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254<br />
LUANG PRABANG LUANG PRABANG & NORTHERN LAOS<br />
13<br />
Luang Prabang is intact and the feel <strong>of</strong> the city has remained unaltered over the last 15<br />
years. <strong>The</strong> massive increase in restaurants and the introduction <strong>of</strong> a Thailand-style night<br />
market are part <strong>of</strong> inevitable changes as the city becomes ever more established on the<br />
Indochina tourist circuit. Unlike Siem Reap in <strong>Cambodia</strong>, Luang Prabang accommodates<br />
the changes without some <strong>of</strong> the circus like aspects that have become part and<br />
parcel <strong>of</strong> a visit to Angkor. In Luang Prabang the views remain the same and they are<br />
absolutely superb.<br />
For centuries before Luang Prabang was founded, several Thai-Lao principalities flourished<br />
in the area around it, in the valleys <strong>of</strong> the Mekong. It used to be called Muang Sua<br />
before it was conquered by a Tai Prince called Khun Lo in a.d. 698. From the 11th to<br />
the 14th centuries, there was a city called Xieng Dong Xieng Thong on this site. From<br />
1185 to 1191, Xieng Dong Xieng Thong came under the rule <strong>of</strong> the mighty Khmer<br />
god-king Jayavarman VII.<br />
King Fa Ngum created the first truly Lao Kingdom, called Lan Xang, or Kingdom <strong>of</strong><br />
One Million Elephants in 1353. At this time, the city was known as Xaxa. In 1357 the<br />
name was changed to Meuang Xieng Thong, or Gold City District. After that, King Fa<br />
Ngum’s successor, King Visoun, received from his Khmer overlords a gift <strong>of</strong> a Sinhalese<br />
Buddha image called Pha Bang. It is from this image that the name Luang Prabang is<br />
derived.<br />
In 1545 King Phothisarat moved the capital <strong>of</strong> the kingdom to Vientiane although<br />
Luang Prabang continued to thrive. <strong>The</strong> kingdom <strong>of</strong> Lan Xang fractured into three<br />
separate entities in 1694 on the death <strong>of</strong> the heirless King Vongsa. Luang Prabang<br />
declined under the grandson <strong>of</strong> the Vongsa. It didn’t get better as time went on. Burmese,<br />
Chinese, and Vietnamese marauders imposed their will at various times. In 1887 Chinese<br />
“Haw” bandits attacked the city and the Luang Prabang administration invited the<br />
French to take the city under its colonial wing. <strong>The</strong> town developed quite fast under the<br />
French, not least because they, like tourists today, took an immediate fancy to the place.<br />
<strong>The</strong>y allowed the monarchy to continue and knowingly prettified the already very beautiful<br />
city. Through the Japanese ascendancy <strong>of</strong> World War II and the wars <strong>of</strong> independence<br />
against the French, Luang Prabang was thankfully spared damage. After the 1975 Pathet<br />
Lao victory the last Luang Prabang monarch, Sisavang Vatthana, and his family were sent<br />
to a remote incarceration where they succumbed to hunger and lack <strong>of</strong> medical care.<br />
In 1989 after the Vietnamese declared doi moi, or their own form <strong>of</strong> perestroika,<br />
Luang Prabang began to emerge from the dilapidation visited upon it by the harsh years<br />
<strong>of</strong> collectivization and a planned economy that drained the city <strong>of</strong> its entrepreneurs and<br />
educated elite. Over the next decade the city rapidly blossomed as the old French colonial<br />
buildings were restored, flourishing businesses came into being, and tourists enthusiastically<br />
flooded in to enjoy this jewel <strong>of</strong> Indochina.<br />
LUANG PRABANG ESSENTIALS<br />
Orientation<br />
Luang Prabang is set out on a slightly crooked grid system. Most <strong>of</strong> the most beautiful<br />
parts <strong>of</strong> the city are on a narrow finger <strong>of</strong> land extending to where the Mekong joins the<br />
Nam Khan River. What could be called the center <strong>of</strong> town extends up from the longdistance<br />
boat pier. Thanon Kitsarat heads southeast, past Phousi hill and the Dara Market<br />
on the left to the crossroads where it meets Thanon Mahapatsaman and Thanon<br />
Wisunarat. Most <strong>of</strong> the old French municipal buildings cluster around the beginning<br />
<strong>of</strong> Thanon Kitsarat near the boat pier. To get to both the main cluster <strong>of</strong> bars and