My last day in Luang Prabang proved to be my culture day. Whilst going round the National Museum earlier in the week, I had seen the Royal Ballet Theatre, which is in the grounds of the museum. I had investigated and found there was a performance on my last evening, so I booked it up. I have only been to the ballet once before, and that was the English Royal Ballet - a rather different type of dance. I did not have any idea what to expect.
When I go there, the requested 30 minutes early, they would not allow entry to the theatre for nearly the full thirty minutes. I, and a few other tourists who had followed their instructions sat talking outside the theatre. There were a small group of Australians who had obviously been travel companions on many trips, plus a young French theatre set designer, who though on holiday, was there partly out of professional interest. It proved to be an interesting introduction to the evening.
The format of the evening was a welcome dance to start with, and some general dances to end - a monkey dance, a goodbye dance, and a giants dance. These framed one episode of a continuing saga - The Abduction of Princess Siva. The company runs through one episode per performance, thus the entire saga takes about six performances to see. (This would take about two weeks in total.) The theatre very usefully provide information sheets about all the dances, including the episode of the serial being danced that evening.
The first dance was performed by the women of the ensemble. This was what I think of as typically Siamese/Indian - much of the action was in very small and precise hand movements, combined with small and precise steps. Very interesting, but there are semantic elements that just passed me by.
The rest of the dances were mixed, but all but one of them focussed very heavily on the male dance. This is completely different from the female dance, and like Beijing Opera, owes a lot to martial arts and the stances and movements from such arts. The dance is very slow, with a lot of foot stomping and held postures - very difficult ones. The whole thing was superb and thoroughly enjoyable.
After the ballet, I went to a restaurant just a few hundred yards up the road from where I was staying. I had seen this when I arrived, and thought it somewhat upmarket, so a possible place to have a special meal. As this was my last night it seemed appropriate. When I arrived there the place was packed, but they managed to find space for me in an extension. This is when I found it was not just "somewhat upmarket". It was a gourmet, French-Laos, living food vegan restaurant. Living food is one of the further reaches of veganism - I don't pretend to know all the implications of it, but they do include not heating any food above 115oC, and using "live" vegan ingredients. Again the implications of this are unclear to me.
There was only a fixed menu, at a fixed price. The menu on the day I went:
Elixir
Bee Pollen, Greens & Mint
Soup
Seasonal Lao Mushroom & Coriander Mouse
Starter
Tomato Carpaccio, Lime Zest & Vanilla Dressing
Main
Warm Laksa Curry
with Herbs & Vegetable Noodles
Green Papaya Condiment
Dessert
Chocolate with Coco Bean & Fruit Slice
Herbal Tea
Bael Fruit & Mulberry
The meal was of extraordinary standard - up there with Michelin starred restaurants - as was the price, which was expensive by western standards let alone Laos ones.
So for this evening I was the complete culture vulture.