First of all, many thanks to Debbie and David for ‘looking after the shop’ last week. Thank you also for Private Eye, the tea and the luxurious Christmas puddings, which, rather naughtily, I enjoyed on successive nights.
I could devote the whole of this blog to the happenings at a Hmong funeral which I have been attending, but I will spare you much of the detail and keep it reasonably brief.
The deceased was the great grandmother of my Hmong friend, Khamphone, see photo, taken in about 2006 when Khampnone was still a novice and a pupil of my son Thong.
He seemed very eager that I attend the lying-in as soon as possible, so I was rushed to the scene within 6 hours of her passing. By then she had been dressed in her traditional clothes, indeed, I think identical to those shown above (in fact, I don't think I ever saw her in anything else), laid on a low bed with an unfamiliar-looking dead bird at her head, and a shaman beside her busy praying and singing. I was told that the song amounted to “Are you really dead? If you are not, come back to us; if you are dead, we shall help you go up to the skies”. After an hour or so he flung his bits of equipment to the floor (these comprised some sticks, a crossbow and a knife) and let out a terrible wail. This was taken up by the others closest to the body. I looked around anxiously to see if wailing was compulsory, since I was not quite sure how to do it, but it appeared not to be a requirement. The sound the wailers made was spine chilling; totally horrific. I really have never heard anything so frightening, and the sound will live with me a long time I suspect.
(The Shaman’s song had a particular resonance, as when we visited at (Hmong) New Year we were told how the Shaman comes to be. He does not apply, not train to do the job, nor show any particular expertise nor even any dress sense. (A little like becoming leader of the Conservative party you might be thinking.) The current Shaman, Khamphone’s father, ‘died’ for 3 (or was it 4?) days and when at the last minute he responded to the song, he came back to life as the Shaman. There are so many issues here that I want to discuss at some point; it is totally fascinating and improbable, but utterly believed by intelligent and articulate people. I suppose it is the age old battle between science and superstition..... and the way science seems to be going, I find myself starting to lean towards the latter, which is a bit scary.)
Later a drummer and piper played laments and dirges, candles were burned, as was incense and “dead money”. Two ladies with fly whisks were in closes attendance, which seemed rather inadequate when the body was to be laid out in a warm climate for maybe 4 days.
I always feel rather uncomfortable at these private occasions, as though I am an interloper, but people seemed genuinely pleased that someone from outside their community had come to pay their respects to the dead. And of course, Chris and I had been out there to the house, as recently as last month. And my sister had visited last year, so it is not as though I am a complete outsider. Nevertheless, when Khamphone ‘loaned’ me my own camera and asked me to take a video, I was more than a trifle embarrassed, and was relieved when he signalled that that was enough.
One general observation is that as ever in Laos...”The young women worked, the men shirked; the children played and the old ladies prayed”.
Four pigs, 2 buffalo and one cow were being brought in to be sacrificed and to be fed to the ever increasing number of mourners and I suspect that further livestock was going to have to be brought in later.
I do have photos, (or shall have when I can get my camera back) but somehow posting them on an open blog seems intrusive and in rather dubious taste. However, some of them are, I suspect culturally quite interesting and if anyone wants to see them I will be happy to email them.
Some of you may have read of the recent death of a more famous Hmong figure, General Vang Pao, who died in the US, and whose funeral will be next month. Now, I realise that to the regime here he was an opponent, and I personally hold no brief for him, finding him to have had more faults then strengths. But he was the undeniable leader of the Hmong population in Laos and across the world. The refusal of the regime here to record his passing seemed both foolish and mean spirited given the size of the Hmong population. Oddly, it was left to me, through the medium of the BBC website to bring news of his death to the local Hmong community. The regime apparently dismissed his death as not being a matter to be made public, as he was “merely a private citizen”, which is simply a barefaced lie, and must be deeply offensive to the Hmong people.
To follow up on a couple of matters previously mentioned in the blog, we had a cock fight again the other day. Or at least, that was the intention. But one of the birds was having none of it and simply refused to engage. A pacifist cockerel? I suspect that there was coq au vin served in the evening...or coq au beerlao anyway.
The piles of road building materials are now being removed much faster, thanks to a handcart that a couple of locals have built. This holds several times more than a wheel barrow. The downside of it is that when full it is very heavy, and tends to run away down the hill with the “driver” hanging on grimly trying to stop it from going totally out of control. If you don’t get it under control from the start, then you are in for a hair raising ride. For anyone sad enough to know about such things it is slightly reminiscent of scenes from ‘Last of the Summer Wine’. And on that subject, whoever thought that Clegg and Compo would end up as our Dear Leaders back n the UK?
During the last week in the village we have had a wedding, a funeral, a “going to Vientiane party” and a house warming. The latter was by far the most objectionable since it was only a few doors away and lasted 2 full days, with a band on day one, and that most appalling event, Karaoke, on day 2. I was invited, but I fled into town to escape from as much of it as I could. According to the calendar we have also had ‘Army Day’ here, but I fear that seems to have passed unnoticed. Over the next few days I shall be buying the largest set of headphones that I can find, in the probably vain hope of combating the next village Karaoke event.
(In fact, Friday night was quiet...oh bliss! But, I had a bit of a cold and a blocked up nose, which meant that I kept waking myself up snoring...sometimes you just can’t win. And there have been no more silent nights since.)
On the subject of calendars, as I was a moment ago, I have been given one by the Electricity Company (of whom more in just a moment). It is a classic piece of socialist realism. There are no lovely Lao ladies enjoying the pleasures of electricity, nor even lying across the bonnet of a company service truck. Electricity is a man’s thing, it seems. Instead, it features a photo of head office, a drawing of the proposed new head office, a line of pylons, some men (only men) at a conference, and some more men in ill fitting suits holding certificates. It is a real delight to the eye, as you might imagine.
The reason that I have it is that we were without electricity for 36 hours or so and the services of the company were required. I suspect this may be less to do with any failing on the part of the company itself than with the builder putting in more and more powerful circuit breakers to accommodate the hot shower, and I cannot help but think that there will be more such failures over the coming months. Should I receive any further calendars I shall be happy to make them available to the highest bidders.
A plot of land close to my home was cleared some while back, presumably with a view to building a new house. But little has happened and since nothing stays unused here for long it has started to be used as a rubbish dump. That in turn means that it is pure heaven for the kids who have claimed it as a playground, with no end of wonderful items to play with. I have been especially impressed by their ability to use bits of rubbish to fashion games that look remarkably like cricket, baseball and golf; sports which I imagine they have never seen, unless the latter has been shown briefly on a news item on TV.
Golf as an instrument of socialism? Hmmmm, I am not sure whether the Central Committee has ruled on that one yet; although I am reminded that Marx once said that “I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member.” But that of course was Groucho, not Karl. The only further evidence that I can adduce is that Amazon lists “Das Kapital” under ‘Sports, Hobbies and Games’... I wonder if anyone at Amazon has tried to read it? Certainly a friend of mine, who is a politics professor, and whose reputation is based on a book critiquing Kapital, will, whilst under the influence of alcohol confess to not having managed to read it.
The village children remain a delight and a slight trial. Having a group of them standing under my balcony, intoning “falang, falang, and falang” can get quite tedious. I know that all that I need to do is smile, or wave or say “sabaidii”, and that should satisfy them. The problem is that once is never enough, and a response just sets off a demand for a repeat performance, which, although undemanding in itself, can get a little tiresome after a while. So I often take the coward’s way out and retire to my sitting room for a short while to allow the fan club to disperse. Last week there was no school on most days; it appears to have been a “half year break”, so a visit to observe the falang seemed an obvious way to fill in the time. This week there has been no school yet either. It is curious to observe the extent to which the school is the heartbeat of the village; the whole rhythm of life here changes on schooldays.
For Christmas my sister gave me a sundial, the like of which seems not to have been seen here before; but then as I have observed so often, time-keeping is not a major concern in Laos. I would like to be able to share it with the community, but for the moment it sits on my balcony, as I cannot think of a secure way to display it. It is a table top, rather than a wall mounted dial, and given that under cover of darkness “bad people” still come and steal my water, I cannot think that it would last long on public display, though goodness knows what else you can use it for. I am not sure, although I doubt, whether people here are at all familiar with the Roman numeral system, which the dial uses.
But I wonder how many people in the UK under 40 years of age are familiar with Roman numerals? (By the way, when did anyone last receive a letter addressed to them as Esq.? Where did that go? )
Oh dear, I have rambled on for far too long. Sorry.
Alan
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