LAOS: Monks at Dawn in Luang Prabang

Sai Bat (morning alms) takes place between the hours of 5-6am each day and involves people placing food and personal care items into the alms bowls of passing monks. 

It’s a silent and sacred ceremony – one that is steeped in tradition.

Every morning the monks wake up at 3.30am and head to the temple house to pray for an hour . 

They then walk into town with their alms bowls to collect rations for the day. 

The monks collect alms as a way to keep their vows, while the locals give alms in order to gain merit for the afterlife – it is considered the first step on the road to Nirvana.

Sticky rice is the most common offering. I bought this bowl of sticky rice from one of the vendors on the street. 

I wore a plastic glove and rolled the sticky rice into small balls and placed them into their alm bowls as they walked by.

This food and other items are shared between the monks as part of their common meals. 

They eat twice a day – breakfast and lunch. They are forbidden to eat after midday.

Without the generosity of laypeople, they would go hungry. 

Children from underprivileged families rely on the morning alms ceremony. 

They also rely on the Buddhist tradition of temples taking in boys from rural villages and offering them education and housing, their only ticket out of poverty. 

Our guide in Laos told us that his family was a poor farming family in the mountains and he went to the monastery at 13 years old and studied to be a monk for 6 years. He said he was very grateful because it was his opportunity to get an education.

Girls in Laos are not granted the same opportunity.

Watching the monk's morning ritual is popular for tourists in Luang Prabang. Chairs are set up along the streets in advance for tourists to sit and make their offerings. 

There is controversy because some tourists do not respect the traditions and display improper behaviour. This is distracting for the monk's meditation while collecting. 

There is talk that the ritual in Luang Prabang will be discontinued because of this. 

But then it begs to ask, how will the monks, poor families, children and their traditions survive without the monks receiving alms?

One of the dilemmas of tourism.