General Vang Pao passes

Not much to say, I hadn't heard until this morning.

General Vang Pao one of the major players in the Indochina warn in Laos passed away due to heart failure a couple of days ago.

A national hero to the Hmong diaspora and a friend to America, his adopted country, not so well liked by his old adversaries. I hope he is resting peacefully tonight.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/08/world/asia/08vangpao.html

Further Into the Forest

The morning began as most mornings. The eldest wife pushing the coals together and blowing on them to start the morning fire and cook the rice. Everyone else still fast asleep in the dark. I got up but kept my distance, waiting for some water to boil to make instant coffee in my steel cup. I wasn't sure of the etiquette in Hmong houses, I couldn't see a clear demarcation of women's side from men's side as with the Akha. I do know that no woman wants a foreigner underfoot early in the morning, so after getting a nod of approval to get some water from the boiling kettle I returned to the edge of the sleeping platform and re bandaged a blister on my foot.

Morning fire Ban Nambo 20 54 25.70N 100 53 50.10

This post is a continuation of similar posts about a walk in NE Laos in the winter of 07 and 08.

1. http://laobumpkin.blogspot.com/2010/07/trail-to-nambo.html
2. http://laobumpkin.blogspot.com/2010/04/lahu-night-out.html
3. http://laobumpkin.blogspot.com/2010/03/one-day-treks-in-vicinity-of-muang-long.html
4. http://laobumpkin.blogspot.com/2010/02/long-time-traveler-muang-long.html

With way over a thousand kilometers of roadless and mostly mapless area the Nam Fa drainage has plenty of places to go for a walk. None the less Tui had one particular town he wanted to revisit, Ban Nam Hee. I think as much as anything the village headman had been welcoming and Tui wanted to go back and say hi. Also last time he'd been there the villagers had told him that it was only one day's walk futher to Jakune Mai where we both have friends.

Tui'd taken an Italian there during the preceding year. That walk with the Italian had been the only foreigner at all in these woods during the two years since i'd been here in early 2007. One of the soldiers with an AK had accompanied them. Tui made jokes about the gun. I've seen hunters stash thier rifle in the bushes before entering an unfamiliar village. Good to enter a place with an empty hand. I don't think the escort was appreciated.

Black Powder Rifle from hunters we met at stream crossing

My guide Tui was the son of the military comander of Lao communist forces in the region throughout the war, afterwards his was head of the district capital past the turn of the century. Like many Lao Tui's dad got his military training in Hanoi, where they taught him all kinds of things best forgotten. Tui taught English in the high school, he usually knows former students in every village, and most people have heard of his father. The connections are helpfull when entering a new village.

That said, upland peoples are an independent self assured bunch. Tui's liniage though known, affords him no special status other than his normal station as guide and teacher and my being a falang is nothing more special than any other stranger. Often the people we are talking to are elders and current and former headmen of their often large old villages. I mostly listen quietly trying to understand what's going on, I go easy with the camera.

After an early breakfast of wai wai we left with our local guide. Hiring a local guide accomplishes a few things, most of them good. The local guide is a hunter and knows all of the trails and his way around the hills. It puts the equivalent of skilled labor wages into the pocket of a subsistence farmer. Three people, one of them a local woodsman, is much safer than two strangers. The guide usually has a much greater depth of knowledge of local flora and fauna, more than likely he knows any strangers we are apt to meet, if not personally, then through kinship ties.

Looking back at Ali's house, the Lahu headman whom I'd stayed with back in 06. Notice the Lahu houses are up on stilts. Stopped to take photo of Nambo 20 53 56.41N 100.54 03.22E

The trail was good and after the first long big hill the terrain eased up. We seemed to be headed in a generaly south easterly direction similar to the way we'd walked the day before.

Despite a lack of accurate maps I have a rough idea of where we are all the time. Far to the south east is the new hard surface road from Huay Xai on the Thai border that goes up to Boten on the border of China. West is the Mekong, behind me the dirt road from Sing to Xiengkok. 

They pushed me hard for the first part of the morning. We had a good sized hill to go up. Afterwards the elevation changes were more moderate.

Break at the top of the first large hill. Hunters had been using a white tree for target practice. (six inch goups at 30 meters) Top of Hill on trail to Nambo Gao 20 52 59.50N 100 54 17E

At around noon we passed the site of the old village of Nambo. A guy I talked to the night before said he'd spent his entire life in old Nambo and he figured he was around eighty years old. On the old topo maps from the war there's a red dot in about  the same place as Old Nambo and a label LS125, "Lima Site 125" which is military jargon for landing site. Someone probably landed a helicopter there and made contact with the villagers.

 Besides Lima Site 125 at Old Nambo you can also see Muang Long in the upper left and the present day Mongla labeled Lima Site 358. Click for larger scale.

Old Nambo gone to weeds.  20 50 53.50N 100 54 29.20E

Heading down towards a creek we heard a shot, and at the crossing met a couple of hunters. We stopped there for lunch. While one of the hunters started a fire the other chased some small fish into the shallows and scooped them up on the bank. Combined with the bird they'd shot, the kilo of rice they'd brought, and some of my favorite flavor enhancer, they had a pretty good lunch for themselves. Certainly a lot better than plain rice. The bird was simply plucked then cleaned by splitting it open with a thumb and discarding some of the guts, stuffing others back in the bird. Similarly with the fish. All had bang nua and salt rubbed into them then were quickly barbecued.

Fish and fowl

Prepping Lunch

Kao Neao, Ping gai, Ping Pa, Bang Nuah, Gua, a perfect lunch.

They say the Akha might get half their protein from the wild. I can't think of many other societies today where every single male is a hunter. Their bullets are made in molds of lead and propeled with home made black powder. The newer longer rifled barrels made in Thailand are a big improvement over the older smooth bores. I'd guess the long barrels are to get as much speed out of the slow burning powder as possible.

Notice the powder horn in the forground? Except for the barrel, most of this rifle is homeade, looks really good. What next Monte Carlo combs?

The Akha often hunt with dogs. The dogs sniff out the pig or deer and bark to alert the hunters that they are chasing the animal. No carnivore is too big to fear the dogs of the Akha and there is a feeling of safety in walking the woods where carnivores still fear man.  The only animal people  have problems with surprisingly is the mild mannered black bear. Mostly meek sometimes the bear mauls someone unprovoked. I figure it's a reaction to the fact that  they live in a bad neighborhood. Tigers and leopards prey on black bears, sometimes even after the bear is full grown, the only defence the bear has is it's strength and ferocity.

Asian Black Bear from camera trap by WCS. Notice how thin the fur is, you can see the skin through it especially along the belly. Still, built stronger than a brick shite house as they say.

We were reaching a point where it is closer to the new hard surface road to China than it is behind us to the road at Muang Long. Close to the road is a demand for market bush meat. The Chinese built a large hotel casino on the Lao side of the border at Boten and the entire town and market surrounding it runs on Chinese currency and speaks Mandarin. (I'm repeating what I've heard, haven't really been to Boten in about a few million years, certainly long before the casino)

The road also drives a demand for all the nutty animal based medicines. for export to China. I'm sure the customs house has been upgraded since I passed by, but the Boten entrance has to be one of the more obscure entries to China. I wouldn't think the customs has much familiarity with CITES . http://www.cites.org/ 

The Akha claim the Kahmu are poaching on thier land, pushed further inland than normal. Maybe by the demand of the market? The Kahmu are actually the original inhabitors of the land, as far back as legend survives. 


It's not just the Chinese at Boten that drive the market, Lao people still enjoy eating civet, porkupine, pig, deer, snake, bat, and bamboo rat if they can afford it. The many varieties of insects, frogs, tiny birds, and fish are still comonly eaten even among the small amount of the population that reside in towns.

I read in a report once that even citizens of the capital can name 300 local species. When I think of doing the same around here I'm afraid I'd run out somewhere around 100. Very recently almost every person in Laos was familiar with gathering fish, frogs, insects, and all of the wild growing plants. It's hard to tell someone that has been eating wild food all thier lives that it's now bad to buy civet in exchange for the money they earn by working.

The afternoon fades from my memory, more hills, more trees and finally the Nam Hee, a major tributary of the Nam Fa. We stopped and washed ourselves in the creek, the water bone chillingly cold. The first bath in a couple days, I felt downright clean and presentable until our local guide unrolled his jacket. 

Blurry photo of local guide all dressed up --Nam Hee Crsng way to ban Nam Hee 20 49 50.90N 100 55 20.70

Less well known, the upland men also wear distinctive clothes that identify them as belonging to one ethnicity or another. In this case our guide was a Hmong fellow. He reminded me of the young cowboys of Wyoming getting duded up in preparation to go to the barn dance. 

The hilltribes have devised ways of both enlarging their gene pool and guarding against inbreeding. In other instances I'd felt as if Lu woodcutters had been taking advantage of fairly young upland girls. In reading I now realize that more accurately they were taking advantage of the social norms that allowed them to get lucky at the same time as the villagers perhaps diversified their genes. It seems as if every time I jump to make moral judgments, I later find I didn't fully understand the situation.

It helps me to realize that the villagers are basically the same human as am I. True I come from a much more developed society technologicaly, but with human interactions, I'd think we're about the same. 

We wander through life mostly as strangers to each other, behind our steel firesafe doors, at the end of our anonymous suburban culdesac. The Akha can recite their lineage back for scores of generations. They not only know their relationship to every living soul in their own village but the connections via  marriage and lineage to every other village of their people from before the time they imigrated out of the north hundreds of years ago. Imagine living next door to your best friends and all your relatives for your entire life?

Shortly the trail became worn, we smelled wood smoke, and heard chickens.

After passing through the village gate, Ban Nam Hee itself became visible, initialy it was strangely silent, and empty. Nothing moved except chickens, no dogs, no people. Then a wild cheer, and singing or chanting to drums and some unusual musical instrument. Except for the music all was again quiet, then a most horrible anguished cry, silence again, then a shout of triumph, cheers.

I'm used to having packs of dogs nipping at my heels or old grannies giving me the evil eye. I understand that until we are accepted by someone we can be viewed with suspicion. There are also instances of villages being absolutely closed to all outsiders. I'd no idea what the heck was going on. Some kind of human sacrifice was the first thing that came to mind.

Halfway into the village we came upon the game of tops. The entire village was cheering the contestants. The tops are spun off a stick with a rope. I'm not sure of the rules, I believe someone can lose their lead by having their top knocked out of the way. The music was a CD of Akha music imported from China. The village had a generator and batteries to power a sound system.

Ban Nam Hee 20 49 04.00N 100 56 06.80E

Hmong House

The Hmong guy Lao Bii, was Tui’s friend, they knew each other from when Tui’d been to Nambo before.

I'm going  to apologise in advance for anything I get wrong. I don't know much about the Hmong. I've met and talked to plenty in Thailand, China, and America, but I really don't know much about the way they live in the more traditional setting of rural Laos.

At first we waited for Lao Bii in the yard, he was out hunting birds like all guys do at the end of the day. With seemingly every guy in the village out looking for birds every afternoon you have to wonder how there are any birds left. But there are, and there always have been.


When Tui's friend returned we went inside. After setting our packs down, slipping off our boots and donning flip flops, we went to off find people I’d taken photos of two years before. I always try to hand out a copy of a photo to anyone I take a picture of.


We also stopped in and said hi to the soldiers stationed in the village, and Tui showed them some sort of documentation authenticating my permission to be gallivanting about.. Since my last visit the government sent fourteen soldiers including two political officers and a teacher to live in the village.

Vang Pao charges dropped

Last night I turned my web browser to read that all charges had been dropped against General Vang Pao. The general stood accused of plotting the overthrow of the Lao Government.


I was a guest in a Hmong house last winter, the first time I'd ever done so. There were marked differences from Akha or Lahu. Notice how it's built on the ground, not so drafty, nice clay oven,also a good roof of split wood not straw. It's the one in the background.

The ending to the story is a lot less melodramatic than the beginning. An out of control ATF agent suggested to a retired American officer that he supply guns to the Hmong. The whole plot was an idea hatched in the mind of a rogue American policeman abetted by a retired American Army Officer and later to include a couple of old Hmong guys. They were about as ready to take over Laos as I am to fly to Mars. No arms purchased, no army raised, just a silly attempt to further some policeman's career.

Links:
U.S. Drops Case Against Exiled Hmong Leader - NY Times

Gen. Vang Pao's Last War - NY Times




General Vang Pao


What about the damage done to Lao / Hmong relations?

The whole whoopla gave plenty of cover for both the Lao and Thai governments to be a lot more proactive in resettling Hmong refugees from the camps in Thailand. There was also friction between Lao militias and Hmong in already resettled villages in Bokeo province, and around all sides of Xaysombone. Many Laotians assumed they were about to be attacked by Hmong guerrillas, after all it was just recently that the Hmong stopped receiving arms and money via the porous Thai border.



Vang Pao 1961


Another aspect is the disrespect shown to the old General himself, after all America is definitely in his debt. He not only fought a war for us, in which tens of thousands of his people were lost, and and contributed greatly to the war effort in Vietnam but his forces saved innumerable US air force pilot's lives. He is now 79, in the twilight of a life spent mostly fighting for US causes or recovering from that fight.

I think our government owes an apology for over reaching and a certain ATF agent should be looking at facing a jury.

Lao Ethnic Handicrafts Store

It would be difficult to spend much time in Laos and especially in the houses and villages of the Lao Seung (upland peoples) without developing an appreciation of their handicrafts. Obscuring the line between what is utilitarian and what is beautiful I bring the uneducated view to handicrafts. I usually buy what can be used as originally intended anyway.


Above is the entrance to the handicrafts cooperative in Vientiane. It's right next to the post office and across the street from the morning market on the South side. Map is below. On the map it's called "Hmong Market" for good reason, most of the stalls are owned by Hmong people and most of the patrons are Hmong. Many overseas Hmong go there to buy ethnic clothes to bring home and wear at festivals. There are also a lot of forest products to buy, the horns from small deer, tusks from wild pig, porcupine quills, plants and animals, powders and potions.

There are also a heck of a lot of clothes and crafts from other ethnic minorities but you have to know what you want and find someone to sell it to you. Most tourists wander through without buying so the shopkeepers don't bother trying to sell anything to you. The lack of tourists also makes for nice shopping experience. I think the first price offered was good, I didn't bargain. The quality was much greater and the work more authentic than at the morning market. Many items were the same as you would see in an upland village, except brand new. No pillow cases or duvet covers. Prices were a fraction of across the street. Things are displayed Asian style. Large piles or hung from the ceiling seemingly haphazardly but really grouped in a systematic order so that the required item can be found quickly.





Above a small bag to carry stuff that all Lao people see have called a tong. This one is Akha, woven like a fish net from the inner bark of some tree or some other naturally occurring fiber. We have to go to the post office down the street to get our mail and sometimes I wear it while pedaling the bicycle. My wife makes fun of me, grown man wearing a pocketbook and all. I bought it in Vientiane at the store in the photo up top.


The basket above hangs beside my computer to catch letters and small screwdrivers and markers I don't want the kids touching. It was made by the Lanten people and I bought it in the crafts coop in Muang Long. Now there is a bank where the coop used to be and a woman runs it out of her house. The bamboo is darkened by being hung above the fire, this hardens it or keeps it from rotting or something, all people seem to hang bamboo stuff above the fire for some time, the darker the better.



Notice the different weaving around the bottom, and also just below the top. I figure this would be a great "go to market in the morning" type basket. Baskets keep greens from being crushed. The Lanten make good stuff.


This sticky rice basket is Lanten also, my wife just recently started using it, remarking that the weaving is very good. Again notice how the weaving changes bottom to top and also a star shaped pattern across the top. I bought these also in Muang Long but had forgotten about them for a couple of years.


Lastly this is a tong made for sale, probably after export, it has a zipper which I haven't seen on the ones regular folks carry, also it's very small, so to be sold as a small purse for women. I think it's Yao by the red pom poms, but I'm not sure, never spent any time in Yao villages. The fabric is hand woven cotton, grown on the side of a hill somewhere up north no doubt. The dye no doubt the natural blue black stuff everyone seems to fancy. The embroidered designs are intricate and with tight stitching. This tong belongs to Thipalada who is modeling it, her first pocket book, she puts lots of things in it. I also bought this at the cooperative in Vientiane.

Photo to teach Hmong kids in Wisconsin

The Ferry at Thaduea, Xaiyabouli Province

The other day I got this eamail saying someone wanted permission to use a photo from my blog in making a lesson plan for teachers to use for kids grade 4 to 12 in Wisconsin. Below is the eamail and link to the teaching materials.

Needless to say I'm totaly phyched to think that some Hmong kid is going to be viewing my photo and learning something about the land his grandparents left so many years ago.

I've no idea why that photo. It is of the same rough geographic location where the Hmong flee to Thailand. If one follows the mountains across from Phonsavan, Plain of Jars, headed for Thailand that is the route you take. Us tourists take busses, but the Hmong walk, and they walk in areas to avoid notice. I'd think even to this day it is the route of choice for Hmong leaving Laos.

The Mekong swings far into Laos in Xayabouli, crossing the river doesn't mean the journey is over but it does mean that one would have even less chance to encounter soldiers.

Hello, My name is &&&&& &&&&&&. I am
a University of Wisconsin—Eau Claire masters student currently working on the
“Making Americans, Making America” (MAMA) project, a UWEC administered
educational program designed to enhance Wisconsin’s history courses (grades
4-12). As part of the program, MAMA creates free graduate history courses for WI
educators. In return, MAMA fellows are asked to utilize the knowledge and skills
they acquire from the courses by creating effective lesson plans to be
implemented in the classroom. In hopes of providing Wisconsin educators with a
valuable teaching resource, the University would like to host on its website
some of the better of these plans. However, such a project inevitably has
copyright implications, as many of the plans feature images scanned or copied
from various websites and publications. Hence, we are currently in the process
of contacting all the organizations MAMA fellows acquired materials from and
requesting their permission to use the content. One of the plans containse an
image (Ferry Boat at the Thadua crossing Xaiyabouli) copied from your webstie.
We would like to request your permission to use the content. You can access
further information on MAMA at the following address: http://www.uwec.edu/chtl/mama.htm.
(MAMA is a non-profit program created specifically for the purpose of helping
Wisconsin’s educators enhance their teaching methods and classroom content). The
lesson plan has been included so that you can view how the image is being used
(slide 25).

Roger Arnold's Still a Secret War

I like Roger Arnold’s photos. A lot. I like this video even better.

The context in which a photo is taken is as important to me the image itself. I like to know the story behind the photo. In this case the story and the image are tied so closely together that I can’t imagine one without the other.

For myself the last chapter in the story of the Hmong and the secret war in Laos will probably be those pictures of the group of Blia Shaua Her in Roger Arnold’s photos from June in 06. The more often I look at the pictures the more I recognise the people again. Tong Fang mourning his wife. Bla Yang Fang with his old M 16 tied together with rags, then with his new UN High Commission for Refugees certificate. Most memorable of all Tong Hua Her first with his face half shot off, then after surgery in Thailand.

Read the story in Roger’s own words at
Still A Secret War by Roger Arnold

What’s not covered in his story and what we do get a taste of in the video, is who the heck is this guy Mr. Arnold anyway. Two weeks in a Hmong village hidden in the jungle? Ten trips to Laos?

The presentation in the video is extremely factual, the delivery of a journalist. Roger’s refuses to speak in hyperbole. He doesn’t sensationalize. He admonishes those who would use his photos or story for anti Lao propaganda purposes not to do so. The completely rational, sober telling of the story in the first person adds untold power to the message.

It’s as if he’s saying, This is what has happened, and this is what is happening now, it’s up to the reader, or the viewer, to try to understand.

Undoubtedly the most amazing story coming out of Laos at the moment, weaving together the threads of a narrative that begins before the war in Vietnam itself and ties in the current war on terror and the political expediency of abandoning our comrades from thirty five years ago.

The Hmong Thing

I assume this must be some kind of DC-3 flying over a hill tribe village. I grabbed the photo off one of those web sites. Check out the houses. Have you ever seen houses in a hill tribe village lined up in rows?

Well they let the general out on bail, the repercussions of the coup plot are being felt far beyond California, perhaps most ominously with the 7,700 Hmong about to be deported from their safe haven in a Thai refugee camp.

Thailand and Laos are probably feeling very little pressure from the United States. President Bush and his secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, and Secretary of Defence Gates have been cancelling meetings in Singaore, Africa, and Latin America as they try to salvage a middle east policy that goes from bad to worse, and is rapidly spinning out of control. The plight of some former comrades from our last failed war thirty years ago hardly seems worth lifting an eyebrow over.

Meanwhile in the land of plah dek and sticky rice tiny indicators of unease seem to be emerging over the past couple of weeks. It seems as if stepped up security issues on the western border with Thailand are finding their way into the Thai papers.

In one incident Laos detained seven Thai Army Rangers and one civilian over in Xaiyabuli Province. It seemed to take a couple of days before the Lao government even could confirm that it had apprehended the Thais, and then a couple more days to get them released. No doubt communications in neighbouring Nan province Thailand are more modern.

Xayabuli is the province where the Mekong doesn’t form a border but flows much further to the East inside of Laos proper. The actual border itself was in contention for a while in the 80s. This is the area where Hmong have been escaping to Thailand for years, or even perhaps returning to create mischief.

Bokeo Province, the next province north, opposite Chang Rai had it’s own activity the week before, busting a cabal of bomb plotters and conspirators. A few years ago Laos experienced quite a few small bombs, most of them not doing very much damage. In these days of massive truck bombs in Iraq blowing up a motorcycle hardly seems ominous. Arresting twenty suspects for feeding intelligence to dissidents abroad might well be nothing more sinister than having received a letter from a cousin in America.

Finally from an expat blog in Vientiane, all foreigners are being required to re register their names addresses, photo, visa, and so on. Shouldn’t they already have all this on file? He he he. I always assumed that all that ton of paper you have to fill out for visas and customs ends up collecting dust in some corner of the customs and foreign affairs department rotting away. Those new visas are actually a paste on type and I thought they were somehow computerized. maybe not. Notice lately they only require one photo?

Well here’s wishing the 7,700 Hmong get an easy return to Laos. It seems that with the millions of illegal economic immigrants we could find our way to granting a few thousand green cards to these folks.

General Vang Pao Arrested in the US

Above, one of the amazing photographs by Roger Arnold who last year ventured into the restricted Xaysambone zone above Vang Vien to document the plight of the Hmong peoples living there. From the front sights on the two rifles shown they look to be old style soviet AK -47s. Photo by permission.

The other day I opened my google account to see that the news filter included nothing but headlines about the highest ranking Laotian General from America’s secret war in Laos, being arrested for conspiring along with other prominent Hmong Americans to violently overthrow the Laotian Government.



Vang Pao

From the L A Times


"A retired California National Guard lieutenant colonel and a prominent Hmong leader were charged with eight others Monday in an alleged plot to buy missiles, mines, assault rifles and other arms to topple the communist government of Laos."

Whenever I hear of one of these government busts I always assume there was a lot of indstigating being done by the government informant. Like the supposed terrorist jihadists they are always aresting in the US. In this case the government got involved in an already ongoing plot. No one seriously considers they had a chance of overthrowing the Lao government, but they sure could have gotten a lot of people killed.

I guess their plan was to take over government buildings in the capital Vientiane. I have no idea what sort of reception they thought they were going to get but I know one thing, they wouldn't have been received as liberators.

Most of the people in Vientiane have a positive attitude towards their government, more so probably than most Americans do. Imagine if a bunch of guys started shooting up the town where you live. Would you up and decide that the government sucks and it’s time to also start running around shooting people? For most Laotians the bad stuff that happens in Xaysambone is something on another planet. Kind of like the way we look at Iraq only without any media coverage or news at all.

I know a lot of Lao guys and their families that were on the losing side of that war. They like going back to Laos and have plans to retire there. They hold no grudges and neither does the new government. The war was a long time ago. They left as young men, they return as grandparents. Many of their children were either born here, remember nothing of Laos, or have vague recollections of a refuge camp.


The flip side of the coin is a long and brutal largely unknown insurgency that has been simmering for the entire thirty years, and the unexplained and mostly ineffectual bombings of many markets and even places such as the airport, customs check points etc. The bombs always seem to be so small that hardly anyone is injured. Still they do happen. And also the many attacks on transportation passing by. The last four years have seen a marked decrease in reported insurgent activities and an increase complaints from the human rights community about Laotian abuses.


No one knows exactly how many Hmong are left within the confines of the Xaysambone special zone. Supposedly the zone itself was abolished last year and divided up amongst the adjoining provinces. No zone, no problem. Most guesses put the number of people at no more than a few thousand. Over the past couple of years news of mass surrenders have made the news, and then nothing. No word of the fate of those who do surrender.


My Hmong Guide from last December a long long ways away from the Xaysambone Special Zone

Many Hmong, if they can, escape to Thailand. Over the years hundreds of thousands have taken the route, following mountains and avoiding roads, bribing a boatman to cross the Mekong where it flows in Lao territory, then across the mountains of Xayabuli province and down the mountains into Phetchabune province Thailand. The problem is the Thai don’t want them, for Thai people all others are "Meao", a pejorative for mountain peoples.


I found this background piece by Jim Pollard in the respected Thai paper, The Nation.
News that General Vang Pao may have been plotting to overthrow the Lao government will come as little surprise to people in Laos, or groups and individuals within the region who have been following the plight of the "jungle Hmong", which is particularly bad at present.

Remnants of Hmong groups that have survived since the war in remote areas of mainly northern Laos are in their death throes, given several years of a reportedly brutal crackdown by Lao and Vietnamese troops in the Saysomboom (Lao spelling Xaysabone) restricted zone, a series of large surrenders by the main jungle groups and a mass exodus across the Mekong to Phetchabun province.

The recent bilateral agreement by a Thai-Lao border committee last month - to forcibly return any new arrivals to Laos "no matter how many bullet wounds they have", as one sarcastic observer noted - was probably the straw that broke the proverbial camel's back.
Vang Pao would have been acutely aware of how dire the situation has become in recent weeks, which have seen a series of alerts of looming forced deportations from detention centres in the North and far Northeast, where Hmong from Laos have been detained.

Websites in the US such as factfinding.org carry regular updates on the predicament of Hmong refugees here, which is now an issue of international attention thanks to activists such as Joe Davy, Laura Xiong, Ed Szendrey and Rebecca Sommer.

Sommer, a German, recently showed her documentary on the plight of the jungle Hmong - "Hunted Like Animals" - in New York. She had initially planned to screen the film in the UN building itself, "but Vietnamese officials stopped that", she said.

Early last month, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) sent a senior official to Bangkok and Vientiane to stop the forced repatriation of 155 Hmong at Nong Khai Immigration Detention Centre, all of whom are listed as "people of concern" and believed to be at genuine risk of persecution or even death, if returned. That group remains, in a pathetic state of limbo, but the two governments have virtually thumbed their noses at the UN by sending back many similar groups.

Indeed, Reuters reported recently that Thai officials have ordered UNHCR staff in Bangkok to stop processing refugee applications because of the large number of Hmong and North Korean seeking refuge here. Hundreds of people with serious claims to refugee status have crossed into Thailand this year but none have been listed since late last year.

At least two large groups of Hmong with serious claims to refugee status (strong links to groups that have survived in the Lao jungles) have been forcibly deported in recent weeks. And a third group of 45 people is now crammed in Lom Sak police station awaiting the same dismal fate. This group allegedly includes survivors and relatives of 26 people killed in a notorious massacre near Vang Vieng on April 6 last year. (Photos have been posted at rogerarnold.net by the US photographer taken to the site several months later.)

Perhaps the most unusual aspect of the whole crazy Vang Pao "plot" is that the US government actually opted to prevent this latest alleged scheme going ahead.

Why? Because many in Laos and Thailand suspect Washington has either turned a blind eye to such activities in the 30 years since the Vietnam War - or has actually encouraged efforts to destabilise the tiny Asian regime and its socialist leaders, many of whom are ex-military and seen as bitter ideological foes.

French journalist Cyril Payen is one of about eight Western journalists and photographers who have sneaked into the military zones in Laos in recent years. He has just published a book, "Laos, the Forgotten War", which details one of several raids into Laos in the 1980s or 1990s by foreign mercenaries allegedly backed by Hmong exiles abroad, and even the Thai military.

Payen said his interest in Laos grew after he met two French mercenaries on the Thai-Burma border after the fall of Manerplaw in 1995.

"They told me about the Hmong. They said they undertook a security mission in 1989 allegedly organised by [a high-ranking Thai military official], to prove there were some resistance groups still existing. They went with a group of overseas Hmong, crossed the Mekong, and made a six-month trip to Phu Bia, a huge mountain where rebels were based. They lost about 200 men - mostly Hmong from America, who were killed by the Vietnamese. But they found 4,000 to 5,000 people - Hmong. The group included kids who were victims of chemical weapons.

"They [the mercenaries] said they later made a film and wrote a book about this, but nobody cared. They had gone later to join the Karen [fighting the Burmese] but were crying when they told me about the Hmong they met years before."

However, not many realise current Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont, a former Army chief, but one regarded as having a far greater grasp of moral issues than the military official Payen spoke of, is fast gaining a bad reputation because of his regime's treatment of the Hmong. Some have argued that the Surayud government has agreed to summarily deport all Hmong because it needs help from Vientiane, as the Council for National Security fears the "former power" or Thai Rak Thai heavyweights may seek to use Laos to funnel weapons or mercenaries, or simply large bundles of Thai baht to buy the next election.

Jim Pollard
The Nation

Every day now the papers report more Hmong repatriated, despite the objections of the United Nations.

Road Dangers

This is a bus Guard at the Kasi Lunch stop

Nothing like a picture of a folding AK strapped to someone’s back to grab the readers attention. Actually the most dangerous part of this bus journey was about to unfold fifty feet away. As I walked around the other side of the bus I saw the driver and door guy at the back table being fed shots by the restaurant proprietor who was hanging out drinking with his buddies. Shots of hard liqueur in Laos are looked upon as elsewhere as a measure of ones manhood. The driver in his mid thirties was being fed booze by the restaurant guy who was in his fifties.
I was taking a direct bus Vientiane to Luang Namtha. Scheduled for twenty three hours, they usually do it in twenty. The easy part of the driving was over, the next sixteen hours are twisty mountain roads on a good surface, a lot less bumps but the speeds are a lot faster, they don’t drive those busses like they love them, they put them through their paces. Before lunch the driver had been adjusting up the brake pads, I’d bet they go through a set every other trip.
The restaurant owner had no work to do, his wife ran the restaurant. The driver needed all his facilities intact. My sincere hope was that he was also doing amphetamines, otherwise I’d be scared of him falling asleep. Twenty hours of mountain roads is too much for anyone. At the end of the ride I asked him how he felt and he said great, looked wide awake to me.
Don’t think me a prude, I too have driven long drives in the mountains while drunk and on meth, just not lately and definitely not with 33 people on board. I counted just for fun.
I was on my second trip to Laos in 1996 when I first heard of a problem on the road. I’d been sitting in the same noodle restaurant in Vang Vien all morning with a Lao policeman, a girl who was then my then fiancé, and her mom. We saw a bus roll in from Luang Prabang, it had taken 26 hours thus far, (rainy season delays), sounded like fun and my suggestion to go there got an enthusiastic reaction. Except from the policeman. Don’t do it he said, bad people in Kasi, lots of problems. OK,, policeman advises against it, ok with me I thought. Maybe that long bus ride isn’t worth it.
My mom in law went back three weeks later anyway. It was the new cool place to have been for Vientiane Laotians. The cloth for the skirts is distinctive and it shows you’ve traveled. A resident Frenchman in a minivan fifteen minuets ahead of my Mae Thaou, and everyone in the van got shot to death. Oops.
Ever since then over the years there have been other “incidents” I lose track of when and the particulars. Truth be told I don’t pay that close attention. Seems like every couple or three years something happens. If there is a foreigner of necessity it’s known, if only Lao people it’s hushed up if possible.
I noticed the last time I came to Laos a presence of government police for the entire trip to Luang Prabang as well as lots of regular army guards who got on and off at random places along the most troublesome part of the road.
This winter I’ve traveled the road many times back and fourth to the north while going for little walk-abouts. There seemed to be a lot less of an army presence, I saw none on regular bus duty, and the federal police seemed to be making an effort to be inconspicuous, often wearing a coat over their gun and wrapping up the gun while eating. Often I don’t even spot a police man on the bus until maybe the end of the trip, or like here when he got off for lunch. I liked the way this guy was watching the back of the bus while we ate, no bombs.
I had assumed that the guards would be removed from the busses soon altogether. They scare tourists and cause tongues to wag. I’d say that they’ve done a pretty good job of pushing the whole story under the rug. Most tourists I’ve talked to are unaware that there is a low level counter government insurgency going on. Insurgency sounds too organized a word for scattered groups of Hmong including their women and children trying to hide and keep from getting shot.
Lately with the good coverage of cell phones and the ready availability of digital video cameras more news is starting to leak out of what’s called the Xaysambon Special Zone. Most famously there was a video taken of the raped and disembowelled bodies of young Hmong teens and the interviews with the survivors of a government attack. Gruesome stuff. Often there are desperate calls for help to relatives in America relayed to their small sympathetic press, the Huntington News, of being encircled and out of ammunition complete with starving children and so on, then nothing.
I guess the Lao government probably knows better if the guards on the busses are superfluous or not. Five days after I took the photo all heck broke loose with the regular dry season offensive somehow making it’s way into the daily rumour mill, and even worse onto the road north of Vang Vieng, but most importantly not the press.
The following is from the Travelfish website which must have very good sources indeed. I suspect an off the record report from someone at the US embassy. It seems too well informed and factual to be a guest house owner or tour operator. My only reservations are due to the use of the term bandit, usually used by the propaganda arm of the Lao government to classify the insurgents as common criminals. For the record armed robbery of foreigners is extremely rare in Laos, and robbery with firearms unheard of.

Link to Travelfish site

"Sources who were in Vang Vieng on the weekend of 10th / 11th Feb, reported they had seen very large numbers of Lao troops to the north of Vang Vieng. The most obvious area of activity on R13 North is understood to be around 15km north of Vang Vieng. It's not clear what precisely took place, but some locals believe it may be Lao Govt "attack" on people in nearby Hmong villages connected to the Hmong refugees in Nong Khai who are scheduled to be returned to Vientiane. February through April are known to be the months of highest bandit - Lao Govt conflicts.Vang Vieng Town itself is considered safe, but travellers should exercise caution on R13N, and for the time being - should probably avoid cycling and/or trekking too far north of Vang Vieng.The "troubles" do appear to have spread south of Vang Vieng as well, with arrests being made as far south as Phonhong (around 70km north of Vientiane) and skirmishes taking place south of Vang Vieng over the past few days. Partly as a result of this there remains a high profile troop presence throughout Vang Vieng District. The risk to tourists is still very low indeed. The bandits are not a competent, aggressive fighting unit looking to blow up bridges and kill tourists -- they are really just "on the run" and only fight back when they have to. Having said that, as a tourist, it is probably not the best time to be in Vang Vieng right now simply because there are restrictions on what you can do. Certainly doesn't sound like time to try the Happy Pizzas anyway!"

I was out trekking in the mountains in the north of the country which might as well be on a different planet. I got a text message from my wife when I re entered an area covered by cell phone. “They have a war going on in kahsii vangvien right now I want u to take arplan back” She had been getting calls from folks we know in the Lao army who know I often take the bus. Of course if you are in the army and people are getting killed you tend to look upon it as serious.
Searching for a good excuse to give my wife for taking the bus I asked a friend who might well be a party member. He reported that the situation was way overblown. Just a case of a few drunk soldiers shooting each other up. I think the misinformation came directly from the top, when repeated many times it’s a great way to dispel concerns over safety.
After reading a warning from the US embassy I took the bus, plane was full. It took me a whole extra day, oh well. I realize that the road carries some risk. So far the insurgency isn’t over and there is always the possibility. It’s trying to asses the likelihood of that possibility that becomes problematic.
When I used to climb we would asses risk all the time. If there is a one in one thousand chance of a piece ripping out of an anchor we consider it to be very poor odds, do something a hundred times and you’ve brought the likelihood down to one out of ten. Put in another piece of equal quality and the odds are back up to ten thousand to one, add another and you are up to ten million, back in the realm of acceptable odds.
If there are bus attacks on average once every three years with three hundred sixty five days in a year your chances of being on the road that day are one out of eleven hundred. Ride the bus six times in that time span and it’s one out of a hundred and eighty. Mind you we are talking about being on the road that day, not in the actual bus. As I remember they have attacked only passenger transport, not cargo or individual vehicles. Sixty busses and mini vans per day? Your odds just went up to around one out of eleven thousand. Significant enough to make me think about it.
I know and accept that amount of risk. It’s interesting to hear some deride it as being non existent or similar to the chance of getting hit by a meteor, or safer than walking city streets in America.
It’s also interesting how people perceive risk. If something appears scary the risk is assumed to be much higher. The chance of being in a plane or building attacked by Al Qaeda are infinitesimally small, in the millions, yet for years after the World Trade Centre in New York was attacked all people could think about was being the victim of a terrorist attack. I think it has a lot to do with those images of planes hitting buildings and buildings falling down.
Juxtapose those images with ones of forty hot tourists falling asleep on a long bus ride and you can see where the insouciance comes from.

In googling around to find background for this blog entry I also found this from an old Time Magazine story called “unlucky 13” after the route number. Great name.

“Around 8:30 a.m., the gunmen as many as 30, say witnesses jumped out from behind bushes along the road. Waving their guns, they stopped a crowded public bus, several cars, a tractor and the two Europeans who were heading north on a bike trip. Survivors claim the gunmen fired M-16s and grenades from rocket launchers, then stepped over fallen bodies and executed the wounded. The two Europeans, who have yet to be identified, tried desperately to flee on their mountain bikes. One was shot repeatedly in the back.”

Ouch, “repeatedly shot in the back” now there’s some guys without a sense of humour. Of course I doubt they were shooting M-16s, the rifle would have to be thirty years old. More likely the ubiquitous AK. Makes great reading though and I think puts a date on the last bus attack at 4 years ago.

Here’s the link Time magazine

Months ago I ran across the photos by a guy named Roger Arnold who managed to get into the Special Zone, link up with the insurgents, take photos, and publish them. For most of the world it was the first glimpse of something they had heard about but sounded too otherworldly to be true. Soldiers from a war that was over thirty years ago still fighting in the jungles of Laos.
Being a taker of snapshots I liked the photos. A very wide angle and lots of natural dark light from the forest. I can hear the dew dripping of the trees. When I looked carefully at the photos I noticed that very young guys carrying soviet style rifles seemed to be doing most of the running around with guns. The M-16s look to be saved but not in use.

Link Here for photos or read the Story Here.

Hard to imagine as I sit comfortably typing on my keyboard and as my wife and kids sleep peacefully upstairs that this is all going on less than a hundred miles from here. At this very moment people are quietly waking from a nights sleep, looking around, and wondering if the day will bring government soldiers. It is an overcast day. The beginning of the end of this long dry season? Let’s hope so.