Expatiperro

1. Decide on your destination, then choose what type of bus you want to take. Minibuses are faster, but your driver will likely be blind and/or insane. Safer to choose the "VIP" bus. (Note: the "VIP" bus in most case is neither a bus, nor for VIPs. This is Laos, after all.)

2. Go to the nearest travel agency to buy your ticket. Realize 5 minutes later that you overpaid.

3. Kill time for an hour before your bus leaves by drinking a liter of beer and watching your 18th episode of "Friends" in the last 48 hours. Seriously, Rachel, just marry Ross already!

4. Catch a tuk-tuk to the bus station. Get dropped off in the middle of nowhere and watch helplessly as the only bus there drives off empty. Commiserate with other backpackers about the frustrations of Southeast Asian bus travel.

5. Get pushed by tiny Laotian woman into another tuk-tuk. Hear her say something about going to a different bus station, but the engine drowns her out before you fully understand her. Continue griping about Laotian bus travel with the two Irish girls next to you.

6. Arrive at the other bus station, which is completely empty save for a handful of other similarly confused and abandoned backpackers. Sit down, open book, and pretend you don't see the buses full of backpackers passing by on the highway. Continue doing this for the next hour.

7. Watch as a brightly colored bus pulls into the station. Get on said bus. Start to relax.

8. Stop relaxing when bus pulls onto the highway and takes hairpin turns at 40 miles per hour. Pretend the queasiness in your stomach is from carsickness and not your suspicious-looking smoothie you had with lunch.

9. Ignore the drunken Irishman walking down the aisle behind you, singing a particularly ear-splitting, atonal version of Michael Bublé.

10. Arrive in Vientiane. Get off bus, grab your bag, and unsuccessfully bargain for cheap van ride into town. Try to convince yourself that although you paid 2000 kip more than you wanted, in the long run, 25¢ isn't anything to lose sleep over.

11. Get off tuk-tuk, walk to hotel, pay extra for A/C because you're so tired, and go to sleep. It's been a long day. You've earned it.