Observing Monks in Lao

I have concluded that the best way to learn about monks in Lao is to ask a tour guide if he was ever a monk. Chances are that he was - 2 of our 3 guides had been monks. The father of one guide had been a leader in the Pathet Lao and had done “bad things.” His son shaved his head and became a monk for a week to earn merit for his father (so his father could be moved to a better place in his afterlife). The other became a monk for three weeks after completing his studies. By being a monk he would earn merit for his very alive mother. Clearly being a monk is does not necessarily assume a life long commitment. A monk may return to “normal” life even after he has taken his vows. To do so a ritual is performed that takes just a few hours.

Both men reported that they ate two meals a day. Dinner was not eaten to control sexual desires. One man said that the hungry monks would be too tired to think of sex. The other claimed that if he ate dinner specific parts of his body would become "itchy." One man said that the hardest part was learning how to mediate. He said that his mind would jump from one thing to other - an experience that is probably universal. Here is a blog posting where one man shares the details of his 10 days of being a monk.

The young novice monks were said to come from poor families in the "north." At the monastery they could study and have more life opportunities. In Bhutan young boys may have been sent to a monastery if they did not show an aptitude for studying. As far as we could tell their education mirrored that of madrasas; although we were told that the education at large monasteries were better. A fellow traveler on this trip, who conversed with some monks, suggested that in Lao the monks were getting a reasonably good education.

When we walked into a wat in Vientiane we were surprised to see no evidence of monks beyond the hanging robes. Throughout the day and into the night in both Vientiane and Laung Prabang we saw one, two, or three novice monks walking along. We had little idea of how they spent most of their days. We did see a few monks doing work in the wats, e.g., planting flowers or helping with renovation.

Commonly seen drying robes - suggest a nearby monastery

A knot of monks - apparently studying

We had heard about the morning walk of the monks through Laung Prabang where devotee would put sticky rice in their alms bowls. The guest house had posters asking tourist to respect this tradition.Web sites remind tourists that this is "not a photo op" and Lonely Planet advises "if it is genuinely meaningful to you, you may take part in the ceremony."  (A blog posting and its comments summarize the ceremony and the mixed feelings of observing.)

We had decided not to seek out the procession; we assumed that we would be part of the problem. Unexpectedly as we waited for a tuk tuk to take us to a bus station along came a group of monks. We tried to be discrete, but I have to admit we gave into the temptation and grabbed a camera.

Basket on road so monk can discard unwanted food such as cookies

Devotees put a few grains of sticky rice in each alms bowl

Apparently the collection of food varies. One guide told us that in his village half of the families provide monks with food in the morning and half in the afternoon. We visited a Lao tribal village which had a drum house, stupa, temple, and monastary. The drum is beaten at festivals and to announce important events. Only 3 monks live in the monastry. They were from the village and sent to Laung Prabang to study with the expectation that they would educate the villagers when they returned. Rather than go out with alms bowls in the morning a window is opened to let the villagers know that they can bring food.

Drum house to the right of stupa