Alms Giving Ceremony, Luang Prabang

Many groups of monks walking along the street (actually more streets) receiving alms. The ceremony begins early in the morning while it's still quite dark. Unfortunately, the ceremony became very touristy. That's not necessarily bad, it helps to keep up the tradition but many of the tourists simply can't behave respectfully. They're going too close trying to take a picture with their mobile phones, they're using flashes etc. Yes, the quality of our pictures isn't that great but taking cool pictures at the price of disturbing the ceremony is not an option for us. If you really need better pictures bring an appropriate photographic equipment with you.

It deeply saddens me that such a great ceremony has already seen its greatest times and it is all in the past. Most people contributing to the alms giving are tourists guided by tour guides. There are certain rules that ought to be followed in order to show respect to the monks and the tradition. However, mostly tourists from Far East were strongly interfering with the ceremony by not obeying the rules and stopping the procession on several occasions. To summarise: the alms giving is not genuine and nor it is very pleasant to see for cultured people as of now.