Standards of living

While I was in Asia Orit, a friend of mine, asked me how do I handle the degradation of the standards of living I was used to. It came to my mind again while traveling in Australia. While I was in Asia I used to have a room all to myself, sometimes sharing it with someone else, with en suite bathroom. I always ate out, whether in restaurants or on the street, whether noodles, rice dishes, organic salads or croissants.

In Australia, a Western country, prices are Western too. Therefore I sleep in rooms of four, six or eight people. My earplugs have finally began proving their worth. The bathroom is en suite some times but it can also be on the other end of a corridor. The quality and prices vary, but they are not necessarily related. I mostly go to YHA hostels. They are a bit more expensive and tend to be quieter, in contrast to hostels defining themselves as "party" hostels. When ordering a package from a travel agency on the East coast, you get vouchers that give discounts for several hostels on the East coast. I use the vouchers to know where not to stay for the night and, on the other hand, where to go out to.

I have a green bag full of groceries I fill up in the big supermarkets, like Woolworths or Coles. For breakfast I eat muesli with yogurt (actually quite good, might turn out to be my new breakfast). At evening I "cook" an instant pasta meal from a bag, improved with some canned "goods" (that's how my cousin, who traveled up the East coast too, calls them) like tuna (in flavors!) or salmon. For lunch I go for the cheapest food I can find. It usually consists of either fish and chips or a burger. I started going for the "works" or the "lot" burger, consisting of a tiny burger topped with lettuce, tomato, beetroot, fried egg, bacon, cheese and pineapple. Unfortunately, in Australia the cheapest food is junk food (nothing like Humus or Falafel). You can get a huge box of chocolate chip cookies for two dollars! and for the same price, half a banana (exaggerated a bit...). The basic menu of take away store will consist of fish, chips and burgers.

There is a positive side of course. Traveling is much easier. Everything is in English and almost everything is online. There are information centers and loads of brochures. Sometimes the huge selection is actually confusing and that's where talking to other travelers helps sorting things out a bit.

And one last complaint, why the Internet tends to be really slow in a lot of places? Why it was easier to burn DVDs in Asia than in Australia??

Huay Xai to Luang Nam Tha

Today I took the "bus" to Luang Nam Tha. The "road" is one big sandy, dusty trail, probably passable only by 4x4 cars and trucks. The only settlements on the way were small villages, with houses made from wood, lots of pigs, chicken, dogs and small children. Part of the "road" was wide but other parts were quite narrow.

The good (also bad) news is that the whole road is one big construction site. It looks like tons of explosives were used to make a path through the jungle. Many Caterpiller vehicles (forgot the words...) dig, pave and prepare the new road. At one point we had to stop because some construction workers dug a hole in the road. Luckily, one construction vehicle made an alternative route for us to pass.

Once we got close to Luang Nam Tha, a brand new road, including sign posts, was waiting for us.

Transportation and communication changed the world. They already have cellphones. I'm certain that this new road will change this area forever.

Now I'm off to the shower to remove about a kilo of dust from myself.

Tempting offers

A famous world traveller once said: "anyway, worse thing - you get screwed and you move on.. it's part of travelling (you get to be fucked on daily basis in India)"
When we arrived to Huay Xai we looked for a bus to Luang Nam Tha. We read that the road to Luang Nam Tha was one of the worst, and that the only option to go there is by a public bus (I'm not sure about the boat option). Prepared to face this rough but adventurous option, one travel agency caught us with the possibility to go by a private mini-van for the same price. Tempted by the alternative, we bought our ticket from that agency. The next morning the mini-van was "broken", but we were promised that we will be taken "free" to the bus station and go on a public bus from there. Well, that was what we originally expected, so it was fine with us. (Another Israeli couple just got their money back and went on their own). When the taxi driver dropped us off, it wasn't at the bus station at all. He said that he arranged us a "better" ride to go there.

And so we went to Loang Nam Tha with a truck/bus used to deliver motorcycles to our destination. We were just extra "goods" for delivery and so some people made more money from this fact. But we had a pleasant journey, with a full seat for each person (we were four and one or two people picked up on the way). It was quite fast and comfortable, even more than the mini-van taking us from Chiang Mai to Chiang Khong in Thailand