Our last stop in Laos was the capital city, Vientiane. Before entering the city, I convinced a group to go to the Buddha Park or Wat Xien Khuan. I saw this on Pinterest and decided I had to see it for myself, and I am so glad I did. We hired and split taxis to take us there since it is outside the city. It is a park containing 200 Hindu and Buddhist sculptures.
The park was founded by Luang Pu Bunleua Sulilat in 1958. He believed that Hinduism and Buddhism could be integrated, which is why there are sculptures of gods, animals and demons from both belief systems. There is a pumpkin shaped structure in the middle that you can walk up to the top where you can take some great photos of the whole park. The Wayfaringgals profile photo on Facebook was actually taken there.
I could not stop taking pictures…the statues looked so old and ancient…it felt like another world. The place is a photographer’s dream.
Another amazing place was the COPE center, which helps the victims of UXOs (weapons that did not detonate when they were dropped), the most common being cluster bombs. These bombs are all over the countryside so children find them as well as farmers, causing not only death but the loss of limbs.
In a previous post, I mentioned that Laos is the most bombed country. COPE estimates that 50,000 people have been killed or injured since 1964 (the US bombed Laos from 1964-73, 24 hours a day). COPE provides prosthetic limbs to victims, and people can donate money to buy a limb…for $75 you can buy a prosthetic leg. You can also get a shirt that kids design to raise awareness for the center. There are various donations that can buy food, equipment, or toys. It is a really great organization to support.
After the visit to COPE, we were able to walk around the city, and see, you guessed it, the Night Market, which was pretty large and sprawled across the riverfront. I think we tried rice on a stick there. We had dinner with the group at a restaurant where we sat outside on balcony. A really amazing day where we learned a lot.
The next day we hired a tuk tuk, and a very nice man that spoke English helped us translate to the driver that we wanted to see Laos’ ‘Arc de Triomphe’ or Patuxai Gate, which is worth taking a look at. I was reduced with trying to draw a picture of where we wanted to go before the kind stranger interceded for us. He took us around the gate and waited for us as we looked around. There are some paintings and interesting artwork on the inside on the ceiling. It’s also scary getting across the street like it is in Paris. It was nice to get some sightseeing in before we left for the airport.
