I'm at the Thai entry point on the other side of the Mekong, and the immigration official is leafing through my UK passport with a stern, but puzzled look emerging on his face. He talks in Thai to his colleague then addresses me abruptly:
"Where's your Laos visa? Mmh?"
I pull my Australian passport from my bag.
"Aaaah. Two passport!", they both say in unison. "Why you enter Laos with Australian passport but try to enter Thailand with UK?", he queries.
"The Laos visa was cheaper on my Australian passport but it only gives me 14 days no-visa entry to Thailand. My British passport gives me 30 days in Thailand, which I need because I leave on the 29th, that's more than 14 days away", I explain to them, starting to get worried.
"No. You need to enter Thailand with the passport which has Lao visa", he responds.
"But why should it matter which passport I enter or leave on? I legally hold both these passports, I should be allowed to use whichever one I chose". I'm getting a little high and mighty I must admit, but I do not like the prospect of having to do an expensive and time-consuming visa run to Burma in the short time I have left on this trip.
The manager is called, I stand my ground, and luckily she's an understanding lady and allows me to enter on my UK passport as long as they have a copy of my Laos visa from my other passport.
After thanking the border staff profusely and exchange wai's I, with my 30-day pass, walk through to Thailand, the third, and last country on this Southeast Asian journey.
I wait a long while for my minivan and eventually we're off towards Chiang Mai, where I plan to spend a few nights and catch up with Nic, whom I met way back in Sihanoukville in the company of the Slovakians.
It's already noticeably much hotter here than the cold temperatures experienced in Laos. The yellow rice fields shimmer, and I can see mirages on the roads, which, I notice, are very well maintained. I see already the signs of a country with a growing economy - the roads, cars, houses - it's all of a higher standard than in Cambodia and Laos.
I close my eyes with the window open and let the warm air push past me, and the feeling is like when I float on my back in the ocean. I open my eyes again, and see the mountains far away, and the jungle, and the rice fields, and even pine trees, and a leafless tree with bright red flowers which reminds me of an Illawarra Flame Tree in full bloom and transports me back to Gerringong and my family and the summers of my childhood.
I arrive in Chiang Mai, and I'm swimming in hectic traffic again. Not since Phnom Penh have I seen traffic like this, and I jump into a tuk tuk and head to a guest house which Nic recommended, a joint called Pirate's Cove run by a relaxed German fellow. The traffic feels like Phnom Penh, but here there are so many more tourists here, and the sex tourism I saw in other places, I realise now, was nothing compared to this. Old white men with young Thai women on every block, in nearly every bar I pass, even the owner of the guest house has a young Thai wife. But Kim the German and his wife, I notice straight away, seem to have a very healthy, affectionate relationship.
Kim tells me Nic has already paid the money for my first night here, just so I could be guaranteed the room; a surprising, but humbling gesture. I send him a message to thank him and ask if he's available to catch up already. He tells me he's not, he'll see me tomorrow morning, but he suggests I go explore the local neighbourhood, "Just down the road there's hookers, good food, bars, and massage, that should keep you busy" he writes back tongue-in-cheek.
I skip the hooker, bars, and massage, but I do find a place to help with my still barely satiable appetite for noodle soups. I slurp the noodles up out of a pastel blue plastic bowl, sip on chrysanthemum tea, dash in some more chili, and look forward to catching up with Nic tomorrow.
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| Another country, another tuk tuk |
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