Packing up in Vientiane

The final week in Vientiane was a time of rationalisation of the bits we had acquired since arriving in September 2010. For being here for nearly 2 years we had not actually accumulated too many possessions, but it was still a daunting thought trying to imagine how it was all going to fit in the suitcase. Andrew actually spent a sleepless night contemplating this.

Andrew and the lady we buy our vegetables from

But when it came down to the line our Kathmandu suitcases were chocker, our two 38 litre day packs were full and a couple of other small bags represented our goods to take back to NZ.


Having not moved houses very often, Andrew found it difficult to make the hard decisions when things needed to be thrown in the rubbish bin. And lacking a shredder, and not wanting some of our work documents to become public property, we spent plenty of time hand shredding papers.



We had arranged with a neighbour in the apartment to take our printer, electric kettle, wine glasses etc. so it was good to have found a nice home for these. Andrew had asked one of the guest houses if they wanted our bikes and made 2,000 baht (about NZ$80) for those. When we threw in helmets and cargo nets for the baskets they were onto such a good bargain.

We made a point of eating at all out favourite restaurants and were even taken out by our landlords to a new spot (to us) to watch the sunset on the Vientiane and had a lovely meal. But the best meal of all was the final night at our all time favourite restaurant in the city L’addresse de Tinay – their deconstructed Cassuolet is divine!

The Staff Office

 

As we prepared to go to the taxi in the car park our housekeeper and another housekeeper appeared wanting to wheel our bags out, and then there we unexpected hugs from the staff in the car park.

We are sad to be leaving, we have enjoyed our time here and have learned a lot in the process.