I had a very relaxing five days here–it had the feel of a small island. Slow, not crowded, with the smell of smoke and plumeria flowers in the air. It has numerous Buddhist temples.
And where there are Buddhist temples, there are monks.
The monks only eat what people give them. Every morning at 6 AM, they walk around with buckets, collecting their daily alms. Many of the monks are very young, aged 12-16. Most of these teenagers are only seasonal monks, doing it for just a few months. Others come from very poor areas, and live at the temples until they finish their education. Of course, there are some lifetime monks in there too.
I rode my bike and took a walk across the “Communist Bridge.”
I held on to the railing too–those planks were a bit rickety and the drop was about 200 feet.
I roused myself out of bed early to feed the monks, which left me sleepy for the rest of the morning. I found a nice park overlooking the Mekong River, where I took a nap on a bench. This is the last thing I saw before I fell asleep.
And these were my views of the river once I was vertical again.
wheresmike 