How Laos, brown cow.

That is how it should be pronounced.

I am currently in Laos in Viang Vieng and it is breathtakingly beautiful. Limestone cliffs rise up vertically like grey teeth from a landscape of rivers and wheatfields. And within these soaring cliffs are cave complexes and caverns that are the stuff of Pan's Labryinth. The long and winding complexes can leave you heart-hammering and sweaty as you squeeze through holes a foot across, fending off bats and jumping spiders, while the echoing caverns with their sunbeam skylights simply leave you speechless. Bulging alien formations struggle towards each other from floor and ceiling. My kingdom for a lens.

The currency here is the kip. I think its about 6 billion kip to the euro. Wheelbarrow's worth for a loaf of bread kind of stuff. On the plus side it does make you feel a bit like a gangster. Buy yourself something nice, I say, as I try and tuck bricks of it into shirt pockets.

I am oft emailed about the state of my love life out here. Some of the crueller among you joke about it, please, be gentle, when stabbed with your verbal knives, do I not bleed? Unfortunately the reality is far, far worse than any of the jibes. For the past fortnight I have been sharing my bed with a dreadlocked tattoo artist from England who answers to the name Tony. Our uneasy marriage of economics is helped by our general lack of body hair but is shaky at best. Laugh? I nearly cry, every night.