Superbowl XLVIII from Vang Vieng, Laos

I'm watching the Superbowl from Vang Vieng, Laos. It kicks off around 6:30am here, and it's a slightly different experience than your run-of-the-mill Superbowl.

First, Thai broadcasters are speaking over their American counterparts, but I can still somewhat hear the broadcast in English.

Second, it looks like the market for Superbowl advertising isn't quite the same in southeast Asia as it is in the states - I've seen the same commercial at least ten times for a charity called redrawtheline.org, promoting energy conservation in response to climate change and other issues.. then four BNP Paribas commercials, and one Ford commercial. That's it for the entire first half. Through the first quarter, I actually wondered if they even sold advertising, because they just kept replaying the same redrawtheline.org commercial, but then BNP Paribas saved the day with a minute or two remaining in the quarter.

Also, I had it muted because my roommate was sleeping.. but it looked like Broadway Joe jumped the gun on the coin toss before anyone made the call for heads or tails.. and it looked like a nice kick-save by the ref to catch that coin before it hit the ground.

Unfortunately, I'm leaving at the end of the first half to go tubing/kayaking and exploring through some caves here. Fortunately, I'm leaving to go tubing/kayaking and exploring through some caves here.. and this game isn't even close - 22-0 at the half. Ouch.

Same Same but Different + Late-night bowling in Laos (Luang Prabang) + The long and winding road to Vang Vieng

One of the most common sayings of the locals in southeast Asia when trying to communicate with English speakers is "Same Same." Just to give you an idea of the popularity of this phrase.. there is an entire market for merchandise throughout Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia.. all with Same Same as the tag line. It's actually become such a popular thing to say that even westerners like us now say it all the time.. and we have plenty of fun doing so.

There are a number of variations of Same Same out there. There's "Same Same.. but different," which is probably the most popular of the lot - and it means that two things are similar, but not quite identical.. so there is a difference there. Another common variation is "Same Same.. but better!" This might be my personal favorite because one thing is clearly better than the other, and that's how we're going to convey our feelings about it - by comparing it to something similar but not quite as good to draw the distinction.

After some quick googling, I've learned that there was actually a movie!!! made in 2009 called Same Same but Different, about a bargirl in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, and the German student who falls for her.. and there's also a book with the same name! In this case... that's Same Same, but SAME, as we would so circuitously say throughout our trip. Since that one doesn't make as much logical sense as the others, we use it exclusively, as it tends to confuse the locals. They seem to need some differing point of comparison in there to make it work.

In case you're wondering, and I'm sure you are.. by the end of this trip, I became the proud owner of two Same Same t-shirts.. Same Same but different, and Same Same but better.. though the former was used at a marker party and is no longer wearable in public.. but more on that in a future post.

Our local Laotian tour guide, Nuth, was a huge fan of using Same Same whenever she talked with us - and that's probably where we picked it up.. that, and also from the street vendors, who are everywhere throughout the realm, where bargaining skills are at a premium.. as we learned in Phuket.

For our final dinner in Luang Prabang, it's a group meal at a place called Hive, which claims to have the best bacon in town.. because it's double smoked. They even have a large sign outside that states this claim for everyone to see. Being there for dinner, we didn't get to try the bacon, unfortunately.

The food for dinner is alright, but on this night, dinner would simply be our appetizer, as we have our sights set on much more ambitious goals.. most notably, to get outside the province lines prior to the 11:30 curfew so that we're able to stay out through the night.

It's fairly well-known secret in Luang Prabang, by backpackers and normal humans alike, that one can take a tuk tuk about ten minutes outside of town to a bowling alley.. that's right - a bowling alley.. and there's a party, filled to the brim with westerners, ready to rage all night long. Curfew? .. not here! They sell the standard Laos whiskey that I absolutely adore, as well as beer and something else that I was unfortunate enough to try - something they referred to as Chinese whiskey (in the attached photo on the left of the Beerlao).

The reason I got this Chinese whiskey is that it was the only option for a bottle smaller than a litre.. it was maybe a fifth.. and since we were just getting started at the bowling alley, I didn't want to go big right away - but I should have, and I ended up going that route anyhow. This Chinese whiskey was honestly the worst tasting whiskey I've ever tried. Forget about whiskey, it might've been the worst thing I've ever tasted.. period. It started out tasting vaguely like a whiskey, right up until this absolutely awful flavor bursts into your mouth.. and makes you want to spit it out immediately. Just awful. To be tough though, I finished the cup I poured over the rocks, and then finally broke down and got the good stuff for five or six bucks - Lion whiskey. So I went crawling back to the Laos-produced goodness.. and thankfully, she took me back.

Anyhow.. enough of that terrible drink.. and onto the bowling situation. I really couldn't believe what I was seeing. We're on the outskirts of a province in Laos.. in Communist LAOS.. and we're at a bowling alley at 1am with tons of westerners.. mostly backpackers.. dirty, grimy, hippie backpackers. It's like we're at party somewhere in the rural US with tons of random weirdos.. except instead of being in the rural US, we're in LAOS. I still can't get over this. Why are all these people here? How did they get here? Why are they in Laos, of all places? I may not be the most worldly of men, but the country of Laos never really crossed my mind before this trip.. yet here we are, and there are easily a hundred westerners, mostly in their 20s-30s, partying it up like there's nothing strange about it. That said, I think I can answer my own question as to why they're here...

Laos is awesome. It's beautiful, mostly under-developed.. it's more charming and less skeevy than Thailand.. and one can probably live and eat considerably well there for about $5-10 per day. Also.. Thailand is so commercial! Laos is the new hotness.

The bowling alley itself isn't half bad either. At one point I actually threw four or five strikes in a row.. but then later in the night, I couldn't even buy a strike. At first though, people thought I was a pro.. and then I came back down to earth. We hung out and bowled for a few hours, the night raged on, and I Irish-exited via tuk tuk back to the hotel around 2 or 3. We had a long drive set for the next day, so I wanted to get some shut-eye.

The following morning, we would depart for Vang Vieng, Laos, a province predominantly known for it's outdoor activities like kayaking, tubing, and the like. On our tour sheet, it warned us of long and winding roads to Vang Vieng.. and it advised anyone with motion sickness to get some pills or a band to prevent any issues.

We were to be on the road from 8-5, with a stop for lunch plus two stops in between.. so a very long day of driving. Given my phobia of vomit dating back to my childhood, I'd always take pills for motion sickness on boats and long bus rides like this to prevent any issues from coming up (pun intended) - except, I suppose I never knew whether or not I actually got motion sickness.. so this time, why not go drug-free and give that a shot?

Well.. the good news is that I do not suffer from motion sickness.. and I was also really tired from the night before, so I was able to sleep much of the way. That said, the road was verrrry long and winding - everything in the region is mountainous, and while the scenery is beautiful, navigating these mountains by bus is simply not ideal smooth sailing perspective.. I think flying might have been a less bumpy idea.. but we already had two flights planned for Cambodia.. so bus ride, it is.

For the most part, everyone made it through this ride unscathed.. people felt ill, but everyone kept it down for the most part.. and the prize at the end was Vang Vieng, one of the most fun stops on the trip.

Day 2 in Luang Prabang: Feeding the monks + Riding Thum: The Renegade Runaway Elephant + Swing jumping into the Kuang Si Waterfalls

At 5:40am, our second day in Luang Prabang would be our second earliest start on the trip, as we needed to be up and out early enough to secure our spots to feed the local Buddhist monks. The procession of monks begins around 6:15-30am, and tons of people line up on mats to pray and give out the food they've brought - this will be the only food these monks will have for a week, or sometimes even a month.


It seemed like there were about 100 monks or so, and they basically walked by in a straight line, one by one, with their food baskets either open (they're still accepting food donations) or closed (no más, por favor).. in a funny way it reminded me of Halloween, except instead of candy they get foods for sustenance like sticky rice, which is what we giving out.


It actually took a little coordination to keep grabbing chunks of sticky rice quickly enough to pass a bit to all monks who walked by without missing one, since they walked somewhat briskly at times.. though they must be a big fan of sticky rice, as I noticed numerous times that they'd have their baskets closed but then re-open them for our group and our sticky rice. Strangely, there was what appeared to be a Jewish star on the inside of my sticky rice basket.. and I didn't see it on other baskets.. but I'm sure that was just coincidence. Hm.


The rules for us as donaters of food were that we had to stay seated (not allowed to stand) on our mats on the sidewalk until our sticky rice was gone, and we weren't allowed to look the monks in the eye when we handed them the food.. so mostly boilerplate monk stuff. Once we finished handing out our food, we were allowed to photograph the remainder of the procession. All in all, it was a really cool thing to be a part of.

The next activity for the day was quite possibly the one I was most excited for before the start of the trip - elephant riding!

We head out to the stomping grounds (yep) of some local elephants about a half hour from our hotel. I get paired up with Tiana, who is the only other American on the trip.. she's from Seattle actually, and at this point the Superbowl had yet to be played, so she's still fairly grounded and low key.. that is, until our elephant, Thum, took matters into his own.. hands? .. hooves? I'm not sure what's appropriate here.

Anyways.. we all start by standing on this high platform that's similar in height to the backs of the elephants, making it easier to jump on. Everyone else gets onto their elephants without a hitch, and they leave to start the tour.. so Tiana and I are last to leave the platform. Tiana (or Tiananmen, as my autocorrect seems to prefer) gets on while I'm grabbing my dSLR camera for our ride.. and then the real fun starts.


Each elephant and group of two of us has an elephant trainer/whisperer of sorts.. basically a guy who works there whose job is to manage the elephant and its behavior during the ride. In the very beginning, this person's job is to simply (or not) help everyone hop into the seat on the elephant's back, prior to getting themselves on near the head/neck to help direct the elephant on the tour.

While I'm grabbing my camera, our elephant whisperer is still on the platform, just after helping Tiana onto the seat on his back, about to help me hop on as well.. and then Thum shows us what he's made of. He's not about rules and conformity - he stomps (yup) to the beat of his own drummer.. he's a renegade.. he's defiant.. he's THUM.. and now he's left for the tour without me OR the elephant trainer. That's right, Thum has run away with Tiana. Now they're about 50 feet from the platform, and people are freaking out.. mostly Tiana, but the trainer was yelling at Thum from the platform, and that wasn't working. Even Tamara, our tour manager who was staying on the platform to watch our stuff, said she'd never seen this before and wasn't sure what to do.


To be fair, I would've been freaking out too. Thum had a pretty good pace going with no one to direct or control him. and he gave no indication that he wanted to turn back. All of the other trainers were riding and directing their elephants on a leisurely tour, and our trainer couldn't even get Thum to come back so we could start ours. Thum wanted to do his own tour, alone with Tiana, and he didn't feel as though the trainer or I needed to be a part of it.


Finally the trainer gets off of the platform with another guy and they start chasing Thum down. The scene was completely ridiculous.. a massive elephant is running away with a girl from our tour, and these guys (the trainers) are running after him on foot, yelling and screaming at him.. like that's going to make a difference.

After about ten minutes, the elephant whisperer does convince Thum to come back with the classic trick that never seems to fail on animals - offer up a treat (in this case, bananas). The tour for other people is about 15% over already, and we haven't even started yet.


When Thum pulls back into the platform, the trainer gets on immediately and the other guy helps me into the seat, which has a wooden bar that closes over you like on a roller coaster, with Tiana. Finally, we start our tour.. except now Thum is in a mood after having to turn around and come back.. so he doesn't want to move around too much. The trainer is yelling at him in a local dialect of Laos, and he's not responding. In fact, Thum's runaway was the fastest he would go for the entire tour.. for us, he moves extremely slowly and keeps going off the path to eat something or relieve himself. Whenever there's an easy way and a hard way to continue along the path.. Thum takes the hard way and then improvises to create a new, harder way. There were points when we'd go up a hill and have to hold on for dear life, because it seemed like Thum was going to fall backwards and we were going to get crushed.. but thankfully, he stayed upright for the duration of the ride.


Somehow we're able to meet up with the rest of the group after another 15 minutes, as they sat and relaxed in the river while waiting for us to catch up. Thum continued to make our tour as interesting as possible, until he finally relieved himself, which may have been on his mind from the start. Pretty amazingly, these elephants actually go the bathroom while they're still walking - now that takes coordination.


It was actually a lot of fun once we got moving.. and once Thum started acting like more of a team player, the whisperer actually hopped off let me take his spot near Thum's head for a really cool experience.. plus, he took a bunch of great photos of us. Luckily, I brought my Korean Bad Guy hat (sorry Ed! I did get you a hat from Laos though) and let Thum wear it for a photo opp, as it couldn't have been more appropriate for him. We trekked up and down the path, through a river, and back to the beginning.. and it was awesome.

At the completion of our tour, we reconvene at the platform and they give us an opportunity to buy mini bananas (they don't seem to have the larger yellow bananas we're accustomed to.. maybe they need a fresh direct gopher?) and bamboo-like branches to feed our elephants. Unsurprisingly, Thum ate everything in sight.. and feeding him was really cool. In the end, we had a blast.. and Thum will go down in history as the coolest elephant.. EVA.


After a great local lunch at the Lao Lao Garden (Padsapao!), our final leisurely excursion on the day (it was a long one) is at the Kuang Si Waterfalls. This one involves some hiking up a bunch of steps and other terrain, and there's a really nice waterfall is at the end. We're allowed to swim in it, despite the fact that the water is extremely cold.. plus there's a rope swing from a tree branch that overhangs maybe 15 feet above the water.. so swing, we did. The cold water is a huge shock to the system once you land.. and heaps (an Aussie favorite to describe a lot of something) of rocks and stones on the floor of the falls make it very difficult to get out. Regardless, this was also a lot of fun, and it wouldn't be the last we'd use a rope swing to have some good times in the water.

A light breakfast on the Mighty Mekong River + Bike Riding with a side of Snake Whiskey + A Luang Prabang Sunset on the mountain-top, Phousi Stupa + Utopia

The morning after our evening in Pakbeng was an early one, as we were back on the boat by 7am heading towards Luang Prabang, our next stop in Laos. There was some banter the night before during our game of Bull$hit that we would resume the game at 7am after we boarded the boat.. and we stayed true to our word. What a way to start the day.. beautiful scenery, a serene setting, a half bottle of Lion whiskey, and a whole lot of Bull$hit.


We were all fairly toasted by about 8am (sorted or pissed are also commonly used by the Aussies.. I prefer sorted because it seems ironic in reference to inebriation), but we were the life of the party and having a great time. It's a good thing we brought a bunch of snacks though, since we crushed a few packs of oreos, chips ahoy, and pringles by about 11 when the Lion whiskey finally ran out. At that point, the group decided to switch to Beerlao, a local favorite in Laos, as well as a favorite beer among our group on the trip. At that time, I decided to break away, take in some more beautiful views along the Mekong, and catch up on some blogging.. as keeping up has proved to be a bit difficult.


We arrived in Luang Prabang in the early afternoon and quickly headed out on the town for a bicycle tour. Being more of a runner, I hadn't ridden a bike in probably a decade or two, if I had to guess.. but I truly can't recall the last time I actually did.


They advised us to refrain from taking photos and video during the tour for safety reasons. However, given my high level of recent experience with cycling, especially whilst recording video/taking photos, I decided to face this challenge, head-on.. even after the shot of snake whiskey - but more on that in a moment.


Biking around a new town is really a great way to see it.. I took tons of great video and photos with my trusty rugged waterproof camera strapped to my wrist.. and I only came close to crashing about ten times. We stopped at a local temple which was quite nice, and passed through all of the main streets within the town itself. Luang Prabang is much larger than Pakbeng and its one street, but it's not quite an urban epicenter.. it's still a developing area, somewhere in the middle.. and it's where our local tour guide lives and works, so she was able to give us the inside scoop on certain things.


One of those things was to find a spot along the bike tour to stop for some snake whiskey. And no.. this is not a brand of whiskey.. this is local whiskey with an actual snake in it, and then that whiskey is transferred to a shot glass for you to drink. Just take a look at that photo - how legit does that guy look? .. exactly what I imagined a snake whiskey guy would look like. Getting past the mental block of drinking something that was just touching a snake was a little tough.. but once I got past that, it wasn't too bad. The shot was pretty harsh/strong. I'm not sure if that can be attributed to the alcohol content of the whiskey or whatever effects are produced by a live snake swimming in it.. but it wasn't half bad, and it warmed us up pretty nicely for our bike ride back to the hotel.


After getting back to the hotel, we had a few hours of free time before dinner, so we used them wisely. By this point on the trip, Frank has really started to show how good of a traveller he is in terms of finding good sights to see and places to eat during our free time. Sure, he mostly uses TripAdvisor.. but he still makes the effort and does the research, and the rest of us reap the benefits, which is great.


The idea this time was to hike up a bunch of steps on a mountain called Phousi Stupa to catch a beautiful sunset over Luang Prabang. There were definitely a lot of steps on the way, but it was completely worth it - the views of the city and the Mekong were magnificent from up there, and we arrived just minutes before the sunset.. right along with about a hundred other people - so apparently this is a popular thing to do. That said, it worked out very well, and we got some good exercise in the process.


To finish off the evening, we had dinner and drinks at a nice restaurant/bar called Utopia. The owner of the establishment purchased it less than a year ago and made huge renovations that turned it into a really cool setup.. and there's even a beach volleyball court tucked away in there, which is awesome. We had some traditional Laotian food including a dish called Laap, which is the most popular meal in their cuisine. It can be made with meat or fish and contains many herbs and spices including cilantro and mint, among others. We also tried something called river weed, which was very interesting.. and the best way I can describe it is seaweed jerky.. it's flaky and served in layers with sesame seeds on top. The story is that local farmers find all of this seaweed, hang it out to dry, dust it up with local herbs and spices, and sell it to restaurants like this one to be served with a number of dipping sauces. It was unique and tasty - I'm usually anti-seaweed (except on the inside of a sushi roll), but this wasn't fishy or anything, and it was nice and crunchy, laid out in sheets for dipping.

We also got to hang out with the owner, Rob, who hails from Canada and is trying to make his mark with the recent uptick in tourism to Laos over the last five years.. and it seems to be mostly working out - the place was absolutely packed by the end of the night, right until everyone got ushered out for curfew (in Luang Prabang it's 11:30 for some reason). Here, though.. there is more to do after curfew, just outside the province's borders.. but more on that in the next post.


The challenges he's running into are related to infrastructure and resources. In terms of infrastructure, it's still a province within a really poor Communist country.. the power goes out in the entire town at least a few times a night. The bigger issue though, is finding reliable help that can provide western-level service with some degree of consistency.

In most of southeast Asia, service at restaurants isn't very good.. they don't necessarily work for or expect gratuities, and attentiveness to customers is generally a low priorirty.. but Laos (and Cambodia, as we'd later learn) really lower the bar even more. It's difficult enough to find locals who can speak or learn to speak English. Those who can speak English tend to get higher level local jobs, as being a waiter for a very low wage is not too glorious when you can speak English well enough. Consequently, what you end up with is a high turnover rate consisting of incompetent help that can barely speak English.. and the high turnover rate ensures they don't have enough time to learn how to work in a restaurant or provide decent service.. so really a perfect storm. The saving grace in Laos is that the food tends to be really good.. so there is that.

On this night, we would get to bed at a reasonable hour, as we would have a 5:40am departure to feed the local Buddhist monks in the morning.

Crossing the Thailand/Laos border + Cruising the Mekong River, day 1 + Pakbeng and the 11pm curfew = [Whiskey Lao + Bull$hit]

Crossing the border from Thailand to Laos is a fairly interesting and highly inefficient process. First off, they're bordering countries, so one could easily just walk from one right into the other, if this process at the border didn't exist. Second, it seems like they're using unnecessary resources to have more control over the process, but it doesn't make a ton of sense to me.. at least at the moment. My other main experience with crossing a border by motor vehicle was in college, going across to Canada from Buffalo.. and that was pretty straightforward. With few exceptions, they look at passports for a minute, ask a question or two, and then you move on to cross the border. Welp.. not this time.

We get to the Laos border and have to wait on line for a while.. a long while. Laos and Cambodia (up next after Laos) both require visas, so that's an extra chunk of time and paperwork down the drain. You hand in your documents and then wait for another while.. another long while. Finally they call your name and you're ready to cross the border, right? Wrong. You have to wait even more time for one of their buses to take you not 100 yards over to Laos, crossing the border.. and THEN you can get into your bus and move on. About three hours after you've started this process, you're ready to move forward. Surely (don't call me Shirley) there must be at least 20 simple ways to streamline this process. Then again, which government processes ARE efficient? .. so perhaps I shouldn't be surprised, after all.

Our mode of transport through the first two days in Laos, visiting Pakbeng and Luang Prabaang, is by boat via the Mekong (pronounced May-kong) River, also known as the Mighty Mekong. That said, calling it mighty is a little misleading, since cruising the Mekong is such an incredibly calm and serene experience. The only thing I can think of is that it's the largest river in southeast Asia, and it supplies power to many of the neighboring countries, making it the main export for places like Laos. So possibly.. supplying power = mighty? Sounds like a job for Wikipedia.

The boat we took to cruise the Mekong for two days was pretty nice.. it was all wooden, maybe 40-50 feet long, had room underneath the boat for our larger luggage, tables to eat our lunch on, an area to sit and sunbathe.. and my personal favorite - it had some power outlets! As a result, we were able to use my knockoff Beats Pill and charge our phones all day, which was great. The cruising itself couldn't have been more relaxing.. it was just what we needed after a handful of days running around Thailand.. and the scenery was just beautiful. I might've taken more photos along the Mekong than in any other place on the trip.

I really can't say enough about how beautiful the views are from a boat cruising the Mekong - all angles are aesthetically pleasing, from gorgeous mountain ranges to different types of exotic-looking trees and plant life.. to small fishing/farming villages on the outskirts of rural Laos - just beautiful, and photos can hardly do it justice.

Our first stop in Laos is Pakbeng, a tiny town right on the Mekong, that appears be supported solely by travellers along the Mekong. There's one real street (street is a liberal description) in the village, and our hotel is very rustic but also very nice. Upon arrival, a bunch of young kids rush to the boat to try to carry our luggage up the hill for tips.. but it's crazy because these kids are far too little to carry our big luggage.. so we decline.. but boy, were they persistent.

Laos is a Communist country, even though it's locally referred to as PDR Laos, or the People's Democratic Republic of Laos. Our local tour guide, Nila aka Nuth, explained that people are allowed to own a certain amount of property and earn wages on their own in certain cases, but there are many other facets of this extremely poor country that are in accordance with a typical Communist society.

For example, in certain places, Pakbeng being one of them, there is an 11pm curfew that is strictly adhered to. This means around 10:50, they begin ushering you out of one of the two bars in the town, and they practically follow you back to your guesthouse, where you need to go to bed or so something else which does not create noise. Also, people are on the streets offer you things like opium.. but if you accept and you're caught, you could go to jail for a very long time or be forced to pay extremely hefty fines (even by our standards) to get yourself out, as drugs of all kinds are fully illegal here, and people who are caught breaking the law will be prosecuted to the fullest extent.

So.. no illegal activities.. no staying out past 11pm.. no problem! .. not for this group, anyhow. After having a lovely local dinner at our guesthouse (despite the evil-eyed cat getting up in my grill), Frank and I went with Marco (Swiss bro) and the Aussie bros, Damon and Nick, out to one of the two bars we found on the one street in Pakbeng. Knowing that we only had about two hours before we would be ushered, we got directly down to brass tacks. After enjoying Sang Som all throughout Thailand, it was time to give Whiskey Laos a fair shake.

Strangely, Whiskey Laos is a bit of a broad concept in that you can order it just like that - "Whiskey Laos" - and you could legitimately end up getting any one of four or five different drinks. The cheapest local whiskey is Lao Lao, which comes in clear and cherry or something to that effect. The cherry is nasty, but the clear is pretty good and packs a solid punch - and for what really amounts to pennies, it's definitely the best value. The more "premium" Loatian whiskeys are Lion and Tiger, and both are really good. There is also a Black Lion whiskey and I think that's different as well. Tiger actually has a flavor called "Smooth and Mellon" which has a melon aftertaste, and it's incredible.. in fact if I can get a bottle or two shipped to the states, I will. So.. depending on which one of these four the restaurant has in stock, you could get any one of them, and the surprise is in the first sip.

We each order a whiskey Laos (in this case they had Lion), only to realize that we're paying about $1 each for a drink when we can buy an entire bottle for $3-4.. so after our first round, we invest in a bottle, half of which would be consumed on this night.. and more on the remaining half in the next post.

Now that we have our whiskey in tow, it's time to play some Bull$hit. I generally always bring cards when I go on any trips, and between Bull$hit and Kings (played on the overnight train), we definitely got our money's worth.

Bull$hit is a fairly simple game where the object is to get rid of all of your cards (or get down to two sets of four of the same card) before your opponents, as cards must be placed down in sequential order while each player gets their turn to place the "next" card(s) in sequence.. but a player can also throw down cards out of sequence, whilst claiming that they are in sequence. For example, two people to my right throw down a five followed by three sixes. Now it's my turn, and I have to throw or claim to throw any number of sevens. At this point, I may have sevens in my hand, and I may not. If I do, I can simply throw any or all of them face-down onto the pile. If I don't have any sevens, I can throw one or more cards from my hand and say "one seven," "two sevens," or something along those lines. The catch here is that while the people to my right represented fives and sixes, and I'm representing sevens.. from the point when someone claims to throw a certain card, anyone in the game can call Bull$hit! on that throw. At that point, the cards that were thrown must be revealed - if the throw was true, the person who incorrectly called Bull$hit has to take all of the cards in the pile (and drink), thus putting them at a disadvantage. However, if the throw was not what was represented at the time and that person gets caught bull$hitting, then that person has to take custody of the pile (and drink). Whoever gets stuck with the cards at that point now starts a new sequence.

You might be wondering.. why would someone be compelled to call Bull$hit on someone else? Well.. especially as the game progresses, people acquire sets of all four suits of a given card - so they know for sure that someone else claiming to throw that card is bull$hitting.. likewise if someone has two or three of a particular card, they may take a risk and call Bull$hit, hoping it will pay off and leave the other player with the pile of cards. People also begin to learn one another's habits and call Bull$hit on a purely speculative basis. For example, it's not uncommon to claim to throw two or three of a card that you actually do have, but instead to throw two or three garbage cards.. because if you have three 7s, four tens, and some other garbage cards, you can try to get rid of the garbage card and call Bull$hit on someone the next time they throw the remaining seven to complete the set of four.

The funniest parts of the game are when you get stuck with the card pile, and you get to look at the cards you take in and see who was bull$hitting and who was not. It's a very fun game, and this would not be the last time we'd play it.. with this bottle of Lion Whiskey.. within the next 12 hours. We played until closing and had some good times until about 10:50 or so, when they ushered us out of the bar to beat the 11pm curfew (ugh, Communism). We walk the two minutes back to the guesthouse and we're then asked to keep quiet and go to our rooms (ugh, Communism).