Luang Prabang

The sleepy, temple-filled main street in Luang Prabang

Luang Prabang is a peaceful, quiet town, one of Laos’ two UNESCO-recognised sites.  Its primary purpose these days is tourism but it’s been a key city for most of Laos’ history – it was the site of one of the three kingdoms (Vientiane and Pakse were the others) of which Laos was long comprised, and the principal seat of the principal king for much of that time. 

The wat opposite our hotel: chanting within!

The main part of Luang Prabang lies on a peninsula bordered on one side by the Mekong river and on the other by the Khan river (the confluence is at the tip of the peninsula).  There are three main streets – one on the Mekong side of the peninsula, one on the Khan side, and one down the middle – which are pleasant to walk along, and which abound with wats and temple complexes.  The town has historically been a place of learning, culture and religion and, as it was not bombed during the independence struggles (the King sided with the Americans) there are many older buildings still in good condition.  Our hotel was opposite one of the larger wats and it was very pleasant to sit on the balcony in the late afternoon and listen to the monks chanting prayers.

The tourist show that is now the early morning alms-giving ceremony

Today many of religious ceremonies seem to be as much for the tourists as for the residents: the traditional morning alms-giving ritual, where devout Buddhists contribute to the monks’ rations in return for merit and prayers is much more commercialised than it was four years ago, when I was last here (and it was certainly catering to tourists then, too!).  Many tourists now participate in the alms-giving – it looked like many monks received so much food they actually had to jettison some.

Monks waiting to be ferried across the Mekong

Bamboo bridge across the Khan (Mekong in background)

R & A & I crossed a bamboo bridge up near the confluence of the Mekong and the Khan and spent some time exploring the far river bank.  As always on the Mekong there was lots of activity: a party of monks was being ferried across, people were mending nets and boats or fishing, and tourists were being moved up and down stream.

Back in Luang Prabang we met up with L who was at a petanque game: it’s fairly common to find a small cleared patch of ground with a scoreboard ready to go.  No one seems to be super competitive, but some players are clearly very skilful!

The Xieng Thong temple, at the tip of the peninsula, is largest and most impressive of the temple complexes in Luang Prabang, with lots of sparkly mirror tiles and gilding around the buildings.  As well as the principle wat there are three or four smaller buildings each housing a Buddha statue, with more Buddha images on the interior walls, and other buildings sheltering ceremonial boats and a former library – these were also crowded with Buddha statues.  I overheard a fellow tourist, I suspect from that bastion of multi-theism, India, sighing, “Buddha, Buddha, always Buddha!”

I like the attitude of the person on the left...