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By Sutthida Malikaew*

LUANG PRABANG, Lao PDR - Duangsavan Boupha, a native of Luang  Prabang, has lived in the same house she was born in more than 60  years ago. She inherited the 72 year-old house from her grandparents.  Her daily routine begins early each morning with the traditional  distribution of alms to Buddhist monks, as is the custom here.

Duangsavan’s Buddhist customs highlight the well-preserved culture  and traditions against the backdrop of French-style architecture of  this northern Lao city, an attractive destination for people from  around the world. Since 1995, it has been recognised as a World  Heritage City by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and  Cultural Organisation (UNESCO).

 

The daily alms-giving ceremony is a major attraction in itself,  drawing hordes of western tourists onto Duangsavan’s otherwise quiet  street. They come to watch Duangsavan distribute alms to nearly 200  saffron-robed monks from the nearby temples, 11 of which line her  street alone.

Duangsavan’s daily routine has not changed much since her childhood  when she first joined her mother and grandmother in giving alms to  the monks. She sits down on a mat at six in the morning, with a  bamboo container full of sticky rice. Each time a monk walks by, she  dips into the container and gives him a handful of rice. The only  change in this ritual over the years has been the sound of camera  clicking and flashbulbs going off, as the tourists happily capture  the scene for posterity. Humble Duangsavan does not mind this  intrusion. Instead, she says, “They appreciate our culture.”

Though Duangsavan doesn’t feel much change in her way of life, she is  a person who has benefited from living in the World Heritage site.  Her modest house is now an adapted guesthouse that she shares with  the foreign guests, earning a small income.

However, this arrangement is actually uncommon in Luang Prabang, many  of whose house-owners usually move out of town after renting their  properties to businesses. This phenomenon has attracted plenty of  concern among locals and officials who wonder where the “real life of  the city” is going.

Concerns over renting-and-moving is so great that this made it into  the preamble of ‘Plan de Sauvegarde et de Mise en Value’, the French- language version of a report on preserving local heritage. The plan  is also available in Lao.

The report says that even though World Heritage status and tourism  have brought economic benefits to Luang Prabang, they have brought  change that could ultimately alter the very character that made this  Lao city the historical and cultural gem that it is. Already, many  buildings have been converted into hotels, and locals have been  migrating out at a slow, but steady, pace. This contrasts sharply  with the project’s stated objective, says the report.

Ouan Sirisack, director of Heritage House, says of the impact of  tourism: “An impact on people’s ways of life is that many of them  rent their houses to others (to run businesses) and they move and  live out of the city.”

But local city dwellers, seeing more economic opportunities and the  development brought by tourism, are loathe to admit the negative  effects of becoming a tourist destination. Still, some astute  observers do say that these trends could shake up Luang Prabang.

Bounthieng Soulivanh, deputy director of Inter- Lao Tourism based in  Luang Prabang, says “I don’t think culture has disappeared, but it is  changing little by little. This is not only because we have a lot of  people coming in, but also because people in the city are moving out.  So the picture of traditional ways of living is fading.”

Duangdueang Bounyavong, a Vientiane-based historian and cultural  expert, has noticed the same trends and often wonders whether Luang  Prabang’s residents really have an understanding that they are living  in a World Heritage city. “Now they do nothing except receive guests  from foreign countries,” laments Duangdueang. “The city is full of  restaurants and Internet cafés, and even the decoration in front of  the shops look like in western countries. There are also too many  advertisement posters pasted on walls that block out the beauty of  the architecture. Is this the right way of development?”

TOURISM EATS INTO TRADITION

   The concerns go to the heart of the debate. While being a World  Heritage City has undoubtedly brought Luang Prabang residents  economic benefits, it is also slowly eroding their traditional ways –  perhaps inexorably.

   For instance, outside Duangsavan’s home, some local residents can  be seen selling food offerings to tourists so they can give these to  the monks. Critics say this distorts the message of Buddhism, which  asks that those who offer alms to monks do so out of true belief in  the religion. The underlying economic exchange introduced by the  influx of tourism into this religious practice obscures the distorts  its message, they add.

   Some native Luang Prabang residents complain that those selling  such offerings are from the countryside or from the other side of the  river. “We don’t like them doing that because it doesn’t seem to be  good manners,” one such resident said. The chief concern of people  like him is that selling alms to foreigners give rise to wrong  perceptions about these offerings.

   Whether that is true or not, there are already unflattering  descriptions of the ceremony on Internet travel sites. For example, a  backpacker wrote to introduce Luang Prabang and the alms ceremony  thus: “Wake up early and watch the monk rice-parade.” The language  used does not seem to show any respect of the alms ceremony, critics  say, adding that these words portray alms offering as part of a  cultural ‘show’ instead of the religious ceremony that it is.

   Tara Gujadhur, sustainable tourism advisor for Netherlands  Development Organization (SNV) who has been working here for two  years in tourism promotion, agrees that “alms offering seems to  become more like a show (for tourists)”.

   She points out that tourists often disturb the monks’ activities  and ceremonies due to lack of cultural understanding. For example,  she says, some tourists take pictures of the monks at very close  range, zapping monks’ faces with high-power flashbulbs. Other  tourists sit on top of tour buses to get observe the ceremony or get  a good angle for a photograph – not realising that being on higher  ground than monks is a no-no in Buddhist communities.

   In her two years in Luang Prabang, Gujadhur too has seen the city  changing.
She feels that more new people are coming into the city, bringing new  economic activities with them, such as trading, hotels, restaurants.  While these create employment opportunities for local people, they  could also be long-term costs.

   “As a World Heritage site, Luang Prabang has more opportunities  from tourism and economics, but the government and residents might  not yet have thought about the long-term effect of this development,”  said Gujadhur.

   Even local handicraft is being affected by the changes in Luang  Prabang. Duangdueang worries that commercialisation could erode the  quality of local goods, wrecking the reputation of heritage cities.  “It is true that those who sell things will benefit, but the  handicraft they think they could sell more might be of very simple  designs. When they need to sell them in a big lot, they might need to  make them fast. So we can imagine about the quality and artistic  work, which might be lower when you think only of quantity,” she  muses. “I wonder whether this kind of thing is destroying local  culture.”

    Even the celebration of Lao traditional New Year in April has  been taking on a commercial flavour, with all the attendant beauty  pageants, Duangdueang added. The onset of the contests, she says,  often induces young women to skip classes in order to prepare for  Miss New Year (Miss Sankhan in Lao) competition. Warns Duangdueang:  “By concentrating only on catering to tourism, I’m afraid Luang  Prabang people will lose their identity in the end.”

   Francis Engelmann, special advisor with Heritage House, which  works to promote and preserve Luang Prabang’s cultural heritage,  thinks that after the city became a World Heritage site, it was not  only ordinary lives but also religious life that began changing.
   “The learning of the Sangha and religious life of the monks are  being disturbed, as has been seen in the “Tak Batr” (alms offering)  ceremonies which have become a disaster now. Some monks feel uneasy  with how the tourists behave. A monk said to me ‘we think people  behave like we were monkeys in the zoo’,” says Engelmann.

BUDDHISM UNDER THREAT?

   Luang Prabang’s identity as a city where Buddhism is practised –  monks are often seen throughout the city – may itself be under threat.

   For instance, ordination as a monk is a traditional part of the  life of young men. With the large number of tourists around, novices  often use encounters with foreign tourists as opportunities to  practise English. While this may be a natural consequence of being  tourist spot, Engelmann observes that it has larger implications --  the city might one day no longer be appropriate for monks to study  Buddhism anymore. Indeed, some monks are thinking of moving out of  the city for their studies, and returning to the city’s temples only  when they feel sufficiently strong in their dharma.

   For 86-year-old The Right Venerable Khamchan Veerajitthera, the  abbot of Wat Saen Sukharam and chief of the Northern Ecclesiastries,  the chief concern is about young monks’ who could be swayed or  corrupted from their religious  principles by the culture of tourism  in Luang Prabang. “I do not see much changes in religious life yet,”  says the abbot. But he also concedes: “I am concerned about the  principles of the monks in the temple. Hence, whenever possible, I  gather them together and preach to them.”

*Sutthida Malikaew, who contributes to Prachatai.com, wrote this  article under the Imaging Our Mekong programme (www.newsmekong.org)