Being hounded at lunchtime by a gaggle of Akha women prodding me in the back and dangling cheap beads in my face was one of the downsides of Muang Sing. A dozen or so colourfully dressed tribeswomen hung around the tourist quarter all day long moving from foreigner to foreigner pressing their wares incessantly and with little respect for a man eating his baguette and eggs.
It was rather like sitting inside a goldfishbowl. Goldfish are beautifully adorned. Goldfish swim around in endless circles. Goldfish have very short memories. So too, it seemed, did these women. Again and again they would return to me, the same fingers prodding me in the back, the same hands dangling beads between my face and my food. Again and again I would refuse them. It is a testimony to Muang Sing that one of the first phrases I learnt in Lao was 'Please go away!'.
So what's the upside then? Weel, the fabulous morning market is one for sure. More about that later. And Muang Sing is a good base from which to explore the surrounding villages, many of which still carry on their traditional ways of life. And, if you're Kanchanaburi Man, another upside is that Muang Sing is a hotbed for opium smokers. Lets just say that beads weren't all that my goldfish women were selling.
All this means that you meet many sorts of tourists here. K-Man of course. He can be seen loping around the town in the later part of the afternoon and occasionally trekking out to a village in the hope of smoking 'O' with the headman. If he is lucky the headman will invite him in. If not, and this is more likely, then there's always some hard up local youth willing to share a joint with our hero. I'll leave it to your imagination to guess what a steady trickle of K-Men does to the addiction rate among local youths.
More sensitive tourists com to Muang Sing too of course. Mostly to get a glimpse of a different lifestyle, to see tribal customs, to meet what they like to call 'the real people' of Laos.
It is a little known fact that most of the people in South East Asia are artificial. It certainly came as a shock to me and I have been itching to examine the soles of their feet to find the 'Made in Taiwam' or 'Patent Pending' stickers.
It's fairly easy to tell the difference between real and artificial people. Wristwatches are a dead giveaway. Real people never wear them. Another sign is flush toilets. These are never found in real people's dwellings. And the mere presence of a satellite dish show up the whole population of a village to be 'not-real'. Anxious tourists, searching for the 'real' Laos, trapse ever further out into the hills around Muang Sing and many are bitterly disappointed to find villages 'spoiled' by these luxuries.
Early in the last century almost everyone from here to Singapore was real. Not a wristwatch or a flush toilet in sight! Then the corrupting influences of colonialism started making their mark. If you believe the history books then it was the administrations of the French, British and Dutch empires which were responsible for the changes. If you believe Hollywood (and who dosen't?) then it was the merry dancing and singing of Anna the Welsh governess which pushed Siam and later Indochina into the intensive manufacture of artificial people. Anna has a lot to answer for ... as indeed does Hollywood.
This process is probably irreversible. The Intensive production by the jewellers and plumbers of Bangkok and Vientiene will always outstrip the natural methods of the village people. The real Thailand and the real Laos are fast disappearing. If you want to witness the beauty of of a people unspoilt by clean sanitation in a village where nobody knows exactly what time it is then get here fast!
Attractive though it was to visit these outlying villages, I changed my mind when I got to Muang Sing. Pictures in my mind of tourists strolling through villages peering at local life brought back memories of when I was a student and visitors to our Victorian era college buildings in Galway would do likewise. Then there was always the temptation to fulfil their expectations and effect a drunken gait, staggering across the lawn roaring 'Begorrah! Me legs! Oh holy God I can't walk straight!' but I'm just not such a tease. OK, I will admit to occasionally wearing a flat cap while I drive my clapped-out '85 Fiesta through the touristy areas of Wicklow - at half the speed limit. After all, I don't want these visitors to know I'm not a real Irishman!
No, the villages were not for me. There was delightful Victorian architecture to attract tourists to Galway. The village architecture I could, and had, seen well from the top of a bus. There had to be a pretty good reason for me to approach and stare at a person going about their daily business and 'being a tourist' is just not a good enough excuse. If I was going to get up close and personal then I needed a more genuine purpose, and the morning market provided just that. Here there was a chance to join the throngs of locals, dip a toe into Lao culture and see Lao people (some of the maybe even real!) going about their business. I could bargain for some trinkets or queue for some banana fritters and, while I was waiting...I could stare!
So, was there much to stare at? Well yes, but staring was not enough. This market assailed all the senses. Even before it started and just as dawn was breaking I stood on the balcony of my guesthouse watching a long scattered line of tribeswomen traipsing past. Their sparse conversation was punctuated by the flap-flap-flapping of their sandles on the dirt road. The coins and medals in their head-dresses jingled and the wicker baskets they balanced on long poles over their shoulders creaked as they bounced up and down with the women's gait.
I don't know how long I stood there looking and listening, but at some point on that balcony I made the decision not to carry my camera to the market. At the time it was as a reaction to the tourist exploitation of the town. I did not want to be associated with the firing squad of photographers who lined up nervous grinning women against the town walls and - click-click-click - stole another little bit of their souls away. As I look back on it now, I have regrets that I missed some classic shots But I also realise that I would have been recording only one sense at the expense of all the others; amplifying that sense; pretending almost that seeing the market was all there was to it. Instead I walked unarmed and unburdened past lines of tiny squatting women, listened to the chattering of bargaining voices and smelt the scent of death around the butchers quarters where customers gathered like flies around the remains of a freshly slaughtered buffalo. I bought my banana fritters and some cinnamon jelly pudding and munched on these as I walked, partly to fill an empty stomach, partly to satisfy another sense, partly to try to taste as much of the atmosphere as I could - to take a little of it away with me.
Wherever I walked I had to tread carefully. Most of the stalls were laid out on the ground and only as wide as the person sittings behind them. If I didn't watch my feet I would be stepping on their neat rows of vegetables and eggs, upsetting their bowls of spiced meats and puddings, or landing a foot in their dishes of soft tofu. All this encouraged me to walk more slowly: all the better to see, smell and taste in even more detail.
I wasn't the only visitor to the market that morning. The firing squad were out in force and had chosen the walls of the toilet to act as their execution cell. More sensitively I was glad to see my travelling companions - Chris Sam and Gregory - tiptoeing through the stalls in much the same way I was. Sam shot some subtle photos from-the-hip with a tiny and inobtrusive digital camera. Gregory befriended a group of Akha women, calling to their stalls several times for a chat and even buying some yellow-flowered vegetable before politely asking if he could take a photograph. They were relaxed by now and graciously consented.
We four crossed paths several times as we delicately made our way amongst the stalls and I could read my feelings of delight and fascination in their faces too. Much as I tried to hide my awe - so as not to seem to be gawking - I am sure some of it escaped onto my face all the same.
With everything there was to sell sold, the market was all over by eight. The procession of villagers mounted their baskets back on their shoulders and flip-flopped back up the street - chatting more now. I guess they were more awake and a little warmer and richer too. We retired for a breakfast of coffee and banana pancakes, Gregory still clutching his vegetables, and a few memories too no doubt. I certainly was. Even now the taste of banana fritters brings a little of it back to me. And that makes me realise even more that a photograph could barely have recorded the experience. It would spark of feelings of recognition in me, but to show a hasty snap of the market to anyone else, I might as well hand them a banana fritter for as much of the atmosphere it would conjure up. Ever noticed the difference between a wedding and a wedding video? Well there you are! You want to know what it's like? I'm afraid you'll just have to go there. But for heaven's sake, please, please, tread lightly!