Word: luang
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...long can Luang Prabang's slumber last? There are ominous signs of a rude awakening. In the old quarter's main street, Sisavangvong Road, tourists now outnumber locals. Satellite dishes bristle from roofs and backyards, sucking from the ether a steady stream of inane Thai game shows. Internet shops spring up daily, each filled with earnest backpackers clicking away. Highway 13 from Vientiane is now paved, putting the capital just a day's drive away...
...Luang Prabang's charms seem safe enough if the abject failure of its first full moon-style party, modeled on Thailand's island raves, is anything to go by. "Us backpackers have got to make our own fun," said a shaggy type who bounded up to me in Sisavangvong Road and thrust a flyer proclaiming the birth of the Full Mekong Party into my hand. "I'm the Great Disco Dane," he explained, assuring me the party would be "wicked." Around 9 p.m., I ventured down to the sandy strip where the ferries land?to find about 20 people sipping...
...SMOOTH SAILING It was the romance of it all that persuaded me to take the slow boat to Luang Prabang from Huay Xai, meandering down the Mekong through a veil of river mist like some intrepid adventurer of old ... Well, O.K., romance and fear: the fast boats have a reputation for dispatching passengers to the murky depths...
BOOKS ON TAP Don't be fooled by the pretentious name?L'estranger Literary Salon is Luang Prabang's coolest bar, perched on the second floor of a gorgeous teakwood shophouse overlooking the Nam Khan river in Thanon Kingkitsalat. Paper lanterns cast a gentle glow over cushions scattered invitingly about the polished wooden floor, as a mix of funk and trip-hoppy sounds filter from the speakers. Marvel at the collection of old National Geographics lining the upstairs walls or browse in the secondhand bookshop downstairs...
...watch him work. Banging hammers, hissing flames and puffing bellows greet visitors to his studio, as Thithpheng and his apprentices turn lumps of silver into intricately patterned bowls, goblets, knives, ceremonial swords and jewelry. "My work symbolizes life and Lao culture," says Thithpheng. You can find him in Luang Prabang's silversmith precinct, off Thanon Chao Fa Ngum...