Feeding the Monks in Laos

I feel like I am working in a soup kitchen but I can't keep up with the demand. I grab balls of extremely hot sticky rice and throw them into the offering bowls as quick as I can. Some of the rice falls and hits the foot of a passing monk, I murmur sorry as I try to put rice in the next monk's bowl. This is not what I envisioned I would be doing at 5:30 a.m. in Luang Prabang, Laos.

Every morning bright and early the owner's wife at the guest house we are staying at gets up to pass out rice to feed the monks and pray in the Wat behind the guest house. 

I read about this practice and had seen monks with offering bowls all over Cambodia and Laos but not witnessed the acceptance of food. When I asked our guest house about what time to get up and observe it, the owner's son told me that it would be more interesting to go with his mother and help pass out food. 

Early the next morning I was given a white silk scarf to drape diagonally over my clothes, a basket of sticky rice and a woven stool to sit on. I was then hurried out towards the street with Wes walking behind half asleep and confused.

We set up shop on the street and I was shown how to form small rice balls with my fingers to drop into the bowls. Less than a minute later a procession of about 20 monks from age 50 down to about 7 came breezing up. I tried to form the balls and drop them in but those are some quick-walking monks! All I could do to keep up was grab rice throw in the pot and grab more rice. 

When the first procession had passed my instructor started sticking more rice in my basket. Then suddenly the next procession was shuffling by. At the end of this group, my instructor set down her basket and motioned me to follow her. 

We hurried into the Wat discarded our shoes outside the door. We kneeled down placed our hands together and said our silent prayers to Budda. (I have to admit one of my prayers was to be able to keep up with the next set of monks.). Then we hurried out of the temple just in time for the next set of monks marching down the street.

 I can't say I was observing much in this experience, I was so busy making rice balls all I could see was a blur of orange robes breezing past my face and the hollow sound of the opening and closing of offering bowls -- All of a sudden I am out of rice and there are still monks coming! My instructor whispers that it is OK, so I sit quietly as the last of the monks pass.

My instructor motions that we are done and I breathe a sigh of relief. This experience was definitely more stressful than I was envisioning it would be.  But I am glad I did it. It's another skill I can add to my resume.