While it is not like sitting on my patio in Chiang Mai, enjoying the sunset in Luang Prabang, or drinking the unidentified fresh draft of Hanoi, it is nice to do beer and cookies back in my own room in Shanghai. The Thai had better cookies and the Lao had better bottled beer though (the Vietnamese beer was better on tap).
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Now that I am back in China and had some time to stew I now feel like it is time for a South East Asia (Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand in my case) retrospective. The first thing I would like to note is that Thailand, particularly Bangkok, is clearly more developed than ether Vietnam or Laos. While Vietnam is trying, and to a fair degree succeeding, in becoming a developed country Laos is simply not. Chiang Rai did feel more like Hanoi in terms of development, but both cities were clearly more developed than Luang Prabang. I would also like to note that I think Luang Prabang is Laos's "model city." The problems I heard about Laos, like starvation level poverty and corruption, are not visible in Luang Prabang; this dosn't mean that these aren't issues Laos faces, it is simply that the government has put there effort into saving face in Luang Prabang for the tourists. Hanoi and all the cities in Thailand felt like better representations of their respective countries than Luang Prabang did.
It is interesting to compare temples in the three countries, since I seemed to spent most of my time in Buddhist temples. Vietnam had temples but they seemed touristy. I did end up in one temple that was actually used by real Vietnamese Buddhists and many of the restaurants had little shrines but the Buddhism was not as visible. I think Luang Prabang gets tourists by marketing itself as a Buddhist temple city. The locals are apparently religious but all the temples did feel like they were set up to handle tourists. The Thai are a remarkable religious people. All of the temples, even the touristy ones, were all used by real Thai Buddhists and basically every public building had a spirt house that people would pray and make offerings to. Another interesting comparison is the attitudes toward their colonial past. Being colonized seems like it plays a big role in the Vietnamese national identity, at least historically. Vietnam is moving past that but it is still very evident in many of the historical sites in Vietnam and I would argue in some of modern Vietnamese foreign policy. While Vietnam and Laos had the same colonizers, the French, Laos seems way more accepting of the French then the Vietnamese. For instance, many young Lao can still speak French while most young Vietnamese can't. I believe that this is because Laos was granted more self government under French administration than Vietnam was. Thailand has a totally different colonial narrative. Thailand was never actually colonized and remained independent through the Age of Imperialism. In Thailand this is attributed to the wise leadership of the House of Chakri (the family of the current Thai monarch). The depictions of The House of Chakri, in particular the late Thai King HM Bhumibol Adulyadej, and Ho Chi Minh were remarkably similar. Both are show as wise leaders who are above criticism and are loved by all. Their images can be seen around, although I saw way more of HM Bhumibol Adulyadej and even the current King HM Maha Vajiralongkorn, who is far less popular than his father, in Thailand than I did Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam. Still, Ho Chi Minh is still on all the money and he is sitting in a glass box in Hanoi (while Bhumibol Adulyadej was also sitting in a glass box when I was in Bangkok the government had plans to cremate him soon). The reverence for Ho Chi Minh extended to Laos, who's current governement was put in place by Ho Chi Minh and the Vietnamese Communists during the Vietnam War. Ho Chi Minh seemed to pop up more randomly in Luang Prabang than he did in Hanoi actually. The relationship between Laos and Vietnam andros and Thailand is kind of odd. All three are ASEAN member states so Lao, Vietnamese, and Thai citizens can all easily travel to and work in any ASEAN member state. This seems to mean that Vietnamese and Lao citizens go to Thailand to work and not the other way around. Furthermore, while the Lao language is actually closely related to Thai (and are actually mutually intelligible) and Thailand (still called Siam thrn) even ruled over parts of Laos for a time, Laos is still closer to Vietnam. While I could go on, this post has to end somewhere and that might as well be here. If I end up feeling like I have more to say I will do a part two. Chiang Rai, Chiang Mai, Changsha, confused yet? I am now sitting in Chiang Mai International Airport waiting to my flight to Changsha, Hunan Proviance, China. I think the names should start to get less confusing from here on out. My only problem is I can't take an airplane picture from out of the windows in the airport.
I decided to combine two days of touring in Chiang Mai because my plans today all fell flat. I was going to go for a massage at the local prison vocational center thing, but they were all booked up. I had a whole selection of bad jokes prepared and everything. It is important to note that the inmates were doing actual massages, not "oil and lotion massages" from attractive Thai women who the monks would prevent from entering the Wat's because of their black micro mini skirts. The next thing I wanted to do, check out the museums, also didn't work too well since one of them was closed for renovations. I did get to see a lot of really cool temples, check out the Lanna Folk Life Center, and eat some Northern Thai food. The old parts of Chiang Mai remind me a lot of Luang Prabang, since it seems to be 50% temples and 50% tourists. Though, Chiang Mai seems to have more normal people who hold jobs outside of tourism/Buddhism. Also unlike Luang Prabang, most of the temples in Chiang Mai are free. The style of temple noticeable changed from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, I read that the northerners have their own style of temple. The Lanna Folk Center discussed it a bit. It seems like some of the natives of Northern Thailand have their own traditions and forms of ancestors worship, in addition to standard Buddhism. It is important to remember that the Buddha dosn't demand exclusive adherence like the big three monotheistic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) do. He seems cool with you worshipping other entities as long as he is in the equation somehow. Chiang Mai also had more Burmese style Buddhas than Bangkok, Chiang Rai, or Luang Prabang. The food is similar to Chiang Rai, both being northern. The biggest difference I noticed between Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai and Bangkok is that both Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai actually have more Thai food, Bangkok seems to be super into forign food. I would also like to note on food that the Cream-O company should stop knocking off Oreos and make exclusively their Choco Plus cookies because those things are wonderful. I guess even with my failures I still had fun over the last two days.
My last day in Chiang Rai was actually super rainy so I basically spent my whole day sitting in my room and eating random Thai food I acquired when I got sick of my room. Today I made it to Chiang Mai, a city with, so far, less rain. I spent most of my day on the bus so I didn't really get a great chance to look around, but I did get to see some cool temples. You know you spend a lot of time looking at temples when you can start to identify what style they are. The bus ride want bad actually. I got the mid-tier bus since the cheapest bus I think is a van and the expensive bus isn't worth it. The ride went smoothly for the most part. The "temporary bus station" is actually just a dirt field so, to no one's surprise but the guy who set up the temporary bus station, got super muddy after a two days for rain. We also were stopped by the police who were clearly looking for someone in particular so ignored us for the most part (other the the stopping our bus thing). I can actually recommend the bus, even if it takes three hours. Hopefully Chiang Mai will be a bit easier to navigate than Chiang Rai. So far it is a bit easier to get around, there is just more easy to get to stuff.
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AuthorI am a junior at Juniata College spending a year studying abroad at East China Normal University. Please feel free to join my on my journey to China and beyond. Archives
November 2021
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