An English teacher's blog about his travels and his digital art.
After the last post of April 15th, the next day I went into Vientiane to take in a few other places, a temple (wat) and one of the few restaurants that were open. Rather than post a lot of individual photos, I ran all my videos through the DaVinci Resolve editor and made one fairly short 10 minute video. You can watch it below. Enjoy.
Pi (pee) Mai (my) Laos translates into Happy Laos New Year, which occurred last week from about April 13th through the 18th. The official observance was from the 14th through the 17th, according to the government, with the New Year day on the 15th. I usually go out to Nai’s sister’s house near the Mekong River about 8 km from my house, an easy ride out. The celebration includes house cleaning, sprinkling and washing the Buddha statues at the various temples (wats) throughout the country, water play (a lot of it) among friends and family with buckets of water and high-powered super squirt guns, and eating and drinking, a lot of that too. Which category do I fall into? Probably visit friends, clean my house (a usual daily chore anyway, no holiday necessary), and drinking too much?? beer Lao. But not too much!
It’s mostly a fun time and it occurs during the hottest time of the year, so the water play is usually welcome. Some foreigners living in Laos hate Pi Mai, but mostly don’t mind it or actually enjoy it. Me? I mostly like it. Here are a few images from this year’s celebration.
These photos are from the 15th, when I went out to the farm along the village. Click on them 2 or 3 times to see a full size view. Below is a photo of Nai’s farm, which is usually tended by Nui.
This very new road, opened in January, out to the villages along the Mekong River was a great revelation. The old road was one of the worst around this area that you could travel on. It was a nightmare during rainy season, with no street lights, severely pot-holed, dangerous at night. This new one is great, lit with street lights and very smooth all the way out to the village where I’m going and beyond, traveling along the river all the way to Vientiane.
The new road out to the villages along the Mekong River.
Now, about the water play. Despite the great road, I’m sure I’ll get somewhat wet going out to the village. Here’s what I have to look forward to! However, I didn’t get too wet going out there, but coming back later in the evening was horrible. I got soaked, my glasses got wet ( I couldn’t put down my motorbike helmet visor because it has a dark tint), and I don’t see that well at night. I made it home OK, though.
Not looking forward to this.
OK, I got to Nui’s house without too many water problems. Here are a few of the people who were there and a look at the food we ate, along with the ubiquitous Beer Lao.
Here’s Nui along with her friend, Ms. Tia, from the neighborhood.
Nui and Tia.
This is another of Nai’s sisters, Lot, in the blue dress, with her girlfriend, Bui.
Lot and Bui.
Here Lot and Bui enjoy a little water play.
Lot and Bui enjoy some water play.
This cute young boy of about 3 1/2 years old was given to Nai and Nui by one of Nai’s nieces to look after until he’s grown up, not an unusual practice among some Lao people.
Young boy Ai (pronounced eye)
Here’s some of the food we ate. Plenty to go around for all.
Some of the food we ate.
Here’s one of my favorite Laos foods, grilled fish from the river. Yum!
More of the food, including my favorite, grilled fish.
Lot, Bui, and Ai play in the water from a hose. Looks like they’re having fun.
Lot, Bui, and Ai play in the water from a hose.
Oh-oh. Lot has a bucket full of water and she’s heading straight for me. However, she only got me wet a little bit and doled out wetness to the others around the table. This happened quite often, though, with Ai being the chief perpetrator.
Lot with a full bucket of water.
That’s all for the time I spent out at Nai’s sister’s house. The next day I went into Vientiane to check out the celebrations. I do that in the next post. I’ve also made quite a few posts from past Pi Mais. You can do a search in the search box, but here are ones from 2014, 2016, 2017, and 2021. That’s all for now. Stay tuned for more later.
P.S. Oddly enough, I didn’t get any photos of Nai. I think he was mostly in back doing the cooking. Oh, well, sorry Nai. If your curious, you can see him in the 2016 and 2017 photos by clicking on the links above.
The Laotian Times reported that the first-ever aquarium is proposed for Vientiane. Wow, that’ll be so awesome if it’s done. The Times says that
Once completed, the facility will serve as a major education and tourism hub. It will provide learning opportunities for students, support research activities, and contribute to the conservation of endangered aquatic species. The project will mark the first aquarium of its kind in Laos.
You can read the entire article here.
Right now, the first day of the Laos New Year holiday (I’ll post about that later.), with maximum temperatures being at or near 39-40 C. (102-104 F) for the last couple of weeks, an aquarium evokes feelings of calm and coolness in me, but I think it will be quite awhile before it is realized. So, along with everyone else, I’ll just have to wait patiently.
Today, July 10th, marks the beginning of the Buddhist Lent period, or Boun Khao Phansa, which lasts for approximately three months. It’s the time when Buddhist monks return to their home temples, there to stay for the length of the period to study, meditate and reflect for spiritual renewal. It happens on the first day after the full moon of the eighth lunar month and marks the beginning of the three-month rainy season. Well, the rainy season this year seems to have begun much earlier, and it’s been raining most of the morning. It’s been raining here since June and my yard at my house has been flooded for at least the past ten days, making it difficult to go jogging in the morning without getting my shoes soaked.
Anyway, at the end of the three-month period, on Boun Ok Phansa day, Lent finishes. The day after that is the final day of the Vientiane Boat Racing festival.
I’ve posted before about the start of the Lent period here, and here. Although it’s not an official national holiday, quite a few businesses shut down, especially local small mom-and-pop vendors.
Here’s a photo, taken this morning, of Nai preparing a goodie basket for the monks at a nearby temple. Most merit-makers include sweets in their baskets. I kid Nai that he’s going to make the monks fat. But, most people, including Nai, also include cooked rice and other food, like fruit, in their offerings to the monks.
Nai has a small shrine inside the house. He lit some candles and prayed to Buddha before he left for the temple. This evening he’ll probably light a bunch of candles on the porch and add some goodies to the outside shrine he also has.
Here’s a new piece of digital art that I made just experimenting with various filters and textures in Photoshop. This is a view of the largely ceremonial Presidential Mansion, which is rarely used, in Vientiane, Laos from the top of the Patuxai Monument looking down Lane Xang avenue. Not my best effort, but at least I’ve got something to post after such a long layoff. Enjoy.
Delay after delay after delay, but, finally, here is the final part of my Thai Trip Report, where I spent some time in Bangkok and Nongkhai. There isn’t much to report about Bangkok, so the video doesn’t contain that much about the City of Angels. [EDIT: I removed it as a matter of fact.] However, the Nongkhai section is a bit longer. I always try to spend some time there on a Saturday since there is a street fair every Saturday, weather permitting. So, here’s the vid. Enjoy!
[Edit: I removed the original video I had posted and replaced it with this shorter version. I took out the Bangkok section because it didn’t add much to the video and I reduced parts of the street fair at night and the kids’ dance practice.]
The annual Laos Food Festival was held in Vientiane from January 23rd to the 27th. I usually try to go on the Saturday date after classes at Vientiane College. Here’s some more about the festival from the Vientiane Times:
“The festival runs for five days from January 23 to 27, with stalls open from 9am to 10pm each day. There are 180 stalls, including 165 offering various types of Lao food, from regional specialties to traditional dishes and desserts, and 15 stalls selling handicrafts.
There will also be live performances, demonstrations of Lao sweet making, a talk on small business management and marketing, a fruit carving contest, and a Lao dessert sale, among other activities.
This is one of the most popular events on Laos’ social calendar and is sure to attract a large number of visitors, especially as it is taking place during the Asean Tourism Forum in Vientiane this week.”
Because I only attended the event on Saturday afternoon, I didn’t get to see any of live performances or other activities. Here’s a video I put together of the event.
(Note: I’m quite new at making quality videos, like for Youtube, so this one probably seems amateurish. I will get better as I post more vids. My video editor is DaVinci Resolve 18.6, which I’m also new to using. Will get better at using it, too!)
We made our way to Patong Beach on Phuket Island, where we stayed at the Holiday Inn Express. It’s a decent hotel that is only a two-minute walk to the beach and some of the rooms have a nice view of the gardens. It’s moderately priced and the staff has always been very helpful and friendly. About the only negative aspect is the rather meager breakfast, but it’s free and will provide you with enough food to get your day started.
One of my favorite ways to start the morning after breakfast was to take a walk along the beach. There aren’t a lot of people out at this time, so it’s quite peaceful. However, the beach lounge chair vendors are setting out their chairs to get ready for the crowds of sun worshippers who will arrive a bit later in the morning.
Directly behind the area where we spent the afternoon and early evening at the beach is the Kudo Hotel, which attracts a mostly younger crowd to its outside lounging area that has a swimming pool. One of the reasons for the age of the clientele might be that at the front of the hotel is the Daily Dose, a coffee shop that also sells cannabis, I believe. So, you can lounge by the pool, toke up with a hookah, and enjoy the nightly entertainment that the hotel provides. (Watch the video below)
Nai likes to sleep until the early afternoon, so he might miss out on some interesting events. One morning, after walking the beach, I went back to the hotel and came upon some folks from what I think is a middle school that’s right across the street. It appeared that there were administrators, teachers and students, including a student band, walking and marching down the road away from the beach, going to one of the main roads in town. They eventually ended up at what looked like a temple area. There’s a short clip of them on the video below, and I made another video of the entire procession that you can also view below.
Overall it was another enjoyable five-day stay at Patong beach and I’m sure we’ll go back again at a future date. Enjoy the videos.
Phuket video:
Patong Middle School Procession
Here are a few videos of the 2023 boat races held in Vientiane on October 30th.
First is an over view of the course finish line.
This is a stylized ceremonial dragon boat that’s lit up at night, if my memory of past years serves me correctly. I didn’t go into Vientiane at night this year.
While I was standing around waiting for the start of the races, a traditional ensemble began playing right behind me. Very lovely at first, but they kept it up for about 25-30 minutes and it became annoying after a while. LOL
Next is the frantic start of one of the races.
Then there’s the exciting finish of a different race, not the same boats that are in the start line video above.
(When I get more time, I’ll go back and enhance these vids with my video program that I have to learn how to use. It’s called DaVinci Resolve and it’s a free, open source video editor if you’re interested.)
So, that’s it for the 2023 Vientiane Boat Racing Festival. If you’re ever in Laos around this time of the year, you really should check out the boat racing festival in Vientiane. There are also more races around the country at this time, including in Luang Prabang, so there might be other opportunities to take in this wonderful cultural event. Enjoy.
The Vientiane Boat Racing Festival takes place every year around the time of the end of Buddhist Lent in Laos. The finals of the boat racing competition take place on the day after the end of Lent, which this year was Monday, October 30th. Before the racing, there are several days of the festival where there are concerts, activities for kids and vendors, who start setting up booths, stalls and tables to sell various products, hand-crafted goods, food, toys, shoes and many other items. I try to go to the festival every year because there’s so much to see, hear and do. The highlight, of course, is the boat racing.
This year, I went on Saturday and on Monday. Saturday was spent just walking around and taking a few photos, while Monday I took in a few of the races and also did some more walking in the area, which is right along the Mekong River. I didn’t take many pics of the festival area this year, but here are a few. Included with these are some photos I took last year and a few I took in 2020, none of which I have posted before. The reason I put them here is that they are very representative of the festival from year to year, like the one in 2015 and another in 2014. Looking at my photos from past years, it’s easy to see that as far as the vendors go, nothing is ever really different.
There are always many different kinds of Lao food for sale, so you’ll never go hungry at the festival. Plenty of eats at this vendor’s stall.
Lots of sweet goods also.
If you prefer home cooking or just getting a pet, you can try to win one of these ducks. See the bright red rings on the ground? Apparently, you try to toss a ring around a duck; if you’re successful you get to keep it. It costs money (I don’t know how much) to toss the rings, but you might get lucky right away..
You might work up a powerful thirst walking around in the heat, so you could always slake that thirst with a bottle of Lao-distilled vodka. (No, thanks.)
Lots of clothes for sale too.
And stuffed animals for the kids.
Though the animal isn’t stuffed, these children are enjoying the goings on anyway.
So, it was a fun day at the festival. I had taken the bus into town because I knew the traffic around the site would be extreme, to say the least, but when I was ready to leave, after stopping for awhile at one of the local watering holes, it started to rain, a very heavy rain. The last bus back to my neck of the woods was going to depart pretty soon, and I had about a half kilometer walk to the bus stop, but I didn’t have an umbrella. I could get drenched or try to find some place that sold umbrella. I found a small mom-and-pop market close by, and, yes, they had some umbrellas. Not exactly my favorite style, but it kept me fairly dry on my walk to the bus. Whaddy’a think? Cute, eh.
Next post I’ll have videos of some of the boat races, so check again later.
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