The exciting and climactic story pt 1

Some people visit 4 countries (or less) in their lifetime. I visited 4 countries in 27 hours.

At 8am I left China and walked across the border between Zhuhai and Macau. From Macau I boarded an Airplane to Thailand. I arrived in Bangkok and went directly to the train station, where I purchased a ticket up to Nong Khai, a town on the border with Laos. The train arrived in Nong Khai at 10am, where I caught a tuk-tuk to the border. I walked across the border, took a bus across the Mekong, waited for my visa, and was stamped into Laos at 11am.

It was quite a smooth journey, up until I fainted 10 feet away from the Laotian border.

Backtrack. When I left China I joked to Liz and Dan “you know, if I was this sick in America I would probably go to a doctor, but I know it’s just China. Let’s eat.” I had been in China for 7 days and was ill on three of them, in addition to other China-food symptoms you can probably guess. On Wednesday night we went out to dinner, which didn’t sit right… but nothing lately had. Thursday I flew to Bangkok, then boarded the train at 8pm. By the time we arrived in Laos I hadn’t eaten anything in at least 36 hours, but I didn’t think much of it.

I shuffled into a Tuk-Tuk with some Aussies I met on the train, we went to the border where i started to feel increasingly… bad. I sat down on the ground while in the line for the visa. About three people from the front I stood up, and my head started pounding, my ears started ringing, and I started looking for a place to be sick that was not in the line or on other tourists. I was called to the front and passed my passport over, my ears hurt from the ringing noise and I kept telling myself not to be sick on the visa guy. He slowly counted out my $35 and then motioned for me to move into the collection line.

I turned towards the collection line, and then I was on the ground trying to prop myself up against the wall. An Aussie yelled “OY” (he probably didn’t say OY but from now on all Aussie sentences will start with OY) “are you tripping?!” “I'm not on drugs” I said, as the good and useful Aussies from the train came over and asked if I was okay. “I need some water and somewhere to vomit” I said.

The Aussies sat me on a chair a few feet away from the border and told me there were doctors inside if I needed anything. There were both Thai and Laotian guards present and both stared at me with passive disinterest. After sitting in the shade and drinking some water I felt better and was able to stumble across the border and catch a bus into town.

(stay tuned for part II!)