Bamboo, qeej, waterfalls, and more bamboo

Phillip and I had a great time yesterday here in Luang Prabang, Laos. Phillip found, and I booked, the "Bamboo Experience and Kuang Si Falls" all-day tour. Our guide, Sai, is the owner of Wander Laos, a tour company focusing on Lao culture. He had been a Buddhist monk for a while and worked in the tourism industry for many years before starting on his own with the Bamboo Experience. Sai picked us up from our hotel and took us to his house where he had built an entire two-story building and outdoor kitchen for his endeavor. He shared the importance of bamboo to the local people and demonstrated some of the many bamboo tools that are used. We were especially amazed by the various fish basket designs.

There are over 50 varieties of bamboo, some used for weaving and some, the bigger, harder bamboo, like the one Sai is holding, is used in construction.

Since we were also cooking lunch with Sai and his wife, we jumped over to the topic of sticky rice and Sai let us pound the husks off the rice kernels.

Phillip did a great job tossing the rice to get the lighter husks and broken rice out of the pounded rice. 

Sticky rice is soaked and rinsed before steaming. Sai's wife showed me how she uses her hands, not a colander, to transfer the rice to the bamboo (of course!) steamer basket. 

While the sticky rice was steaming, we went back to bamboo. An older gentleman, Ti (not sure of the spelling), demonstrated how to process raw bamboo for weaving. We did some of the peeling with him, but not the knife-work. 

Our next project was weaving bamboo. Ti showed us how and then helped us. He would tell us "two over, one under, two over" or whatever the pattern was. As he is not used to handcrafts, Phillip had some difficulty and Ti laughed with Phillip as he struggled to get the pattern correct. 

We did both complete our coasters in a herringbone pattern. Ti then provided us with a shot of banana whiskey and bamboo rings to celebrate our successful project. He also gave me a bamboo bird and horse that he had made. We then moved over to lunch preparation with Sai and his wife. We chopped, pounded, and stuffed for our lunch. A mortar and pestle combine the spices for almost all our dishes. We prepared fish with herbs in banana leaves, pork-stuffed bamboo shoots, and several condiments to go with the sticky rice. Sai's wife also prepared a vegetable soup and a noodle dish that included bamboo shoots. 

After lunch, Sai arranged for a Hmong musician to give a performance of the qeej. The qeej is a traditional instrument, made from bamboo, that produces a sound like a bagpipe, but much cleaner and more pleasant. It doesn't rely on a bellows, but on the in-and-out breaths of the musician. The musician also dances as he plays. So interesting and enjoyable.

Our next activity was the trip to Kuang Si Falls. Sai drove us, about 45 minutes away, to the Falls. During the drive, he described the countryside, noting for instance, when we passed the water buffalo dairy. We had seen very few cows but many water buffalo, so I guess it only makes sense that milk can come from the buffalos. We didn't stop at the dairy as it is a commercial operation, not a tourist spot. The Falls, however, are a popular tourist spot. Phillip and I didn't swim there, although swimming is allowed and others were in the water. 

We walked the trail to two of the three levels. It was a beautiful series of cascading falls into turquoise pools.

The trail wound thru the forest, so it was almost comfortable going uphill in the heat.

The second level had the tallest of the waterfalls, 50 meters, and a bridge across the pool of water so that people could see both sides of this waterfall.

We didn't go to the third level as it was a steep scamper without handrails up rocks and I don't do scamper. We walked back down, briefly stopping at a bear rescue spot, but the bears were sleeping in the heat of the day. Sai took us back to town and dropped us off at our hotel. It was a delightful day for us, one of our best tours ever. We hope that Sai's Wander Laos tour company does well as tourism returns to Laos. 

Today, Phillip and I walked to the Traditional Arts and Ethnology Center, a small museum of clothing and musical instruments of the four ethnic groups who live in Laos. One of the four groups is the Hmong, so we saw the qeej in the museum and read of its history and uses. The center also had hands-on projects, so Phillip tried again to weave bamboo.

After the center, we walked thru the morning market, buying roasted cashews and fried bamboo shoots for our evening snacks.

From the market, we walked again down the tree-shaded road next to the Mekong River. No bridges here so crossings are made by ferry. 

We returned to our room for me to make this post, but we will venture back out for dinner. It rained quite a bit yesterday evening and it is clouding up again now, so I'll have our umbrellas with us this evening. And, after dinner, I'll have my bamboo shoot snacks.