Phonesvan Bilavarn
Puangchampa Cultural House
Laos, or the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, the jewel of the Lower Mekong River, is well developed in culture and traditions that have been carried on for many generations and are related to the living condition of the people up to the present. Lao PDR, with its tropical climate, is rich with dense forests full of diversity of plants and especially flowers. The living conditions and the natural resources, such as the culture and traditions, cannot be separated.
Laos is the land of “Champa”, frangipani or (plumeria), which is the Lao national flower. Flowers are in harmony, they are beautiful, soft, valuable and useful, and play an important role in religious and social life, not just in Laos, but in the entire region.
(Presented in the 2014 Chulalongkorn Asian Heritage Forum: Flower Culture in Asia, 8-9 July 2014, Imperial Queen’s Park Hotel, Bangkok, organized by Institute of Thai Studies, Institute of Asian Studies, and Faculty of Arts, Chulalongkorn University)