Three memorable experiences in Laos – Luang Prabang

For the residents of Luang Prabang, daily activities begin at 5 am. At the time when the sun makes its way through the coconut trees and old buildings that watch over the journey of the Mekong River, spiritual traditions awaken the community and guide it to the main street, where the most sacred Buddhist ritual takes place - the alms giving ceremony - the ceremony of giving food to Buddhist monks. It is a religious event that has been taking place since the 14th century and through which locals give rice, fruit and sweets to the 200 monks who walk the streets of the city to ensure their food for the day. I had read a lot of information about this sacred ceremony, I knew I had to participate in it and I also knew that Villa Champa, the place where I would stay in Luang Prabang, would be on the street where the Buddhist monks travel. Suddenly awakened by my phone alarm at 5:30, I went out onto my room balcony and glanced outside, thinking that by 6:00, when I knew the procession would arrive in the area, I would have time to prepare a cold coffee, just good enough to keep my eyes open. I took a step onto the balcony and heard someone shouting, in a completely unknown language, of which I only managed to understand madam 🙂 It took me a while to realize that a local woman was calling me to take part in the ceremony, but from her desperate gestures, I deduced that I had to go down now and that any minute of delay would be against me. In order not to wake up my dowager husband who had warned me the night before that I would suffer consequences if I woke him up on his leave at 5 AM, mostly in the dark, I got dressed in a hurry, took my camera and went down to the street. There was a lot of hustle and bustle here, chairs and mats spread out on the floor, women carrying bowls of boiled rice and packaged cakes on their backs, tourists with their cameras ready for the moment, and cars trying to make their way through all the madness and honking their horns deafeningly, the beginning of a promising day. Looking around and trying to separate reality from imagination, I see myself surrounded by 3-4 local women who were trying to sell me products to give to the monks at the ceremony. More pushed by them than by my desire to occupy one of those small stools, I found myself sitting in the same row as those who had come to give alms. What the hell? I woke up at this hour to see the moment from a distance!!! Before I realized that in one hand I had a large bowl full of rice and in the other a basket of cakes, I saw an orange mass of people: Buddhist monks were arriving. The moment was impressive, in almost perfect silence, with their heads bowed to the ground and seated on mats, the locals were taking rice with their hands from their bowls and putting it in the monks'. Everyone knew very well what to do. Only curious tourists disturbed the solemnity of the ritual, triggering their cameras quite close to the main characters. I returned to the room to make the coffee I had been thinking about and, delighted by everything I had seen, woke up my husband, for whom 7 am was too early, and went downstairs for breakfast. The night before, I had arranged with a tuk-tuk driver to take us to Kuang Si Falls, the famous waterfall located 29 km from Luang Prabang, and at 9 am he picked us up in front of the hotel. We ventured into the rainforest that was about to reveal the most beautiful waterfall I had ever seen. In front of us stretched a group of turquoise pools, unreally beautiful and impossible to describe in words. There were many people bathing, although the water was cold, but the adventure was not complete without swimming next to the strangely shaped trees growing out of the water. I wasn't tempted to get my dose of coolness like that and kept going until I reached the 60-meter high waterfall, at the base of which was another beautiful natural pool, but where swimming was prohibited. I knew from home that at the top, where the waterfall is formed, there is another very beautiful pool, from where you can have a spectacular view of the entire area. We crossed the bridge that crossed the water and started climbing. The road was getting harder and harder, with bumps and very steep. We climbed about 30 meters and met a group of Chinese tourists who wanted to do the same thing, but turned back because of the difficulty of moving forward. I watched them struggle to get down and realized that we would have the same problem on the way down, because I was wearing inappropriate shoes. So we turned back, stopped at a restaurant near the exit, had two beers and drank them resignedly, but enchanted by the color of the water and happy to have seen such a place. We then passed by the street stalls selling souvenirs and, at one of them, there were two little girls, the youngest was no more than 3 years old. She tried to convince us to buy something from her and she succeeded, it wasn't hard🙂. She was a little taller than the pineapple behind her🙂 We got our driver and tuk-tuk back and made our way back to Luang Prabang. Only a momentary glimmer of hope prevented me from missing the butterfly farm I had heard about and which was on our way. So we took another 2-hour break and entered a fairy tale, another world where hundreds of butterflies fly freely by you, land in your palm and stay there until you attract their attention 🙂 A nice lady who was in charge of raising them, took us on a tour of the farm and showed us the process of releasing butterflies that had reached a certain stage of their development and had to learn to fly. Magic! We had a hard time saying goodbye to the butterflies in the fairy tale farm and returned to Luang Prabang with the idea of ​​entering the first restaurant and ordering anything edible. I had the spiciest dish on the menu and, after trying my best to satisfy my hunger, I swapped with my husband who was more inspired and had a soup. Very good 🙂 A fresh mango and beauty sleep followed.