The first time we came to Luang Prabang, in 2005, we met a very nice young man named Sinchan, who worked at our guest house. We would often help him with his English and he would ask very tough questions. He often wanted to know the difference between two words whose definitions were very similar. The one I recall most was when he asked the difference between melt and rot. Tadashi and I had to think for a few minutes before coming up with an easy explanation (ice melts and wood rots).
Tadashi and I came to Luang Prabang in the June 2007. Sadly, Tadashi had really bad food poisoning the entire time (damn that airplane food!). Sinchan’s family (whom we had never met) was kind enough to have a healing ceremony for the two of us. That was really interesting, and involved the entire extended family joining in and tying white cotton strips around our wrists. Afterword, we all joined in on a feast. This in itself was scary. Laotians eat in the traditional Indian style: they ball us a piece of rice and dip (and double- and triple-dip) into the communal food bowls. Considering that nobody washed their hands before they ate, we didn’t eat very much. Luckily it was easy to blame sickness for not eating too much; this way we weren't being insulting.
This year when we came to Luang Prabang, the first thing we did was go looking for Sinchan. He no longer worked at the same place, but luckily we remembered how to get to his mother-in-law's house. We didn't find Sinchan, but we did find his wife -- although she doesn't speak any English. Luckily, we had already purchased local SIM card (which are dirt cheap in Laos, I might add) because it turned out that Sinchan was 45 minutes away in his parent's village. His wife called him for us and we were able to arrange a day to see Sinchan.
It turned out that Sinchan had permanently moved back to his village to help his parents with the farm. Apparently it’s not that uncommon for husband and wife to live separately. He was in the middle of a 15 day monk-hood at the time we were visiting. It's not uncommon for locals to become monks for a week at least once in their lives. Sinchan had decided to do this in solidarity with one of his really good friends from America. We had originally planned to visit them on our second day in town, but we had decided to wait since I cold. That turned out to be the best decision we could make.
We found out once we got there that the new moon festival was just about to begin – and we were invited to join the villagers in the festivities. This festival involved nearly all the women in the village, as well as about a dozen men. The temple in this village is a very small windowless concrete structure. As it only held the monks, the important men in village sat on the “porch” of the temple, with the spill-over men sitting on mats covering the ground. The women (and us) sat on the 4 mats behind them. Since it’s impolite to point the soles of your feet at Buddha and monks, everyone was sitting with their feet under them. Everyone also had a scarf draped over their left shoulder and tied at the waist on the right side. Since I was wearing my scarf, I re-tied it to mimic theirs. Tadashi didn't have a scarf, but nobody seemed insulted at that.
After a little bit of conversation with the village English-speaker, the praying began. All the worshipers untied their scarves, and while keeping it over their left shoulder, extended one end so that about 6 inches of the scarf is laid on the mat. This end served as a platform on which to place your hands for bowing down.
The praying in Loas is a mix of Catholic and Muslim. It's similar to Catholic prayers in that the monks say a few sentences (using a microphone and small speaker), and then the worshipers says a paragraph. The difference is the prayer it more sung than said. This makes it sound more like a call-and-response singing/chanting that repeats for an hour and half. During this time, everyone’s feet stay under them, and everyone’s hands are in payer in front of their chests. Once in a while, everyone will bow, placing their hands on the scarf in front of them, and nearly touching the forehead to the hands (as in a Muslim prayer). Sometimes while bowed, the hands will come together to the forehead, then back to the ground and back up again before the worshiper sits back up. Once up, the hands, in prayer, will touch the forehead briefly before returning back to the chest; this move is also made after re-adjusting your sitting position. And so it went for an hour and a half. Tadashi and I could only sit for about 10 minutes before needing to adjust. The locals could go almost the entire time.
What was most interesting was on the one hand this praying period was very formal, but yet it wasn't very formal on the other hand. During the prayer, kids were running around, men would have an occasional cigarette, and more than a few people were chatting.
The woman I was sitting next two seemed to be the “coordinator” of the whole thing. She would interrupt her praying to tell people to do things, like when to give the offerings and such. One such offering was a 2-foot spire tower made of banana leaf and marigolds, with incense and money stuffed into the top. There were also little offerings of marigolds, incense and money wrapped in a banana leaf (this was the size of a sugar ice cream cone). At one point, there was a huge discussion – while the monks and most of the attendees were still chanting – about how many “ice-cream” offerings to give. Apparently there were only 3 up there, while there should have been 4, so another one was made.
Next, there were 4 trays of food brought out that to be given to the monks. Tadashi and I were totally unprepared for a festival, but as luck would have it, we had brought along four sandwiches (crazy luck to even have the proper number!) and we donated those to the food plates, along with about 50 cents cash per sandwich.
At the end of this session of chanting, the monks were given the trays of food and a mix of rice, candy and money was thrown above the crowd of attendees (it was like throwing rice at a wedding). Each adult had to have one piece of candy; the kids got the rest of the candy and all the money. Next, the monks ate; rice snacks were passed around while we waited. One of these snacks was really good; it was a pot-sticker outside, with baklava-like filling inside. The other was rice cooked with eggs. After snacking, we talked (well, pantomimed, really) with the locals for a few minutes. (I learned the pantomime for "Do you have any children?" I'll have to show you that sometime!) It wasn't long before we heard, “helloooooooo”, “helloooooooo” echoing from the speaker. I thought it was a monk checking the sound, but then some proper Laotian singing started. One of the village elders had decided it was a waste to sit next to that speaker and started singing. Mind you, he’s still sitting right next to the door of the temple. Again, they’re formal, yet not so formal.
Based on the surprised looks on the locals’ faces, I’m guessing he was showing off for us farang. After the first song, requests were being yelled from the audience, including one for us to sing. We politely declined, as the singer didn’t seem to need much of a push for an encore. For his next song, he stood up and started singing for real, including doing a little dancing. He even got an accompaniment of cymbals (in the form of two pot lids) and clapping. It was awesome. Tadashi took a video of it that we’ll try to put it up. At any rate, after he finished this song, he paid the cymbal player for his accompaniment and passed the microphone to a woman in the audience. We had one song from her before resuming the praying.
We prayed for another half hour, after which the food trays the monks ate from were passed out; the elder men and women each got one and we got one. Everyone else got a fresh food tray. This time there was a hand-washing bowl passed around before we ate. Tadashi and I, slightly afraid of the food (what with the germs, the sitting out and the flies), had Sinchan come out of the temple and explain that we could only eat a little, as our driver had been waiting a long time for us already (which was true – we were on the far end of the time frame we gave him). So we ate a lot of rice and a little of the food. It was good going down, but you never know how it’ll be inside. Tadashi was braver then me (I stuck to the boiled vegetables) and had the pork dish. Alas, he’s paying for it now, and is sick with intestinal issues – that makes him 3 for 3 in Luang Prabang.
As we were saying thank you and goodbye, one of the locals wanted Tadashi to take a picture of the village teenagers singing clapping while they ate. He did, and had the two shots of the local rice whiskey they offered (called Lao-Lao, or Whiskey Lao). We then said goodbye to elders, who offered us another shot of Whiskey Lao. That stuff is crazy strong! I'd swear it's close to 100 proof.
So once again, plans changed and we were better for it. Well, maybe not so much for Tadashi, but he still had fun.
Tadashi and I came to Luang Prabang in the June 2007. Sadly, Tadashi had really bad food poisoning the entire time (damn that airplane food!). Sinchan’s family (whom we had never met) was kind enough to have a healing ceremony for the two of us. That was really interesting, and involved the entire extended family joining in and tying white cotton strips around our wrists. Afterword, we all joined in on a feast. This in itself was scary. Laotians eat in the traditional Indian style: they ball us a piece of rice and dip (and double- and triple-dip) into the communal food bowls. Considering that nobody washed their hands before they ate, we didn’t eat very much. Luckily it was easy to blame sickness for not eating too much; this way we weren't being insulting.
This year when we came to Luang Prabang, the first thing we did was go looking for Sinchan. He no longer worked at the same place, but luckily we remembered how to get to his mother-in-law's house. We didn't find Sinchan, but we did find his wife -- although she doesn't speak any English. Luckily, we had already purchased local SIM card (which are dirt cheap in Laos, I might add) because it turned out that Sinchan was 45 minutes away in his parent's village. His wife called him for us and we were able to arrange a day to see Sinchan.
It turned out that Sinchan had permanently moved back to his village to help his parents with the farm. Apparently it’s not that uncommon for husband and wife to live separately. He was in the middle of a 15 day monk-hood at the time we were visiting. It's not uncommon for locals to become monks for a week at least once in their lives. Sinchan had decided to do this in solidarity with one of his really good friends from America. We had originally planned to visit them on our second day in town, but we had decided to wait since I cold. That turned out to be the best decision we could make.
We found out once we got there that the new moon festival was just about to begin – and we were invited to join the villagers in the festivities. This festival involved nearly all the women in the village, as well as about a dozen men. The temple in this village is a very small windowless concrete structure. As it only held the monks, the important men in village sat on the “porch” of the temple, with the spill-over men sitting on mats covering the ground. The women (and us) sat on the 4 mats behind them. Since it’s impolite to point the soles of your feet at Buddha and monks, everyone was sitting with their feet under them. Everyone also had a scarf draped over their left shoulder and tied at the waist on the right side. Since I was wearing my scarf, I re-tied it to mimic theirs. Tadashi didn't have a scarf, but nobody seemed insulted at that.
After a little bit of conversation with the village English-speaker, the praying began. All the worshipers untied their scarves, and while keeping it over their left shoulder, extended one end so that about 6 inches of the scarf is laid on the mat. This end served as a platform on which to place your hands for bowing down.
The praying in Loas is a mix of Catholic and Muslim. It's similar to Catholic prayers in that the monks say a few sentences (using a microphone and small speaker), and then the worshipers says a paragraph. The difference is the prayer it more sung than said. This makes it sound more like a call-and-response singing/chanting that repeats for an hour and half. During this time, everyone’s feet stay under them, and everyone’s hands are in payer in front of their chests. Once in a while, everyone will bow, placing their hands on the scarf in front of them, and nearly touching the forehead to the hands (as in a Muslim prayer). Sometimes while bowed, the hands will come together to the forehead, then back to the ground and back up again before the worshiper sits back up. Once up, the hands, in prayer, will touch the forehead briefly before returning back to the chest; this move is also made after re-adjusting your sitting position. And so it went for an hour and a half. Tadashi and I could only sit for about 10 minutes before needing to adjust. The locals could go almost the entire time.
What was most interesting was on the one hand this praying period was very formal, but yet it wasn't very formal on the other hand. During the prayer, kids were running around, men would have an occasional cigarette, and more than a few people were chatting.
The woman I was sitting next two seemed to be the “coordinator” of the whole thing. She would interrupt her praying to tell people to do things, like when to give the offerings and such. One such offering was a 2-foot spire tower made of banana leaf and marigolds, with incense and money stuffed into the top. There were also little offerings of marigolds, incense and money wrapped in a banana leaf (this was the size of a sugar ice cream cone). At one point, there was a huge discussion – while the monks and most of the attendees were still chanting – about how many “ice-cream” offerings to give. Apparently there were only 3 up there, while there should have been 4, so another one was made.
Next, there were 4 trays of food brought out that to be given to the monks. Tadashi and I were totally unprepared for a festival, but as luck would have it, we had brought along four sandwiches (crazy luck to even have the proper number!) and we donated those to the food plates, along with about 50 cents cash per sandwich.
At the end of this session of chanting, the monks were given the trays of food and a mix of rice, candy and money was thrown above the crowd of attendees (it was like throwing rice at a wedding). Each adult had to have one piece of candy; the kids got the rest of the candy and all the money. Next, the monks ate; rice snacks were passed around while we waited. One of these snacks was really good; it was a pot-sticker outside, with baklava-like filling inside. The other was rice cooked with eggs. After snacking, we talked (well, pantomimed, really) with the locals for a few minutes. (I learned the pantomime for "Do you have any children?" I'll have to show you that sometime!) It wasn't long before we heard, “helloooooooo”, “helloooooooo” echoing from the speaker. I thought it was a monk checking the sound, but then some proper Laotian singing started. One of the village elders had decided it was a waste to sit next to that speaker and started singing. Mind you, he’s still sitting right next to the door of the temple. Again, they’re formal, yet not so formal.
Based on the surprised looks on the locals’ faces, I’m guessing he was showing off for us farang. After the first song, requests were being yelled from the audience, including one for us to sing. We politely declined, as the singer didn’t seem to need much of a push for an encore. For his next song, he stood up and started singing for real, including doing a little dancing. He even got an accompaniment of cymbals (in the form of two pot lids) and clapping. It was awesome. Tadashi took a video of it that we’ll try to put it up. At any rate, after he finished this song, he paid the cymbal player for his accompaniment and passed the microphone to a woman in the audience. We had one song from her before resuming the praying.
We prayed for another half hour, after which the food trays the monks ate from were passed out; the elder men and women each got one and we got one. Everyone else got a fresh food tray. This time there was a hand-washing bowl passed around before we ate. Tadashi and I, slightly afraid of the food (what with the germs, the sitting out and the flies), had Sinchan come out of the temple and explain that we could only eat a little, as our driver had been waiting a long time for us already (which was true – we were on the far end of the time frame we gave him). So we ate a lot of rice and a little of the food. It was good going down, but you never know how it’ll be inside. Tadashi was braver then me (I stuck to the boiled vegetables) and had the pork dish. Alas, he’s paying for it now, and is sick with intestinal issues – that makes him 3 for 3 in Luang Prabang.
As we were saying thank you and goodbye, one of the locals wanted Tadashi to take a picture of the village teenagers singing clapping while they ate. He did, and had the two shots of the local rice whiskey they offered (called Lao-Lao, or Whiskey Lao). We then said goodbye to elders, who offered us another shot of Whiskey Lao. That stuff is crazy strong! I'd swear it's close to 100 proof.
So once again, plans changed and we were better for it. Well, maybe not so much for Tadashi, but he still had fun.
Comments
Post a Comment
Thanks for commenting!