Laos has no fast food restaurants, Starbucks or movie theaters, and every once in a while we all want those things. So today we went to Udon Thani, which is an hour into Thailand.
The most painful part of the process is clearing Customs. You have to do it when leaving Laos (painful), arriving in Thailand (not awful), then again on the way back when leaving Thailand (OK), and arriving back in Laos (really easy when done late at night and no one is there).
There were four of us so we tried to implement the "Divide and Conquer" mentality. It didn't always work. Here are Wes (white guy on the left) and Nick (white guy on the right) who are in the same line. And only one person needed to be in line.
Also at the Lao / Thai Customs windows (there are three on each side- 4 times going through Customs x 3 windows = 12 windows you have to visit) people cut in line ALL THE TIME. And I get angry about it. Hulk-like angry. In the culture here it's totally socially acceptable to cut in line, but it's also incredibly non-confrontational. I struggle.
Anyway, after getting past Customs and driving an hour to Udon Thani, we finally reach our final destination : Starbucks. And the best part? They had HOLIDAY DRINKS. First time I've seen that at a Starbucks Asia-side.
But they didn't have eggnog so my excitement was a little diminished. "Eggnog chai latte hold-the-water" is the best drink Starbucks can make :(
One of the main reasons I wanted to go to Udon Thani was because Hunger Games 2 just came out, and Laos has no movie theater. We got tickets to the English showing- awesome movie. Also, we bought from the concession stand.
They were having a special- a massive bucket of popcorn plus two sweet Catching Fire thermos full of soda- 300Baht (or $10). I'm going to have a hard time when I go back to the States and have to pay $5 for a small Coke.
Nick attempted to buy a ping-pong table. He spent about an hour looking at ping pong tables in different sports good stores in the mall and measuring the trunk to see if it would fit. But as the ping pong table would be going into our apartment, and the table was much bigger than I expected... we did NOT get a ping pong table.
There are a dozen restaurants in the mall, and all but one are hot-pot. As it was Jesse's birthday, he chose the one Western restaurant. And I went to Sizzler for the first time!
At the Central Plaza parking lot, it is apparently totally fine to block cars in, as long as you leave your vehicle in neutral. The truck to the right is ours. We had to call a security guard to roll back the other truck to get it out. Super annoying.
The three guys, for all their shopping, didn't get much, but I spent a lot of money getting clothes, baked goods (brownie mix! Canned pumpkin!) and hair conditioner.
It's the little things.
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