Elephant Festival in Sayaboury

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We'd seen posters advertising Elephant Festival around Luang Prabang and decided that we really wanted to go. We'd passed on tubing in Vang Vieng and thought that spending three days photographing and admiring elephants dressed in silk costumes was a great alternative and more our kind of thing.

From the posters we'd seen the festival promised to deliver 100 elephants, all competing for the prestigious title of “Elephant of the Year”. Elephant processions, elephant bathing, mahout demonstrations, ancient Baci ceremony, traditional Monk blessings, live performances from Lao and foreign artists, night markets, fun fairs and much, much more.

Thinking there might be a rush of tourists heading to the event we got up early to make sure we were on the first bus to Sayaboury where the festival is held. We were two of about 6 tourists on our bus and we soon realised that this was more of a celebration for Laos people and not many tourists ventured to join them. One reason for this could be that Sayaboury isn't the easiest place to get to and doesn't offer much in the way of things to do unless, of course, the elephants are in town. The journey started out typical of most Laos bus journey's; the roads were winding and the bus driver was erratic. After about 3 hours of driving we suddenly came to a stand still and joined a long queue of traffic, all the locals abandoned the bus so we followed to see what was going on. It turned out to be a river crossing, there wasn't a bridge so all traffic was being transported over the river on a platform that is navigated and pushed by a big old boat. We waited for over an hour until it was our turn to cross.

The rest of the journey was smooth as can be expected and as we neared our destination the midday sun started to beat down at full force, it was much hotter here than anywhere else we had been in Laos. From the bus station we jumped in a tuk tuk with some other 'Falangs' and headed for the festival where we would find the homestay desk and the location of our homestay family, as we approached the site we passed a line of 4 huge elephants walking with their mahouts down the road. Our homestay number was 24 and we were shown on a map how to find it, it wasn't that far to walk but in the baking heat and heavily loaded down with our backpacks it was a tough walk. When we finally arrived at our new home we were very surprised by how modern it was, compared to what we had seen of homes in Laos so far it was definately luxurious. For a start it wasnt made of bamboo or balanced on stilts. There were a few people hanging around in the garden who seemed to be expecting us, they invited us in and we waited in their huge front room while they dashed around the house moving matresses around and preparing a room for us to sleep in. We weren't quite sure who was who but there was a lady who seemed to be doing most of the running around so we assumed that was the mother of this family that seemed to extend into neighbours, dogs, puppies, and whoever else was passing by and wanted to take a look at us.

We stayed and chatted as best we could with our new hosts but with no common language it wasnt long before we announced (by pointing out of the window to the direction we had arrived in) that we were going to explore the festival for the rest of the afternoon. Not officially starting until the next day the events weren't in full swing yet but there were still plenty of elephants to go and look at and all of the stalls and tents were set up ready for the arrival of the crowds.

After spending a few hours spying on elephants the heat got too much and we retreated to a tent for a cold beer. We bumped into some friends we had made on the bus and spent the rest of the afternoon watching the festival unravelling from the shade. We were entertained by some street theatre as the evening drew in, including three men in pink tutu's who came dancing down the road harrassing passers by on the way. We decided to sample a local dish for our tea, Papaya Salad; possibly the spiciest dish on the menu, Luke managed to finish his off but the rest of us had really sore lips and mouths from just a few mouthfulls.

When we returned to our homestay that night, the mother was still up with her eldest daughter, Noi. Noi was learning English at school so we stayed up for a while and tried to piece together a conversation with her which was much more successful than our attempt with the rest of the family earlier; we still only managed to cover our ages and how many brothers and sisters we had but it was nice to be able to communicate. When we went to our room we realised that while we'd been out they had put up a mosquito net, placed bowl of fruit on the table and a book on 'How to Behave in Laos'. Laos people are much quieter and more reserved than their Thai neighbours and we learnt fast to follow a certain set of manners; always removing shoes when entering homes, not raising voices, not wearing revealing clothes and not kissing or showing affection in public.

The next morning we were up early to catch the elephant procession which started from a stadium near by. Not really knowing where the stadium was we followed the crowds of people all heading in one direction, we realised how few tourists there were at this event, it was a good feeling to be part of something set up for Laos people and not as a tourist trap. When we arrived at the stadium we could see a lot of effort had been put into announcing the start of the festival; even the Laos Prime Minister was present to welcome everyone. The stadium was full of brightly decorated floats ready to follow the elephants in the procession, there were hundreds of children dressed in uniform each with a single drum. As well as the Prime Minister there seemed to be a few other important Laos people sitting on the stage, after they had all said a few words they officially announced the opening of the festival. Everyone cheered and a huge bunch of helium filled balloons was launched into the air, as the balloons filled the sky music suddenly started blaring out of the speakers, the tune was familiar, it was the Star Wars theme tune. The children with drums started to steadily beat in time to the music and step from side to side, it felt very communist and we felt like we were in Soviet Russia.

The elephants were now on their way so we rushed out of the stadium and into the street, as each elephant walked past we were amazed at how magnificant they looked. Each elephant was decorated uniquely in colourful silks, flowers and some were even painted with bright symbols. Each elephant had their own mahout mounted on their neck who controlled them by calling out different commands, an elephant can learn up to 40 different commands. After all of the elephants had marched passed the floats followed behind, most of them were just for advertising purposes though, apart from a couple that were decorated in vegetables. Just as the last few floats went passed we noticed a helicopter in the sky, it was dropping sky divers out who were parachuting down and landing in the stadium to everyone's cheers.

We then headed back to the festival in the direction of the elephants, the next display on the program of events was the 'elephant demonstration'. There were four elephants in a large ring with their mahouts, they demonstrated how working elephants are used to move large logs using their trunks to roll them and their front legs to kick them. It was interesting to see how these animals are still used in everyday life in Laos and many parts of Asia and play an important role in farming. We also learnt that some of the elephants at the festival had walked for 6 days to get to this important event. After the demonstration we wandered around the stalls for a while trying to avoid the heat that was now setting in fast, we walked past a stall selling flowers and realised that it was Valentines day, not wanting to offend any Laos passers by we gave eachother an unaffectionate pat on the back.

We then decided to go for a walk in the areas surrounding the festival. We climbed a hill not far away where we could see the other side of Sayaboury and get a good view of the festival down below. As we walked we could hear the familiar clinking sound of the bells the elephants wear around their necks, there were elephants dotted all around us taking a rest from the festival and like us, seeking the shade of the trees. It was good to see the elephants close up and away from the hustle and bustle of the festival. When we headed back down we bumped into our friends and decided to go for some dinner, we found a restaurant in town that did food other than papaya salad so we excitedly ordered chicken curry. A more accurate description of what we recieved would be bones curry. They had chopped up the whole chicken bones and all, eating it was hard work as we were constantly picking tiny bits of bone out of our teeth. Still starving we ordered again, vegetarian this time.

The next morning we were woken by the clinking of elephant bells, Luke went out to the front of the house to see what was going on and found all the elephants walking in line past our house. We quickly got dressed and followed them down the street. They were heading to a field behind the main stadium to get ready for the final procession and ceremony of 'elephant of the year'. We weren't sure whether we were meant to be there but we hung around and then once the elephants were dressed and ready we followed them into the stadium. The newly crowned Elephant of the Year was at the front of the procession, followed by second place they were both dressed in beautiful orange silk with matching ankle bands and must have felt very important as they were being photographed from every angle.

Once again all of the elephants proudly paraded out of the stadium and into the street, this time we followed them closely and when we arrived at the bridge that lead to the main festival area all the people following rushed up onto it to get a good view of the elephants as they crossed the river. Still in a neat line each elephant plunged into the river, sucking and spraying water as they went. The mahouts showed incredible balance as they kept their seats on the elephants necks. Some of the elephants decided to submerge themselves into the water forcing their mahout to stand up and try not to fall in; inevitabely, and to the crowds pleasure, some did. Once all the elephants had made it to the other side they were de-robed and each taken to another part of the river for a bath.

We followed the now clean elephants back to the festival where they were given some shade and a well-earned rest. We took our last looks at the elephants and then left, we had a bus to catch to Vientiene that afternoon and it was going to be busy as many people from the festival were now trying to leave. We headed back to our homestay to get our bags and say a quick goodbye to our family. As we packed up our things our homestay father came to see us with one of his neighbours who claimed to be able to speak French. His French turned out to be limited to 'Je parle un petit Francais' which he slurred at us with the smell of Lao Lao (famous Laos whiskey) thick on his breath. We tried to speak back to him in French, to our disapointment he didnt understand but we managed to give him the impression we were from France, even though we had told him a few times we were English.

We paid the father for the two nights we had spent in his home and thanked him for his hospitality. The two men remained at our door as we packed our bags, they were trying to tell us something. Using the universal sign for eating (fingers together, moving hand to and from mouth) we realised they wanted us to join them for lunch. Feeling bad that we hadn't really spent much time with them while staying in their home we nodded our heads and followed them into the front room. They had clearly been drinking for some time and when we produced a bottle of Lao Lao that we had bought and not drunk the day before they were very impressed. We were joined by the mother and three or four other neighbours, they brought us sticky rice and another dish that looked very much like the bones curry we'd had the night before. A couple of hours later we were all drunk, the guitar was out, one of the neighbours had produced an instrument from next door and we were all singing. The neighbour who claimed he could speak French now realised that I was English but was convinced Luke was French and that his name was Mr Lips.

We weren't sure how many hours had passed, Lao Lao seems to have that effect, but we knew we had to leave to get our bus, if there still was one. We said one final goodbye to those still standing and promised to write with photo's we had taken of them. We arrived at the bus station and luckily still managed to get tickets to Vientiene on the next bus as we'd planned. After an hour waiting around for the bus to fill up completely we set off at 4pm. We'd been driving for about 30 minutes when the bus came to a standstill, we heard a few gasps from the locals so we peered out of the window to see what the matter was. It turned out this was the back of the queue to cross the river on the little boat we'd waited an hour to cross on the way in. The locals were gasping because we were no where near the river. 7 (seven) and a half hours later we crossed the river, we'd been queuing for a lifetime and we still had the 14 hour journey to Vientiene ahead of us. It was dark and the bus was so full of dust from the road it hurt to breath, the driver stopped every few hours to let people off to go to the toilet so it was impossible to sleep. Our least favourite bus journey yet!

We arrived in Vientiene at 2pm the next day dusty and exhausted. The elephants were worth it.

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