`Next morning I woke unnecessarily early (4.20) in that mood of pleasurable suspense peculiar to the first day of a long trek. Joyfully I went through the loading-up ritual: money-belt under shirt, camera pouch around waist, rucksack on with water bottle attached, binoculars over right shoulder, cloth journalbag (the most precious possession) around neck, torch, map and compass in bush-shirt pockets, umbrella-cum-walking stick in hand. Then I left Vang Vieng by the light of a setting full moon . . ." And Dervla Murphy is off trekking - around Laos this time. Her critics (yes, there are some) will label this book as more of the same: intrepid woman sets out to discover the romance of travelling among a backward people, eats funny food, has an accident - back/rib/foot - goes home and writes all about it. Next country, please.
So - intrepid? Definitely. She hacks her way through forests, wades waist-deep across rivers, straddles her way over a log bridge, and hangs onto her hat as, descending a narrow mountain road, the brakes on her locally-bought bike fail. Romance of travelling? See: rats, cockroaches, unsafe buses and inappropriate travelling companions. Funny food? Try squirrel, beetles and small round things in the soup that could either be testicles or eyeballs.
Finally: backward people. It is with this criticism that the political rottweiler in her comes into its own and which makes this book a sharp expose of the crass foolishness - not to mention self-interest - of those living in what she calls the Rich World (us) who think that those living in the Poor World (them) need to be upgraded to the sort of environment that will make life easier for them - an environment of tap water, cars, fast food, antibiotics and television. In other words, a world of bureaucrats, profligate NGOs, transnational companies, Monsanto and logging concerns. Travelling from village to village, she witnesses communities that are self-sufficient, hardworking, caring towards their children and household animals, resourceful when it comes to providing entertainment for themselves and - after the initial fright of seeing a sixty-six-year-old grey-haired foreign woman - welcoming.
However, the people of Laos might have good reason not to be so welcoming of foreigners. Between 1964 and 1973, the US airforce, in a futile attempt to destroy the Laos part of the Ho Chi Minh Trail, dropped, on average, one planeload of bombs every eight minutes, twenty-four hours a day, for nine years - and these are the Pentagon's own figures. Twenty-four years later, nearly 3,000 villages still have unexploded bombs within their perimeter, most of them anti-personnel cluster bombs. Arms manufacturers used Laos as a testing ground to try out these new bomblets, which were later used when NATO bombed Serbia. Still, welcoming they were - from the indigenous, animist Khmu to the hundreds of other cultures (mainly Buddhist) that make up the country of Laos. Many were on hand to help with interpreting, bike repairs and herbal remedies for an injured foot. Some of her fellow-travellers were less congenial. I nearly fell out of bed laughing at her description of a drunken English couple and their warring relationship, which necessitated her whacking the man sharply over the head with her torch. Her boat journey down the unspoiled Mekong, sleeping bag crammed between oil barrels, is magical. (The American backpackers disembarked in favour of a speedier boat).
Dervla Murphy, an experienced and knowledgeable traveller, has been trekking to remote parts of the world for the last 35 years. When she writes about the "progress" and "development" she has seen, we should take heed: she knows what she's talking about.
Mary Russell is a journalist and author. She recently contributed to Amazonian, a collection of travel writing by women published by Penguin The illustrations are from the cover of One Foot in Laos, and were taken by Dervla Murphy