Pork in Pakse - Blogabond

We left Don Det for Pakse, our livers only just intact. We had been looking forward to the coffee in Laos, as the guide book said they were very proud of their coffee, believing it to be the best in the world. After the fantastic Vietnamese coffee this sounded plausible due to their proximity, but unlikely it could be better just becuase the Vietnamese stuff was so good. We expected it to be a massive relief anyway after the very disappointing Khmer coffee (whch they are also very proud of), but in Don Det anyway it had been very poor so far. So, we headed to Pakse in search of good coffee, as Pakse is meant to be the coffee capitol of Laos. It is very close to the Bolaven Plateau, where most of the coffee is grown.

When I tried to take a couple of photos in Pakse, I realised that the beer I spilled on my camera in Don Det had actually done a bit of damage. It had seemed OK at first, but now it had dried off it seemed like all the mechanisms were a bit sticky.

My camera was taking strain

There's not really anything to do in Pakse. It seems to be full of people just using it as a base for trips to the Bolaven Plateau, so we decided to do the same. Wandering around the streets, I spotted someone selling more banana leaf parcels, and not being able to resist unusual things, least of all surprises wrapped up in banana leaf, I bought one, maybe expecting pickled fish again, but not really sure what to expect. I unwrapped it and it still wasn't obvious what it was, but it looked a bit like raw pork. I bit into it and, yes it seeemed to be raw pork, wrapped around some herbs, spices, and a big chunk of raw chili. It tasted very nice, but I couldn't help worry about worms, although the meat did taste like it might be cured, which I hoped would take care of any parasites. Oh well! I finished it off. I had read that the Lao have a taste for raw meat. Their main national dish, laap, is traditionally made with raw minced meat of fish, but it is usually cooked these days.

I tracked down a half bottle of lao-lao in the hope it would kill anything not killed in the curing process nad we finished the day in an indian restaurant, which was packed with falangs, probably more of them than we had previously eaten with.

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The Happy Couple on March 21, 2009 from Pakxe, Laos

from the travel blog: Michael's Round-the-World honeymoon

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