Faraway Places: A Luoi

This weekend I went to A Luoi, which is very close to the border of Laos. My friend Hang, the same one that I spent that long day meditating with, invited me to accompany her to a Buddhist ceremony. To be completely honest I am not sure what we were celebrating because Hang wasn't quite sure how to translate it into English. I know that we were celebrating 30 years of something so I tried

This is where I slept. With like 100
other people.

researching it online. I really didn't find much except in 1981 all Vietnamese Buddhist sects and organizations were unified. Soooo... maybe that's what is was all about? Even though I am not sure what I was doing there I really enjoyed spending time in A Luoi. The van ride was about two and a half hours through the twisty-turny roads up and over so many mountains. We drove there on Saturday night so I didn't have the mountain views, but since we were away from cities and towns the stars were shining so bright. Hang and I just looked out the window the whole time. We arrived in A Loui and had a huge, delicious dinner, which was vegetarian of course since it was a Buddhism event. After dinner we helped set up for the following days ceremony. Finally it was bedtime– probably one of the most bizarre sleeping situations I have ever been in. I slept with literally ten nuns on a bamboo mat. At first I thought I had gotten the better end of the deal by being on the end, but that actually meant that I had no blanket. And it is cold in the mountains. I had a long night of tossing and turning, trying to stay warm.

Sunday morning started at 6:30, which was late considering that everyone else woke up much earlier to prepare breakfast. Following breakfast I did some yard work and then just took pictures of everyone preparing for the ceremony. The ceremony itself was about two hours long. There were lots of speeches and also dances by local children. The dances were really entertaining and I am sure the speeches were very interesting– I just wish I could have understood them. We had lunch and then we helped clean up. Then we had a beautiful van through the mountains back to Hue (still an enjoyable ride even though the switchbacks had some of the nuns a little carsick). All in all it was a fun weekend– and there was no meditation!