Laos Essential Artistry

Tai Daeng Funeral Shaman Videos

This last summer we were lucky to have been part of a process of interviewing several Tai Daeng shamans in Sam Tai and were able to purchase some of the textiles they used in their ceremonies, and in this video we visually explore one of the textiles set to an audio track of a Tai Daeng Funeral Shaman chanting at a funeral in Vientiane. The chanting you hear is part of the process of the shaman guiding the spirit of the deceased as they make their way up to heaven. This chanting can take days and the journey is long and sometimes dangerous, and on the textile you can see the shaman on the back of an elephant when journeying over land and naga boats set between the elephants that the shaman can use to travel up rivers.

In the video below you can see the actual Tai Daeng funeral ceremony we recorded the audio from which we included in the video above. In this video you can a man dancing with "wooden sticks that are symbolic of knives as a show of power to frighten any bad spirits (phi) from interfering with the shaman leading the deceased's spirit on the long journey to heaven.

Panoramic shots of the Annimite Range near Sam Neua, Laos

 

I've been experimenting taking shots and merging them into panoramas. The photos above were taken this summer on the way from Sam Neua to Muang Vaen.

Firewood: A Traditional Source of Cooking and Warmth in Laos

 
Here's an article below that recently ran in the Vientiane Times about the importance of firewood. While most villages have, or soon will have electricity, almost all the homes still use firewood or charcoal for cooking and I don't think electric stoves will replace cooking using firewood. It's ubiquitous and will be for a long, long time.

When you travel in rural Laos it's hard not to see people, mostly women and older girls carrying wood back to their homes. You can see that the five girls above are heavily laden down with wood they've gathered from the forest for their homes. Sometimes they have to walk many miles over steep terrain, and let me tell you these baskets are heavy! While it is not easy work, the girls like you see in the photo above make the best of it, joking and singing, and strong bonds of friendship are formed in joining together in this important task for their families.

Below the article you can see a couple more of our photos with older women carrying wood on the "main road" in Muang Vaen, a fire keeping villagers in southern Laos warm and making a batch of lao lao over a traditional wood fire in a Tai Daeng home in northern Huaphan Province.

Firewood a traditional source of warmth

For thousands of years Lao people in rural areas of the country have depended on firewood to fuel their traditional household stoves and keep their families warm at night.  Such wood is typically harvested from native forests near the villages and is not only used for cooking, but also heating and fencing.

 

Many households in remote rural areas of the country continue to use firewood for cooking because they are yet to receive access to the national electricity grid.

 

Xieng Khuang province in northern Laos is one of many places where local people still use firewood for cooking. More than 50 percent of villages in the province now have access to the national electricity grid, according to provincial authorities. Over 2,560 families in villages throughout the province can now access electricity supplied by the provincial branch of Electricite du Laos (EDL).

 

Mrs Chouthor Yang, of Nam Kha village in Phaxay district, Xieng Khuang province, said she goes to cut and collect wood every day for use as fuel for cooking and heating at night. Nam Kha village gained access to the national electricity grid early this month. “Now, our house is bright from light bulbs, but we don't use electricity for cooking,” she told Vientiane Times .

 

“Actually, we don't know how to use electricity for cooking, but we hope to soon use it to prepare meals at our house,” Mrs Chouthor said with a hint of a smile.

 

Residents of five villages in Phaxay district, Xieng Khuang province, have started cooking with electricity after they gained access to the national power grid earlier this month.

 

About 30 of the 347 households in Nam Ka, Naphiathang, Sua, Thangxiengneua and Navarn villages have stopped using wood as fuel for cooking, Deputy Head of Tangxiengneua village, Mr Khamfay Dalavong said.

 

The five villages gained 24-hour access to electricity when the small Nam Ka hydropower station was officially opened and connected to the national electricity grid on August 9.

 

Mrs Chouthor said she collects wood in the forest from 8:30 to 11:30am each day. “My sons and daughters like to burn wood during the wet season to keep warm in the morning and at night.”

 

In the winter, her children burn wood all day and night in front of the house to keep warm, she added.

“Burning wood provides fuel for cooking and keeps us warm during the winter and wet seasons,” she explained .

By Khonesavanh Latsahao

 

Laos Handwoven Silk Textiles Receive Most First Place Prizes!

 

Below is an article that ran in the Vientiane Times last week and surely validates why we started Laos Essential Artistry. Above is a silk textile we purchased this summer in Sam Tai with a design that we think perfectly captures the Sam Tai mountainous landscape as seen in our photo at the very top that we took driving between Sam Tai and Sam Neua this last summer.

Laos receives most prizes at Asean silk contest

 

The unique and natural handmade silk of Laos has once again shone on the regional stage, this time receiving five first prizes at an Asean silk contest held in Bangkok last month.

Ms Manivone Keomany, who last year won the top award at an exhibition of Asean silk, also held in Bangkok, was this time awarded four first prizes at the Asean Silk Fabric and Fashion Design Contest 2010 held from August 22-29.

 

Six countries – Thailand, Myanmar, Malaysia, India, the Philippines and Laos – sent more than 300 silk products to compete at the contest held at the Impact Exhibition and Convention Centre, with Laos receiving more top prizes than any other country.

 

Twenty first prizes were on offer as Laos achieved the highest overall tally of 11 prizes, comprising five first places and four second places.

 

The handicraft leader of Xamneua district in Huaphan province, Ms Manivone, and other handicraft shops in Laos sent their products to compete on behalf of the Lao Handicraft Association.

 

“Last year's award was an inspiration for the group to create various unique designs to represent to the world,” Ms Manivone said.

 

One of the board committee members of the association, Ms Kommaly Chanthavong, who led the Lao team at the exhibition, said Lao silk has built a strong international reputation and many countries recognize the quality of the country's products.

 

“Even though our industries can't complete with other countries, our silks and our unique identity certainly can,” she said.

 

While other countries use modern machinery in the silk production process, Ms Kommaly said the quality of Lao silk is better because local producers still rely on handmade techniques, with all textiles hand woven on wooden looms and many using natural dyes.

 

“Our silks have become recognized because of our longstanding traditional values that we have preserved from generation to generation. Another major attraction of Lao silk is that we use a natural process,” she said.

 

She stated that the Lao handicraft groups working under the association have made great progress to present a wonderful image of Laos to the world through local silk.

 

Recently, representatives from Korea and Japan have invited the association to exhibit Lao silk in their countries.

 

Lanterns, Sihos, Ngeuaks and Nagas in Lao Textiles

We’ve isolated this diamond shape piece from tapestry style textile woven in Sam Neua because we find the motifs, design and color especially mesmerizing in this textile.

We included in the introduction to the Sam Neua Silk Tapestry Wall-hangings as is written the catalog Weaving Tradition: Carol Cassidy and Woven Silks of Laos in the section Patterns and Motifs that “The motifs in Lao textiles reflect and record the complex history of the region. Some are drawn from the unique Lao Tai culture and are said to represent characters in traditional Lao epics. Others are derived from outside influences both ancient and recent. The imported motifs have been adopted and adapted by each weaver and translated into designs that express personal experiences, hopes and dreams…"

But what do all the motifs in the diamond shape mean? Luckily, we’ve had the good fortune to guide a friend of ours who is doing research on a book about Lao textiles from primarily the Sam Neua region and we asked her what she thought about the motifs in the above textile and she wrote back:

“This brightly colored diamond shape is called a "lantern" and is often found on such Lao-Tai textiles as shoulder cloths (phaa biang) and door curtains (phaa kang). Here it may come from a funeral panel. The central design is a saang hong (or siho) that represents a mythical being that is half elephant (see the trunk) and half bird (see the legs). In the center, the siho appears in a mirror-reversed design, and again on each side in two smaller versions.

The siho is pregnant with double-headed serpent or ngueak (naga) in its belly, and on its back is a candle house with a figure inside -- representing a boat taking someone to the other world. The figure is either a recently deceased member of the community or the shaman accompanying him as guide into the after life. Notice the five-fingered hands of the figure and the naga heads on either side of him.

Rainbow patterns occur in the candles on top of the houseboat, in the “S” designs representing baby nagas, and in the hooks of the sihos’ hair. There is one story that says that such a design can occur on coffin covers of fathers who die before their children are grown and that the double headed naga in the siho’s belly represents the youths who must mature before the mourning process helped by this textile can be completed."

Thank you Elli! We love it. Not only are the textiles exquisite works of art, they’re incredibly rich in meaning. One of the reasons we’ve opened Laos Essential Artistry.

 

Cosmic Creatures: Lao Textiles from Sam Neua, Sam Tai and Muang Vaen

We actually got the idea for the title of this post from an exhibition curated by Patricia Cheesman at the East-West Center Gallery in Honolulu, Hawaii titled Cosmic Creatures: Textiles from Northeast Lao Communities this last summer. We substituted Sam Neua, Sam Tai and Muang Vaen for Northeast Lao Communities, because these are the towns most associated with Northeastern Laos and the towns we are very familiar with and will be visiting on our June 2010 Laos tour.

If you're a regular follower of our blog then you probably are familiar with Patricia because we recently wrote a post recommending two books for our tour participants to read to gain a better understanding of the history, complexity and artistry of Lao textiles and one of them was Patricia Cheesman’s Lao-Tai Textiles: The Textiles of Xam Nuea and Muang Phuan. In the exhibition mentioned above Patricia writes in the handout that, “This exhibition gives us a glimpse into the heavens of the peoples of northeast Laos where serpents are powerful allies and can become human; birds can turn into elephants, serpents or boats, through an art-form created by women.”

We’ve isolated the diamond shape piece above from a tapestry-style textile woven in Sam Neua because we too are fascinated with these magical (cosmic) motifs. But what do they mean? Luckily, we've had the opportunity to guide Elli Findley, a professor at Trinity College through northern Laos the last three years as she has been researching the use of Tai Daeng (Red Tai) textiles in rituals such as weddings and funerals, and we asked her if she would provide insight into the possible meaning of the motifs used in this diamond shape piece.

She wrote us back saying, “This brightly colored diamond shape is called a "lantern" and is often found on such Lao-Tai textiles as shoulder cloths (phaa biang) and door curtains (phaa kang). Here it may come from a funeral panel. The central design is a saang hong (or siho) that represents a mythical being that is half elephant (see the trunk) and half bird (see the legs). In the center, the siho appears in a mirror-reversed design, and again on each side in two smaller versions.

The siho is pregnant with double-headed serpent or ngueak (naga) in its belly, and on its back is a candle house with a figure inside -- representing a boat taking someone to the other world. The figure is either a recently deceased member of the community or the shaman accompanying him as guide into the after life. Notice the five-fingered hands of the figure and the naga heads on either side of him. Rainbow patterns occur in the candles on top of the houseboat, in the “S” designs representing baby nagas, and in the hooks of the sihos’ hair. There is one story that says that such a design can occur on coffin covers of fathers who die before their children are grown and that the double headed naga in the siho’s belly represents the youths who must mature before the mourning process helped by this textile can be completed."

Elli writes that the siho is  "pregnant with double-headed serpent or ngueak (naga) in its belly." Patricia Cheesman in the handout mentioned above writes about the naga (nak/ngeuak) that,  “The serpent is the oldest symbol known to have been a totem of the ancestors of the Lao-Tai peoples and was shared by the Chinese in the Yangtze River basin over 6000 years ago. Whereas the Chinese told of the male serpent hunder god controlling rain, storm, earthquake, and flood, the Lao talked of their mother ngueak, a serpent goddess that had a human face and could turn into a human at will. She had the same powers over water, a crucial resource for growing rice and the source of life force and well-being of the people. The serpents guarded the treasures of the earth, living in caverns full of gems and crystal water and often ventured into the realm of humans, seducing and procreating with them. They are loved as ancestors of the Lao-Tai peoples in myths and legends. In the textiles these serpents are shown with colorful crests, bodies that curve into ‘w’, ‘v’ or ‘s’ shapes and appear to be spiraling in a criss-cross game or passing from one realm to another in procession. The crested serpent is the active, aroused form of the serpent mother.

In Buddhist iconography, there are serpents called nagas. The most famous naga protected the Buddha from floods at the Enlightenment. The naak, which is the Lao pronunciation of naga, is represented on temple steps and roofs as the link between the realm of the gods and humans, the profound and the mundane. They can also become human, protect and bring rain. The correlations between the Buddhist naak and the shamanic serpent mother ngueak are as entwined as their bodies on the textiles. The cosmic serpent is still the most popular motif on Lao textiles today and represents female energy, the power of nature, and the earth.”

Join us in June to visit Laos, "Land of the Naga!"

 

Laos Tour Bibliograhy continued: Textile Books

There are three books that we recommend if someone wants to gain a better understanding about Lao textiles. Two are in print and our top two choices. They are: Weaving Tradition: Carol Cassidy and Woven Silks of Laos and Lao-Tai Textiles: The Textiles of Xam Nuea and Muang Phuan by Patricia Cheesman. The third book is the small classic by Mary Connors, Lao Textiles and Traditions, published in 1996 and has been out of print for many years.

The one book that we’re most excited about though is one that hasn’t been published yet. It’s in the process of being written by Elli Findly, the professor we’ve guided the last three years. It will be the kind of book that anyone traveling to Laos with an interest in textiles will want to have, providing the most complete discussion of all the different motifs being used in Lao textiles and the influence of religion (Buddhist and animist) and their use in rituals past and present. As she writes in her vita, the current proposed title is, Spirits in the Loom: Religion and Design in the Weaving of Northeastern Laos,” and of course its still in the process of being researched and written. Her direction in the book is reflected in a recent presentation she gave on “The Serpent and the Bird: Images of Transformation in Tai Textiles,” sponsored jointly by the Costume and Textile Society, the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum, and the Town and Country Club, Hartford, October 7, 2009. 

Our top two books are very different and are complementary, at least from our perspective. Carol’s book is actually a catalog produced in conjunction with the exhibition Weaving Tradition: Carol Cassidy and Woven Silks of Laos. The book was written by Dorothy Twining Globus and Mary F. Connors and the exhibition was curated by Dorothy Twining Globus.  As is written on the mocfa website, the book is “a comprehensive overview of the traditional and contemporary woven silk textiles of Laos and the techniques used to produce them plus a portrait of designer Carol Cassidy and her workshop, Lao Textiles. 160 pages, with 125 images and illustrations.” The book can be ordered through the San Francisco Muesum of Craft and Folk art here.

And we have to give ourselves a little plug as Peter is one of the many people listed in the acknowledgements as “having given generously of their talents, experience, and commitment in bringing this book and exhibition to fruition.” Two of our photos were used, there’s one of a Mien women embroidering on pg. 31 and the first photo in a sequence showing the tapestry weave technique of pg. 59.

The book is divided into three sections, The People of Laos and their Textiles, Making Textiles and  Carol Cassidy and the Lao Textiles Studio. The section we keep turning to is “Making Textiles.” Mary and Dorothy have done a marvelous job in describing and illustrating all the myriad facets of the weaving process. The writing is clear and the photographs leave no ambiguity, you really learn something here. Plus, almost worth the price of the book itself are the two black and white detailed illustrations of the loom, one facing the back of the weaver and one from overhead, looking directly down on the loom and weaver. We can’t begin to tell you the hundreds of times we’ve referred to these drawings in trying to better understand certain weaving details (at least from Peter’s perspective!).

The only nitpicking we have is with the binding of the catalog and our book is now in many “pieces.”

  

The second book we highly recommend is Lao-Tai Textiles: The Textiles of Xam Nuea and Muang Phuan by Patricia Cheesman. In writing this post we discovered there is a new PB edition, published on September 30, 2009 that is available on Amazon at a 32% discount for $40.85. Yes!

We are eternally grateful to Patricia because it is only through her book that we learned about Muang Vaen, one of our favorite weaving villages in all of Laos, and one that we visit on our tour. The book is clearly a work of love combined with some serious scholarship. We’ve met Patricia at a conference in Bangkok, visited her gallery in Chiang Mai and have a DVD she produced on Tai Daeng Shamanic Traditions in Sam Neua, and her strong connections with the tribal people of this region are clearly evident.

Patricia has published numerous books and articles on Thai and Lao textiles and is a recognized Lao-Thai textile expert and recently curated an exhibition (Summer 2009) at the East-West Center Gallery in Honolulu, Hawai‘I titled Cosmic Creatures: Textiles from Northeast Lao Communities, centering in the Sam Neua, Muang Vaen and Sam Tai area.

Back to the book. Whereas Carol’s catalog is more technical, Patricia’s book is rich in its telling of the story of weavers, villagers and shamans from the northeast region of Laos through their textiles.  The history and geography chapters are a little confusing, but they can be skipped and we’ve learned so much from her chapters on Lao women’s sinhs (Chapter 5: Textiles for women’s everyday wear and Chapter 6: Textiles for women’s ceremonial dress). The book is richly illustrated, with color photos on most pages and provides a remarkable insight into a region, Sam Neua/Sam Tai/Muang Vaen, that is often overlooked.

Tai Daeng (Red Tai) Shaman in Ban Sop Hao, Huaphan Province, Laos

Tai Daeng Shaman in Ban Sop Hao in Huaphan Province, Laos from Laos Essential Artistry on Vimeo.

When we were researching with Elli last summer we met quite a few shamans and witnessed different ceremonies and blessings. Here, the shaman is performing a ceremony to bless a new house and rid it of all its bad luck and clear the way for good luck in the future. Part of a ceremony is often a display of "power" and in the video toward the end you will see the shaman balance a long candle on top of a knife he sets in a small bowl of rice. Pretty impressive!

Lao Sinhs Need to be custom measured and sewn

We often get asked if we have sinhs pre-sewn and ready to be worn. Unfortunately that's not the way it works. Yes, in the old days women would wrap the sinh (material) around their waist and then tuck it in or wrap a cloth belt around the sinh to hold it up. An example is in the photo above of Bai dressing in the traditional clothes (sinh and blouse) of a Tai Wat woman, a small tribal Tai group located in northern Huaphan Province (somewhat similar to the Tai Dam style).

But for many, many years sinhs have been custom sewn and it is crucial that the seamstress has to take three measurements of the woman who is going to wear the sinh so the sinh will fit correctly and look stylish, without wrinkles and mis-matched patterns. You can see in the photo we use on our Lao Sinh Section that the sinhs of the two young women on the right display perfectly, while the one on the left shows some wrinkles, which ideally, if sewn correctly, will not show.

In the three photos below you see Bai being measured for a sinh that the woman will sew for Bai. The three crucial measurements are the waist, hips and length, which vary of course with each individual.

Our hand-woven silk fabric is beautiful in its own right and the fabric doesn't just have to be used for sinhs. The average sinh fabric length is call in Lao "pheun neung" with one "pheun" being about 30 x 70 inches. But if you want the sinh fabric to be sewn into a sinh for you then you'll have to locate a seamstress that will sew the sinh for you

We had a manual for sewing sinhs translated into English this last June in Vientiane and will be referring to it in future posts.

 

 

Laos Woven Bamboo Strips Photo

Laos Bamboo Woven Fence5
Originally uploaded by Laos Essential Artistry.

Does anyone else love the contrasting texture and color of the woven bamboo strips? We saw these panels being dried in the sun in Sam Neua. Check out the other photos in the series on our Flickr site.

Girls Carrying Wood

When we were driving up in Huaphan Province between Sam Neua and Sam Tai we passed this group of four girls carrying wood. Since my wife is Lao, it works out great in a situation like this because we stopped the car and got out and Bai was able to ask them some questions and I was able to take a few shots. Bai is super friendly and it makes a huge difference when she is able to talk with people, such as these girls, which makes them more relaxed and open to having their photo taken.

The reality in Laos that girls work hard and it's almost always the girls and women who you see carrying wood. It's a never-ending task because without wood there's no fire, and without a fire, how can one cook a meal? There is in larger towns and cities the option of using charcoal, but that costs money, and wood, with effort is free, so in rural areas photo opportunities like this are fairly common...

Sam Neua from the Air

Even if someone didn't want to fly to Sam Neua just to get there, I would recommend flying to Sam Neua and back for the photographic opportunities. Currently, Lao Airlines, the main Lao airline, doesn't fly to Sam Neua. They've retired the old Chinese 17 seat Y12 and a new smaller airline that specializes in charter flights, including flights to Sam Neua, now uses a Cessna Caravan. The Caravan is smaller, but more comfortable inside, and for photographers, the great news is that the windows are clear with minimal scratching. The Cessna flies lower than the Y12 did and consequently there are great aerial photographic opportunities.

On the second flight we made into Sam Neua, rather than coming in low into the valley and landing on the runway from east to west, the plane flew in higher, circled round and landed from the west. Since we came in at a higher altitude we had a beautiful shot of the entire city/town of Sam Neua.

You can see how Sam Neua is nestled in the mountains, which in the cold season months of December and January with the accompanying fog/low ground cover, means that often times the flights are canceled because the fog doesn't clear.

The Soul of Hmong New Year

When I saw these four young girls as we walked through a Hmong village north of Sam Neua I knew there was something special here. I started taking photos and surprisingly they didn't run away or cover their eyes, but looked right at me and actually came together for this informal portrait.

Like the photo of the young woman washing her hair, my wife's sister's boyfriend also created a series of three painting with these four young girls as the main subject. Below is a photo of the first one in the series.

Northern Laos Textile Research Tour - December 2006

In December 2006 we set up a special two-week tour for Elli on the textile traditions of northern Laos. Elli wanted to do research in Laos on “Thai-Lao Textiles: Shamanic and Buddhist syncretism” so we set up an itinerary that was designed to facilitate her research needs. We started off in Vientiane where we visited some of the main textile galleries such as Taykeo’s, Phaeng Mai and Carol Cassidy’s. Elli’s main source of information though was a Tai Daeng (Red Tai) expert, Tong, where Elli was able to bring photos of textiles she bought and ask questions about the motifs used in the textiles. On our third day we were invited to a Tai Daeng funeral and there are a couple photos in the gallery taken at the funeral.

We then flew up to Luang Prabang where we had scheduled a full-day workshop with Jo and Veo, co-owners of Ockpoptok, textile gallery and weaving center. Ockpoptok, means East meets west in Lao language and Ockpoptok will be exhibiting at the Santa Fe International Folk Festival this July along with Taykeo who has exhibited there for the two previous years. Ockpoptok has two galleries in the downtown area of Luang Prabang, and then have a weaving center a little south of town. We went to the weaving center for the workshop and it is in a beautiful location right on the edge of the Mekong River. The focus on the workshop was primarily on motifs used in weaving, plus they talked about the use of natural dyes and explained the steps used in the weaving process. There is a photo of Elli with Veo and Jo, and another shot of some of the natural dye materials they had on display.

We also spent a lot of time at the gallery owned by Veo’s mother in a small village north of Luang Prabang. She has a large gallery of contemporary textiles woven by weavers in her gallery, and then she has a shop of antique textiles that Elli was most interested in.

There is a world of difference between professors and K-12 teachers in their ability to seriously research a topic. I was impressed with Elli on the entire tour with her research focus. She was always thinking, analyzing, asking questions and writing voluminous notes. Plus, she was extremely organized. I’ve never seen the same curiosity with K-12 educators. It’s hard for most people to escape beyond the typical tourist mentality where the primary focus is on relaxation and enjoyment. I’m more like Elli, though I don’t have that academic intensity.

We did take time to have a little fun and took a slow boat up to the Pak Ou Caves. People have been climbing into the Pak Ou caves, high above the Mekong some 25km from Luang Prabang, for maybe a couple of thousand years. They were used for the worship of the river spirit until Buddhism spread into Laos along the southern route from India. And gradually, over the 60 decades, more than 4,000 Buddha images – mostly the standing Buddha of the Luang Prabang style – have been placed in them. There are two caves in a striking limestone cliff where the Nam Ou river meets the Mekong. The lower and smaller, called Tham Ting, is open to the light some 50ft above the river; but the higher cave, Tham Phum, is deep and impenetrably black without a torch. Most people get to the Pak Ou caves by river from Luang Prabang and make an easy landing at a little jetty under Tham Ting.

We didn’t leave until late afternoon and caught a beautiful sunset on the way back and thankfully I took probably fifty plus photos and I got one great shot with the glint of the setting sun on a distant boat. December is a great time to travel to Laos since it is the dry season and it rarely rains, but there can be cold spells and we were there when temperatures were only in the fifties and I remember how cold I was in the boat that day, but the sunset made it all worthwhile.

We then flew back to Vientiane, spent the night, and the next morning flew to Sam Neua. I love flying in the rickety 17-seat Y2’s as the two back seats have big windows with little to obstruct the views. There are a few aerial shots I took of the mountainous terrain and some remote villages only accessible by trails in the gallery. When I see these villages I keep thinking what it must be like for the inhabitants, what is the school like, do they have a teacher and do any of the children ever make it to high school and transition to living in a bigger city like Luang Prabang or Vientiane?

When we arrived in Sam Neua I was a little scared because I had made arrangements with Sousath Petrasy, owner of the Maly Hotel in Phonsavan to drive/guide us while we were in Huaphan Province, and he wasn’t waiting in the “lobby” of the airport. But, when I walked outside I saw a Landcruiser where he was resting, listening to a CD.

I’m a little confused with the priorities of Lao tourism. There have been several articles in the Vientiane Times lately about establishing Vieng Xai, 45 minutes from Sam Neua, a major tourist destination since it was where the Pathet Lao leaders lived in caves during the Secret War. But, they recently cut all the flights now to Sam Neua so how are people going to visit Vieng Xai??? They’ll have to fly to Phonsavan and then rent a vehicle/driver to drive (all day) to Sam Neua and then will have to do the same going back. Most people won’t make the effort and I don’t blame them.

I like Sam Neua, you rarely seen tourists there, even when there are flights from Vientiane, and the textiles are gorgeous. With Elli, we were going to two towns I’ve never visited before, Sam Tai and Muang Vaen. The road to Sam Tai is paved most of the way, so even in the rainy season, if the rains are moderate, one should be able to drive to Sam Tai, about a six hour journey. It’s beautiful, rugged terrain, and the road snakes along side the Sam River a lot of the way. Sam Tai is considered the heart and soul of the textile tradition in Laos, but it’s not a place most tourists visit and the few guest houses are very simple. After we arrived, the word got out that Elli was interested in looking at textiles and soon a number of women appeared with bags of textiles they had woven. I have some photos of when we were gathered in a large room of the guest house and all these women had laid out their textiles for Elli to check out.

There are also some photos of Earl and Bai making papaya salad at one of the small restaurants where we chose to eat dinner. I need to come up with a better name of though for these restaurants/food stalls. In small towns like Sam Tai, their menu is very basic, usually they’ll serve noodle soup, maybe fried rice and whatever wild game and/or fish someone has sold them. Earl is a gourmet cook at home, and was interested in learning more about Lao food so here Bai showed Earl how to make papaya salad and by looking at the photos in the gallery you can see they had a good time.

Another interesting thing about Sam Tai was that although it was only about 150 km south of Sam Neua, it was much, much warmer. In Sam Neua I was wearing long underwear under my jeans, but here I was back to wearing shorts.

The next morning we explored the old part of Sam Tai and were invited in to a ceremony being performed in a house to bring good luck to the family who had recently experience some misfortune. There are some photos in the gallery of the shaman performing the ceremony in the house.

When we were driving back to Sam Neua we stopped in a small village to get some 150, a Red Bull type drink, for Sousath, who was getting very tired while driving. In this village we saw a woman sitting in front of a charcoal fire roasting something. On closer examination it was a rat, and she had a basket of rats she had already toasted. I saw a great photo opportunity here and asked Earl if he would like to be immortalized in a photo toasting a rat. Being a easy-going soul, he agreed and there are a couple of photos of Earl toast a rat over the fire, and the first one shows the woman holding a crossbow her husband used to kill the rats. In Laos, almost anything, anything, will be eaten, and a well-toasted rat is considered a tasty treat. At the same home was a string of bats waiting to be bought, the key ingredient in “Laotian Bat Soup.”

After driving back to Sam Neua, the next morning we drove to Muang Vaen. We were interested in going here because it was highlighted in Patricia Cheesman’s book,” Lao-Tai textiles: The Textiles of Xam Nuea and Muang Phuan.” She had some beautiful photos of textiles woven in this village, plus Tong, our Tai Daeng expert in Vientiane, recommended that we go here.

We had to head down the road we would be driving to Sam Neua the next day and then headed south on a dirt road. We stopped in a small village along the way and met a monk in a small wat on a hill overlooking the village. There are a number of photos I took of the wat and of the friendly monk.

Muang Vaen is a very picturesque village, and they had a rounded roof style I have never seen before. And many of the houses had a pair of carved wooded nagas at their roof peak as protective spirits.

It was interesting to see that many of the women were weaving these pastel-colored textiles that I had seen in the Morning Market in Vientiane. I wondered where they had come from, and now I knew. From my perspective these textiles are more for decorative purposes and have a thicker weave, that I call “tapestry style.” They’re pretty, and we all thought they had better quality textiles here, than in Sam Tai.

The Lao Woman’s Union leader in this village invited us to lunch and then similar to Sam Tai, a group of women came to lay out their textiles for Elli to look at and hopefully for all of us to buy. What was a little strange here was that we had spent most of our kip in Sam Tai and when we tried to use American money, which is readily accepted in most of Laos, they were extremely reluctant to accept dollars though they could readily exchange the dollars for kip in Sam Neua, just about a two hour drive one way.

There are a number of shots taken in this village and a few of Earl who had a great time playing frisbee with the kids. We left in the late afternoon and drove back to Sam Neua and then the next morning we drove all the way to Phonsavan where we stayed at Sousath’s Maly Hotel. The next morning we went to the Plain of Jars and then drove all the way to back to Vientiane. I had never been on the stretch of road between Phonsavan and Phu Khun, where the road from Phonsavan intersects the main road between Luang Prabang and Vientiane.

What I haven’t mentioned is that wherever we were driving on these rural roads, we often drove through Hmong villages, and since Hmong New Year is celebrated during the month of December in many of the villages there were groups of Hmong girls dressed up and often lined up in rows tossing the ball with boys or other girls. This is a traditional social ceremony where teens from different villages, and different clans, get to meet each other and while tossing the ball, engage in small talk that might lead to their eventually getting married. In the past, they were so busy working on the farms and after the harvesting of rice in November, December finally provided some free time where they could travel to another village There aren’t any malls to hang out in Laos…

When we stopped in Phu Khun there were a lot of Hmong women/girls dressed in traditional clothes and men in suits, and it was plain to see there were a lot of Hmong that had come to Laos from the United States. I have a group of photos in the gallery I had taken in different villages, including Phu Khun. The ones of the young girls are my favorites.

I want to emphasize that all these photos were taken on this trip in December 2006. I’ve also included some nature shots of trees, an interesting still life of branches, some lilies, colorful umbrellas (evening market in Luang Prabang), and a series on beautifully carved, painted doors and windows from wats in Luang Prabang. Enjoy!