9th January: Luang Prabang, Laos
After breakfast, I went wandering for coffee and decided to try the local Lao speciality. This is made by straining locally grown ripe coffee beans through a cloth and produces the thickest and strongest coffee that I’ve ever tried! Way thicker than Turkish coffee. Luckily, I needed a caffeine boost this morning, but my head was soon floating. I had mine without the usual condensed milk, so it looked like tar. When I mixed the sugar in, I tipped the small spoon upside down and the coffee didn’t even drip off! The flavour is a little bitter but mainly just overwhelming strong. I think I’ll try it again.
Directly opposite the cafe was our first port of call for the day, Vat Souvannapoumaram. The outside of the sim is covered in friezes of holy scenes and entirely gilded. The magnificent five-tiered roof sits over a red and gold stencilled interior housing a large golden Buddha. The site also contains a manuscript library and classrooms for teaching. Notably, the temple is the seat of the highest dignitary in Laotian Buddhism, the Pra Sangkharat. Another golden Buddha is situated in a small modern building, which looks like a heart from the inside. Poetically, a few choice quotes were hanging from trees. “Light dispels darkness. Wisdom dispels ignorance.” Truer than ever.
With a bit of time until the Palace reopened, we made a beeline for the garden café. What better place to spend an hour in the peaceful shade with crispy baguettes, a papaya salad, bael fruit tea, and a smoothie. Bael fruit was a new one for us, but it is apparently sacred in Buddhism and Hinduism. It was definitely good in a Lao tea.
Luang Prabang isn’t the capital today but has a palace as it was the capital of unified Laos kingdom from first establishment in 1353 until 1500s and has remained important since. It was the Royal capital and home of Kings (effectively French colonial puppets during their rule) until 1975, when the monarchy was overthrown by the communists who still rule today. Cameras and phones aren’t allowed in the interior of the palace, which is now the National Museum, but it is a beautifully airy building with natural ventilation and cross-flow of air. Much needed on a warm day like today, although this is still a comparatively cool time of year. As well as the furniture of the palace, many gifts from countries around the world are on show. I think they missed a trick by including a model moon lander gift from the US. If it was up to me, I’d have made a statement by including a prosthetic leg here instead to represent the amputees from the 300 million cluster bombs they dropped here which made Laos the most bombed country on Earth. Laotian people are too kind and forgiving, however.
One other key artefact in the palace grounds is situated within the temple. The Prabang Buddha was gifted to the local ruler by the Khmer king in the 14th century. In 1502, the city’s name was changed to Luang Prabang to recognise its importance.
Today, Luang Prabang is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site as an “outstanding example of the fusion of traditional architecture and Lao urban structures with those built by the European colonial authorities in the 19th and 20th centuries”. Whilst it is incredibly interesting and beautiful, all the more for this mix of styles, this statement does kind of imply once again that UNESCO doesn’t believe that countries such as Laos deserve to be recognised on their own merits aside from being a backdrop for the architecture of the colonists.
The final temple we decided to visit was Vat Sensoukharam. The external gilded decoration looked the best of all those we’d visited but unfortunately the doors were closed. We were in luck though as we witnessed a young monk ring the bell to mark 4pm and the end of their holy day which begins at 4am. We couldn’t leave Luang Prabang without watching another sunset over the Mekong. We breathed it in with a fresh coconut and a Beerlao. We rounded off our last day in this wonderful town with our favourite dishes from the night market – fried spring rolls, tofu lap salad, tofu with shoots and ginger, and mango sticky rice. So good!
