Extra Credit

On Saturday, April 16^th, I visited the Wat Lao Buddhavong, or Lao Temple, in Catlett, VA for the Lao New Year 2011 celebration. The Buddhist temple is nothing new to me, but in all honesty I haven’t been to the temple in more than six years. I even wore a ‘sinh’, or traditional Laotian skirt to play my part in the Lao tradition. The festival consisted of numerous Buddhist ceremonies, traditional Lao and Thai food (best part), souvenirs, Lao classical music and dances, young women’s pageant, and cultural shows and entertainment. “Songkan” is the formal and traditional name for Lao New Year’s Day. All Laotians often perform many auspicious ceremonies on this day, and it’s the opportunity to pay respect and remember parents, relatives, teachers, and others.

Throughout the morning, there was a religious ceremony inside the temple, and then there was the offering of food to the monks. When I was there, my mom got holy water for me outside of the temple and told me to pour it over all the Buddha statues nearby. This is supposed to be lustral water that honors the Buddha image. My mom also mentioned that pouring the holy water onto the Buddha statues was suppose to ensure good luck in your life.

Even though my religion is Buddhist, I felt new to this experience since I haven’t done something like this in years. When I was younger, I used to go to the temple with my parents a few times a year and we would meditate. I remember sitting on the ground for what felt like centuries with both feet facing the same way (sitting Indian style was frowned upon) and praying while the monks chanted words in which I could not understand at all. It was
probably only 30 minutes, but sitting on the ground while your feet fell asleep made the meditation feel even longer than it was. I also remember approaching the head monk of the temple with one of my parents and having to bow down to the floor three times before talking to him. Any time you approach a well-respected monk, you have to bow down three times. Whenever my parents requested for the monk to bless us, he would do some sort of chant and then spritz holy water onto our heads while we’re bowed down.

Meditation was never really instilled in my life but my parents liked to take me to the temple in order to educate me in my culture at a young age. Prior to re-living my meditation experience this year for the first time in years, I expected it to be boring and long. However, I surprisingly had a good time and was glad to become cultured with my own culture. Pouring the lustral water onto the Buddha statues was a holy experience that taught me how to pray in my head and wish good luck to myself and the people who are close to me. Entering the temple and seeing countless people made me realize how religious and dedicated lots of Laotian people are to Buddha and the Buddhist religion.

What I liked about the experience was the turnout of all the people who showed up to go to the festival. It rained pretty much all day and even poured during some parts of the day, but there were still a lot of people who went. Meditation played a big role during the festival, especially in the morning. After meditating with the monks, attendees were able to offer food to the monks by placing any food items such as sticky rice into a ‘begging bowl’. In Lao it means thak bahd. In Laos, the tradition for this is that novice monks line up in the village with their bahds and ask for food from the residents of the village. They then go back to the village to eat the food they receive. What I liked about the tradition at the temples in America is that regular people like me are able to take the food from the bahds after all meditation is finished! The only thing I disliked about the event was the rainy weather since I had to be outside the whole time I was there. There weren’t really any surprises of the day since I was used to what the traditions were for the festival. Despite the gloomy day, people were happy to be there and in good spirits that is was a new year.