Mekong

The Mekong or Mekong River (UK: /miːˈkɒŋ/ mee-KONG, US: /ˌmeɪˈkɔːŋ/ may-KAWNG) is a transboundary river in East Asia and Southeast Asia. It is the world's twelfth-longest river and the third-longest in Asia with an estimated length of 4,909 km (3,050 mi) and a drainage area of 795,000 km² (307,000 sq mi), discharging 475 km³ (114 cu mi) of water annually. From its headwaters in the Tibetan Plateau, the river runs through Southwest China (where it is officially called the Lancang River), Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia, and southern Vietnam. The extreme seasonal variations in flow and the presence of rapids and waterfalls in the Mekong make navigation difficult, though the river remains a major trade route between Tibet and Southeast Asia. The construction of hydroelectric dams along the Mekong in the 2000s through the 2020s has caused serious problems for the river's ecosystem, including the exacerbation of drought.

The Mekong was originally called Mae Nam Khong from a contracted form of Kra-Dai shortened to Mae Khong. In Thai and Lao, Mae Nam ("Mother of Water[s]") is used for large rivers and Khong is the proper name referred to as "River Khong". However, Khong is an archaic word meaning "river", loaned from Austroasiatic languages, such as Vietnamese sông (from *krong) and Mon kruŋ "river", which led to Chinese 江 whose Old Chinese pronunciation has been reconstructed as /*kˤroŋ/ and which long served as the proper name of the Yangtze before becoming a generic word for major rivers. To the early European traders, the Mekong River was also known as Mekon River, May-Kiang River and Cambodia River. Historian William Dalrymple suggests that Mekong comes from "Ma Ganga" which means Mother Ganges. Hindus think of the river Ganges as mother.^{[citation needed]} The local names for the river include:

The Mekong rises as the Za Qu (Tibetan: རྫ་ཆུ་, Wylie: rDza chu, ZYPY: Za qu; Chinese: 扎曲; pinyin: Zā Qū) and soon becomes known as the Lancang River (simplified Chinese: 澜沧江; traditional Chinese: 瀾滄江; pinyin: Láncāng Jiāng, from the old name of Lao kingdom Lan Xang; the characters may also be literally understood as "turbulent green river"). It originates in the "three rivers source area" on the Tibetan Plateau in the Sanjiangyuan National Nature Reserve. The reserve protects the headwaters of, from north to south, the Yellow (Huang He), the Yangtze, and the Mekong Rivers. It flows through the Tibetan Autonomous Region and then southeast into Yunnan Province, and then the Three Parallel Rivers Area in the Hengduan Mountains, along with the Yangtze to its east and the Salween River (Nu Jiang in Chinese) to its west.

Then the Mekong meets the China–Myanmar border and flows about 10 km (6 mi) along that border until it reaches the tripoint of China, Myanmar and Laos. From there it flows southwest and forms the border of Myanmar and Laos for about 100 km (60 mi) until it arrives at the tripoint of Myanmar, Laos, and Thailand. This is also the point of confluence between the Ruak River (which follows the Thai–Myanmar border) and the Mekong. The area of this tripoint is sometimes termed the Golden Triangle, although the term also refers to the much larger area of those three countries that was notorious as a drug producing region.

From the Golden Triangle tripoint, the Mekong turns southeast to briefly form the border of Laos with Thailand.

Khon Pi Long is a series of rapids along a 1.6 km (1.0 mi) section of the Mekong River dividing Chiang Rai and Bokeo Province in Laos. The name of the rapids means 'where the ghost lost its way'. It then turns east into the interior of Laos, flowing first east and then south for some 400 km (250 mi) before meeting the border with Thailand again. Once more, it defines the Laos-Thailand border for some 850 km (530 mi) as it flows first east, passing the capital of Laos, Vientiane, then turns south. A second time, the river leaves the border and flows east into Laos soon passing the city of Pakse. Thereafter, it turns and runs more or less directly south, crossing into Cambodia.

At Phnom Penh the river is joined on the right bank by the river and lake system the Tonlé Sap. When the Mekong is low, the Tonle Sap is a tributary: water flows from the lake and river into the Mekong. When the Mekong floods, the flow reverses: the floodwaters of the Mekong flow up the Tonle Sap.

Immediately after the Sap River joins the Mekong by Phnom Penh, the Bassac River branches off the right (west) bank. The Bassac River is the first and main distributary of the Mekong. This is the beginning of the Mekong Delta. The two rivers, the Bassac to the west and the Mekong to the east, enter Vietnam shortly after this. In Vietnam, the Bassac is called the Hậu River (Sông Hậu or Hậu Giang); the main, eastern, branch of the Mekong is called the Tiền River or Tiền Giang. In Vietnam, distributaries of the eastern (main, Mekong) branch include the Mỹ Tho River, the Ba Lai River, the Hàm Luông River, and the Cổ Chiên River.