The road less travelled

We lurch to a sudden stop. For the third time in ten minutes. We’ve barely left Laos’ sleepy capital, Vientiane. At each stop, we pick up something different; another passenger, a box of fruit or several crates of flavoured milk. This time, the driver brings a large, brown box through the door and places it in the aisle near my feet. I can hear scratching coming from the box. The petite woman across from me notices my alarm, grins and lifts one flap of the box with her hand. It’s the chirping that surprises me first and then the two dozen baby chicks scrambling over each other to find the light. The box is closed with a flick of her foot.

Two friends and I are on our way to Thakhek, a town near the centre of the country. Our bus is run by a local company and tickets are too reasonably priced. Some of the windows are without glass. Nobody’s complaining as there is no fan and the missing panes provide much-needed airflow, when the bus is moving, that is. “Sabaidee! Hello!” the local children shout; all smiles as we drive past them, through tiny villages and herds of cattle, past rural clinics and countryside schools.

At the fourth stop, street vendors hop on to ply their wares. There is an elderly woman selling iced water and baguettes stuffed with pork floss, meat paté and cucumber, a taste of French colonial influence. The young man sitting behind me buys two sticks of gum from a teenage girl and offers me a piece. I am struck by the incredibly long nails on each of his ‘pinky’ fingers and the kindness of his unnecessary gesture.

Four other backpackers sit near the rear. We exchange concerned looks as the smell of burning rubber wafts through the open windows. A rusty, red tool box appears from a side compartment and the driver crawls under the bus. The humidity shows on our faces. It’s a long wait before we hit road again.

And it’s a short one before we stop twice more. First, it's an emergency ablution break for our driver who grabs the roll of toilet paper from the dashboard and heads into the bush. Next, it is with expectation, not disbelief, that we watch two dust-covered scooters hoisted onto the roof of our bus.

The trip from Laos’ capital city should take four hours at most, we were told. We’ve been on the bus for over seven. The man with the long fingernails is playing a game on his mobile phone with the sound turned up loud. We have no idea where we are and have lost count of the number of stops. But no matter, we’ll soon be off again.