When I first started travelling in my early 20s, I quickly received the impression that I was somehow out of step with my fellow travellers. While the majority of my peers were following a prescribed route, connecting up the top ten sights by the most efficient means possible, I often found myself going against the grain of the human traffic: heading north when most were heading south, beginning in the middle of the tourist trail only to double back or skipping whole sections altogether with a series of long and tiresome bus rides through dusty provincial towns.
Naturally this often made life on the road extremely uncomfortable for me, but on balance, I felt that I was getting the better deal. Unlike most of my fellow travellers, my itinerary was always put together on the basis of what I felt I wanted to see and do rather than what was generally seen and done. More to the point, it was flexible enough to reflect the simple truth that the experience of travelling changes you, instilling in you new goals and interests that you would never have been able to anticipate only hours before.
But perhaps the greatest advantage of this ad hoc approach is that it allows, or perhaps requires, you to create your own narrative. Step outside of the route prescribed by your guidebook and sanctioned by the masses of earnest young men and women all moving in unison, and you soon experience the exhilirating yet terrifying truth that you are free to choose whatever bold and onward path you like. At times your mood alone will carry you forward in confidence. But far from the madding crowd, when every decision carries the weight of personal responsibility, you would do well to construct an ongoing story to provide permanent sanction to the path you have taken. For through the alchemy of storytelling, even the most haphazard and disastrous sequence of events is retroactively configured into a coherent, necessary and inevitable tale. Your present circumstances are justified as the only possible outcome, and even as you sleep you are already oriented toward tomorrow's goals. ln short, narrative has a momentum, purpose and internal logic that make it a tool well-suited to those who are forging their own path. And of course, when you eventually reach your journey's end you will emerge with a polished tale never before told.
The tourist trail in South East Asia goes something like this. Bangkok is your point of entry to the region, and from there most travellers head to northern Thailand, then east into northern Laos. From Houay Xai at the extreme north western point of Laos, you take either a bus or boat ride down the Mekong to the temple city of Luang Prabang. That box ticked, you bus down to Vang Vieng to go tubing and drink a skinful, before pitching up at the capital Ventiane where you catch a cheap flight or overnight bus to Hanoi in northern Vietnam. There, the adventurous can buy a motorbike to assist them in traversing the country north to south, or simply bus it all the way down to Ho Chi Minh city. Either way, your next destination is Cambodia and a long westward tramp through that country taking in at least Phnom Penh, Sihanoukville and Angkor Wat. After that, and if you have any money or stamina left, you can relax on Thaliand's southern islands -- but only after either a long hot bus ride or an expensive flight.
On the road in South East Asia I met so many gap year students who were undertaking just this route. Through the accumulated pressure of numerous encounters, I began to notice their most salient characteristics: early twenties, soft-skinned or bearded, vested, logoed, accessorised, loud, sociable, optimistic, but with an unfortunate tendency to talk in cliches as if these were the most poignant and original of insights. In short, they were young, wealthy and well-adjusted as I was not. And while my better half understood that their platitudes were only the result of a life lived without suffering, all that was evil in me could not help but wish them a healthy dose of what they were missing.
You might think this judgement harsh, and clearly I have written to raise a smile as much as an eyebrow. But consider for a moment how these conspicuous kids of privilege must appear in the eyes of the bus driver, the chambermaid or the waiting staff of the rural towns through which they pass en masse. How odd must it appear to them that by far the greatest number of tourists to their region have not yet drawn a salary, nevermind accumulated the personal savings necessary for long-term intercontinental travel? And in any case, is there not something unsavoury about middle-aged men and women struggling to make ends meet in a developing nation by providing tube rides to groups of footloose and well-groomed western students?
Suffice it to say that my aims in visiting South East Asia differed from the standard demographic. Having spent one month in the Himalayas, I now wanted to get intimate with the jungle, and in particular the culture and practices of some of the hill tribes still living in the remoter parts of northern Laos. Besides this, I was also interested to see those three sights of Cambodia already mentioned. The temples of Angkor are of course a must for any visitor to the region. As for Sihanoukville, my interest here lay in finding out how Cambodia was managing its potential for beach-side tourism along the lines of the Thai model, particularly in terms of the tension between short-term profiteering and long-term sustainability. With Phnom Penh my intentions were rather more idiosyncratic. Yes I wished to reflect upon the crimes committed by the Khmer Rouge regime, but I also wanted to visit the city which gave birth to South East Asia's 60s surf pop scene, recently revived by one of my favourite bands, Dengue Fever.
How on earth I managed to wrap a story around such a mix, you will soon find out...
