Luang Probang, Laos: Making Merit with Monks

On June 3rd, while cruising down the Mekong River in Laos, we made a stop at the Pak Ou caves, on the side of the river, inside a limestone cliff. the caves contain about 4,000 Buddha statues.




The view of our boat from the caves:

After the caves we got back on the boat and made our way to Luang Probang, one of the larger cities in Laos. After checking into our (air conditioned and wi-fi enabled) hotel, we set off on a tour of the town. Our first stop: The Vat Xieng Thong temple.




We then stopped at a street vendor that was selling Whisky with different snakes and lizards fermenting inside of it! It looked disgusting!! (I didn’t try it… but a few people did and they said it was really strong!)

We at dinner at a restaurant that had a cooking grill in the middle of the table, so we cooked our own food! It was really good!

The raw food:



The following morning (June 4) we woke up at 5am to make merit with the Monks during the Monks procession and we took part in the ritual giving of alms. Every morning the Monks walk down the streets in a line, collecting rice and food for the day from citizens, travelers, etc. We were all given rice for the Monks and we lined up on mats to prepare for the procession.




Me and Kate giving them rice:

There were about 200 Monks in the procession, and each got a small handful of rice from us. Their bowls were actually quite full; other people gave them crackers, bananas and meat.
It was really interesting, and it was well worth waking up at 5am!!

First Impressions of Laos

The night before crossing into Laos (night of June 1st), we decided to experience the nightlife of Chiang Rai, Thailand… in 80s themed clothing! We first had dinner at the night market, where we had the opportunity to feast on fried cockroaches and crickets (unfortunately I didn’t take any photos of them… they looked super gross and not very appetizing!!).
Before heading out to a local Chiang Rai nightclub (aka disco) called The Sperm Bar, we took photos in the hotel lobby of everyone in their 80s gear. I have to admit… I wasn’t too dressed up, I didn’t have much time to prepare a costume, and I also didn’t want to buy and carry around a costume in my backpack for the next 2 months!


We were the only foreigners in the bar, but we had an awesome night.
We woke up at 6am the next morning to take the bus to the Thailand-Laos boarder crossing. It was the most interesting crossing I’ve ever seen. We arrived by bus to the Thai side, and had our passports stamped with our departure cards. Then we loaded ourselves and all our belongings on long boats to take us over the Mekong River to the Laos boarder crossing.



Our bags traveled separately:

Once over to the other side, we all had to apply for our Laos visas at the immigration office. It was a very relaxed boarder crossing! We didn’t even go through customs, or need to actually talk to anyone. We only needed to hand over the visa fee (of $42 USD),, our passports and completed visa forms, and we then received our passports back with a Laos visa pasted into them.
Laos is the only land locked country in southeast Asia, and has only been open to foreigners for about the past 10 years. Because of this, most of the local traditions have been kept. It is also not very highly populated, and has a total country population of 6 million people. Laos is still under communist rule, and there are strict curfews in place. You are not allowed to walk the streets after 11pm, so at 10:30 everyone must start making their way indoors. I’m not sure what the punishment is for being out after curfew… but I don’t really want to find out!!
We learned some pretty scary warnings for the country of Laos. If a foreigner has sex with a local Laos citizen, then the foreigner will go to jail for 3 months and have to pay a $300 USD fine. This law is to prevent prostitution. Also, drugs are highly highly illegal here! And there lots of traps, for example: a local Laos person will sell you drugs, then call the police, who will then arrest you. If you are caught with enough drugs for distribution it is punishable by death. If you only are caught with using drugs, but do not have enough to distribute then you will go to jail and pay a fine.
Apparently drugs are very easy to find here though, and are sold at a lot of restaurants… labeled as “special” products. For example, you can go to a pizza restaurant and order the “Special Mushroom Pizza”… and you will learn the hard way that these mushrooms are not normal mushrooms. Our tour manager told us to stay away from anything in restaurants labeled “Special”. Another clue to watch out for is a food product that is more expensive than the others, for example the Special Mushroom Pizza would be around $10 CAN, while a normal pizza here should only cost about $1 or so.
After crossing into Laos we spent the remainder of our day relaxing on our own private boat and cruising down the Mekong River. It was really nice to have a day to relax, listen to music, and have some down time. Every day has been so rushed and packed with activities!
Our boat is number 666:





Me with my computer writing my blog:

I had a wonderful time on the boat: relaxing, reading, listening to music and taking in some sun.
We arrived at the small village of Pakbeng in the late afternoon not entirely prepared for what was awaiting us. First when we walked off the boat we were immediately surrounded by many children, all of them offering to carry our bags up the hill to our hotel for money. It was a bit overwhelming. Most of us (including me) carried our own bags up the hill, in around 35-38 degree Celsius temperature, and were literally soaked and dripping with sweat by the time we reached the top. (which has been pretty normal here… every day I’m drenched with sweat. It’s disgusting!) All we wanted was to lie down in our air conditioned rooms, and take a shower!
Imagine our surprise when we arrived at our hotel rooms…. which were pitch black… no power… no air conditioning… no internet… just two beds and a bathroom (toilet and shower head, no curtain), and a fan on the bedroom ceiling (which was not working because there was no power). Sydne and I thought we were going to die. We were soaking wet with sweat, lying on the beds, stripped down, fanning ourselves with magazines, in a dark room with still stagnant air. It must have been 40 degrees in that room! And we couldn’t shower because the bathroom was pitch black and there was no way to get light into it! I also only had one clean shirt because our luggages were locked up and inaccessible until the following night. So I was stuck in my soaked clothing for a while…We both couldn’t stop laughing at how uncomfortable the situation was.
The village only got electricity last year, and it is only used at night, so we were told our power would go on at 7pm. We were also told that we were staying in the nicest hotel in the entire town. We decided to get out of the hot, dark, hotel room and wander through the streets of Pakbeng.
Laos one of the poorest countries in the whole world, and this is very noticeable while walking through the streets and observing the local people.

The local markets look like scraps of random items that are found and then sold for money:

Some of the local houses:

We also had to watch out for mosquitos! We are now in a malaria infested area, and will be in a malaria zone for the next 1.5 weeks, so we need to constantly wear bug spray and protect ourselves by taking malaria tablets.
The power went on at 7pm… but only for about half an hour, and then we had no power for the remainder of the night. Unfortunately I didn’t know we wouldn’t have power, so I left my flashlight in my luggage, which was locked away until the next night. So Sydne and I used our iPods and a little keychain light I had with me. No power meant no light AND no fan AND no showers! The room was hot, we were sweaty, sticky and gross, and there were bugs flying around our room. Sydne and I were so fed up with this that we drenched ourselves in bug spray, we both took sleeping pills and passed out at 9pm just hoping to get through to the morning!
It was a very interesting experience….
Waking up in the morning, the view from the hotel was beautiful. Laos is a beautiful country, filled with lush greenery and breathtaking views.




We boarded our boat and continued down the Mekong river towards our destination: Luang Probang, Laos.




I’m getting excited for my week in Laos. It seems like a very interesting country so far! I was also guaranteed by our tour manager that the night in Pakbeng was the only night of the trip where we wouldn’t have power!

Chiang Rai, Thailand

On the morning of June 1st we took a 4 hour bus ride from Chiang Mai to Chiang Rai, also in the north of Thailand. Half way through the bus ride we made a stop at a restaurant called Cabbages and Condoms.

For those of you who followed my Europe blog (summer of 2009), you may remember the bright pink ridiculous pants I bought with Mikaela in Zurich. What made them ridiculous was that the crotch went almost down to my knees. Anyway I finally figured out the purpose of those ridiculous pants! And I purchased a new pair here in Thailand to serve this new found purpose. They are perfect for putting on top of shorts when you are entering a temple! Kate, Sydne and I all purchased matching ones, as seen in the photo above.
The main sight in Chiang Rai was the visit to see traditional hill tribe people. We drove up to the tribal reserve, where we had the opportunity to see a few different tribes including the Akha and the Karen.
The tribal people were displaying and selling their traditional hand crafts, and the Akha tribe even did a performance for us:



The most interesting of the tribes were the Karen: better known as the long-neck peoples. This tribe is known for the brass coils worn around their neck. The story behind the neck coils is that many hundreds of years ago, the women would stay in the tribal area while the men went hunting. One day a tiger came into the tribe and killed a number of the women. Since tigers attack people by biting into the neck, the tribe began protecting their women’s necks with these brass coils to prevent another tiger attack.
Now the brass coils are put onto every woman in the tribe, starting when the girls are between 4 and 7 years old, and are only ever taken off during childbirth, severe sickness, and when replacing the coils (when they need to be made longer as you age).
What I found very interesting is that the brass neckpiece is not actually a number of rings placed one on top of the other, as I had originally thought. It’s actually one long coil that is wrapped around and around the neck. On the older women, with the longest necks, the brass coil can reach a weight of 4.5 kg.

The woman in the photo below was actually featured in National Geographic:


Below is a diagram of the effects of the weight of the brass coils on the neck and spine, and another diagram of the coils being put on:

It was such an interesting afternoon!!