Vientiane: Around Town

Here are some shots of me and Tim wandering around Vientiane... hopefully it gives you a sense of how small and relaxed the city is. Sabaidee.

The national library... ha!  So small and cute:

The black stupa, That Dam... located in the middle of a traffic circle, covered in plant life, and believed to be inhabited by a seven-headed naga who protected the Lao people from the Siamese invasion in the 1800s:

Tuk-tuks and jumbos and songtheows, everywhere you see.  When the drivers are awaiting a fare, many of them unroll a hammock, sling it across the passenger area of their vehicle and grab a nap:

Tim and I hit up the weekend night market down by the Mekong in the city's new riverside park.  There were several vendors selling this filled pancakes/crepes for kids that they put in plastic cone bags covered in cartoon characters:

We also watched as people flocked to the many booths offering paint-your-own pottery, focused on piggy banks and Angry Birds:

The night market was pretty similar to the one we attended in Hue, Vietnam, and has lots of booths selling clothes for locals, food, activities for kids (in Vietnam it wasn't paint-your-own pottery, though, it was "put your name on a piece of rice and suspend it in a pendant filled with a weird gelatinous, glittering substance."):

At the night market we also saw this awesome, portable cocktail bar.  I want one:

The next day we wandered by this ice scultpture contest outside of one of Vientiane's hotels.  Let me tell you, those people had to work fast, as the ice was rapidly melting in the 95 degree heat:

We had an awesome modern Lao meal, including the pomelo cocktail below, at Makphet, a great restaurant that trains street youth in cooking and hospitality... I bought their cookbook and can't wait to try some of the recipes:

We took another tuk-tuk ride around town.  Tim frowned:

We savored reasonably priced Belgian beers at Chokdee, a Tin Tin-themed bar (Belgian beer in Jakarta is heinously overpriced- like $15-20 for one):

You'll notice in the photo below that I look weird/old/tired... that's because whilst in Vientiane I had a strange allergic reaction to god-knows-what, which caused my eyelids to a) swell up and b) burn, and then subsequently c) wrinkle and d) peel.  Not sure what caused it, but it seems fine now.  Another country, another freak skin incident:

Yet another tasty meal, this one at Lao Kitchen... sticky rice, jeow, laab, Beerlao, sour and spicy soup... mmm:

Street-side take-away noodles:

Sunset and awesome cocktails on the Mekong at the kick-ass Spirit House bar:

Spirit House cocktails, from left to right: the Kojiro Martini (Tanqueray, dry sake and pickled ginger), I can't remember the middle one and it's not on their online menu, but it was an awesome cardamom infused rum, P&P Granite (pomelo, pineapple and cava):

Deep Fried Sun-Dried Beef, served with a traditional spicy Lao dip:

Beautiful riverside sunset:

Cool harvest moon:

Vientiane: Pha That Luang

Tim and I checked out Vientiane's big golden stupa, Pha That Luang, which was originally built in the 3rd century, but has been refurbished multiple times after being damaged and plundered during invasions over the years.

An image of the stupa is on the Laos national seal and its considered the most significant religious and nation monument in Laos (although the front desk lady at our hotel downplayed it somewhat, saying, "Oh, tourists like that temple.").  Apparently, when it was originally built, the stupa was said to contain a piece of Buddha's breastbone. 

A view into 2 of the 4 prayer gates surrounding the stupa:

In the parking lot of the stupa, there are several women selling birds in tiny bamboo cages- there are 3 or 4 little birds in each of those boxes.  They seemed to sense that Tim and I weren't feeling it, but they pounced (successfully) on this tour group below:

We saw this woman who had purchased a box o' birds saying a quick prayer and then subsequently releasing the birds within the stupa grounds.  Disturbingly, she was shaking the box quite a bit to get the birds out.  Not sure I'm on board with this practice:

In front of the stupa is this statue of a seated King Setthathirat, a Lao leader from the 1500s.  We saw several people praying in front of the statue while we were walking around the stupa.

Vientiane: Monks Doing Stuff

In Vientiane, sometimes it seems like Buddhist monks outnumber regular people... they're everywhere, walking around in their orange, mustard and saffron colored robes.  With so many of them out and about, you see them doing interesting things (that are really not that interesting, but are somehow made more interesting when you see a guy swathed in orange cloth doing them).

This monk below is illustrating the local practice of using an umbrella to guard against the ridiculously hot sun, a practice that I myself happily adopted:

These monks were doing a thorough cleaning of the area surrounding Pha That Luang, Vientiane's big, gold stupa.  The monks were sweeping, scrubbing Buddhas, and generally tidying up:

Across from our hotel was a temple and monastery - the monks lived in this cute yellow building below, hanging their monk-wear out to dry on laundry day:

Here is another view of the monastery... the monastery that played a loud, deep drum repetitively at 4:30 am, we think for the harvest moon, perhaps?

If you look closer, you can see that the monk in mustard colored robes is shaving his head:

Monks as tourists, checking out and taking photos of Patuxai/Victory Gate/Vertical Runway:

Other things we saw monks doing:

- Riding bicycles

- Weed whacking

Vientiane: Xieng Khuan

While in Vientiane, Tim and I decided to head just outside of town to check out the famed oddity, Xieng Khuan (Spirit City), also called Buddha Park.  The park is about 25 km outside of Vientiane, built along the Mekong River near the Friendship Bridge, which spans the river, connecting northern Thailand to Laos.

Traveling there was... interesting.  Tim and I hired a tuk-tuk for the journey.  Half the trip was on wide, dusty but paved roads, while the second half was on unpaved, pittec and doubly dusty roads, making for a super bumpy ride.  Check out the photos and videos from the ride....  I had to go bandit style to avoid inhaling a pound of dust, while Tim was gripping on for dear life in the back, lest he get jostled right out the back of the tuk-tuk:

Once at the park, we entered an eccentric riverside theme park full of over 200 concrete Buddhist and Hindu statues of humans, gods, demons, and animals:

Although the statues look weathered and ancient, apparently the park was only built in 1958. The park's designer was a mystic/priest/shaman who later fled to Thailand where he built a similar park, just across the river.

The park has a large (390 feet long) reclining Buddha:

The statues are pretty trippy throughout, and some look like they are telling a story:

This one looks like a hunger strike of some sort?:

 

Stop the violence:

This headdress is quite an elaborate mosaic:

Tim laments that he only has 2 arms:

Three headed elephant, anyone?

I like turtles:

 

So many crazy sculptures:

Nice skull hat, buddy:

The piece de resistance, though, is the large pumpkin-shaped temple from which a strange tree is sprouting.

You enter the pumpkin through a large demon head in the front, crouching down to get through the tight space:

Once inside you can take 2 routes to get to the top- super steep stairs on the outer ring or the claustrophobia-inducing trip up the 3 stories through the center of the pumpkin, which Tim did.  In the center, you ascend from the hell level, through the earth level, and end up on the heaven level:

Finally, when you reach the top, you have a great aerial view of the whole park in all of its bizarreness, but you are also frying in the hot sun:

Tim descends from the top through the center route:

A strange, but interesting place, that's for sure.