"mr.yang!" a girl was knocking on my door. "mr.yang!" i put on some clothes and answered the door. "a phone call," she said, and i followed her downstairs. it was my mother calling me after i gave my parents the guesthouse number via e-mail. we talked briefly before i had a call of nature and had to rush upstairs for my ritual morning unloading.

my battle with the mosquitoes continued last night. this place is definitely more mosquito proof, but apparently one must've sneaked in during the day and waited for me to go to sleep. i was totally ready to surrender, let the mosquito have its fill of blood, until i heard the mosquito buzzing in my ear. that's like a taunt, and i quickly bolted out of bed to turn on the light so i couldn't hunt down and kill the mosquito. no such luck. i did the next best thing: i fished out the can of bug repellent from my bag and went into the bathroom and sprayed myself with DEET. even though i smelled like insect spray for the rest of the night, there were no more mosquito bites.

this morning i bought my plane ticket for chiangmai, leaving sunday afternoon, and i finally exchanged some money into laotian kips. you hear horror stories of how you get handed back a stack of kips, but that's only because the biggest denomination here is equivalent to US$2, so i got a wad of laos money in pocket. i feel so rich, but it's only US$100 worth of cash.

i visited a few temples: i figured i don't really need to overdo it, i got almost a week here. now i will return to the hotel for a nice hot shower, only to come out again at night for dinner.

writing in bed

transporting golden buddha

buddhas & dharma wheels (wat xiang thong)

"spanking the monkey" (wat xiang thong)

nagas (wat xiang thong)

last year's buddhas, this year's price (wat xiang thong)

monk's robe

mega standing buddha (wat saen?)
(note the pink buddha on the pedestal)

wat aham

novice kao and his monkey

calling for rain buddhas (wat wisunalat)