Forest People"

Kae, our guide, took us the local produce market yesterday. He mentioned that the Hmong people, or ‘forest people’ as he called them, bring produce daily to sell. Many of them walk 2-3 hours every single day to arrive at the market around 6:00-6:30am for the opening. As I ran, I saw a number of women carrying their produce and clearly headed to the market. A couple things were striking to me based on my small sample size.

Short - the women were so short. Definitely not hitting the 5 foot mark.

Young - I saw what looked to be two sisters on their way to the market, my best guess is that they were 12 and 9 years old!

Dogs

They’re the one thing I have to often be on the lookout for on runs. At one point, a dog playfully joined me on my run for about 500 yards. Running in Greece, Italy and Croatia the dogs were a bit scary and skiddish. They even caused me to turn around on a couple of runs. So far in Southeast Asia they’ve been docile and playful.

Monk in Training

I ran by the local temple and saw what I can only assume was a young monk in training. I motioned to my phone to make sure he was OK with me taking a picture, I got a nod and smile.

Smiles

I got many smiles or looks of bewliderment as I ran by Laotian people who were up and starting their day. I was definitely a different look to their morning.

Most of the homes doors where open, day starting early.

As usual, I started listening to a podcast while running to catch up on the news, but not this morning. Instead, I heard families waking up, fires crackling.

View of the Mekong River by our hotel as I returned from my run.

Good morning Laos!