Edition: U.S. / Global

Luang Prabang Journal; Where Pagodas Draw Tourists, Concrete Is Unwelcome

Published: July 8, 2004

This former royal capital perches on the banks of the Mekong River, a gorgeous medley of gilded temples and pagodas, creaking wooden homes and some spruced-up vestiges of the French colonial era. Scarlet hibiscus and cream frangipani nestle beneath coconut palms.

To the newcomer, it is easy to imagine the impression left on Pierre Billotey, a French novelist, who traveled here to north central Laos in the 1920's to see his recently ensconced countrymen. He wrote of a tropical paradise where the French and the locals, including the Laotian king, Sisavang Vong, lived in harmony. Other visitors spoke enthusiastically about the easy opium and the not-too-discreet harems.

Now the foreigners are back, bringing with them a quickened pace and different demands.

Specifically, Unesco, the United Nations agency that fosters the preservation of important historic sites, wants the people here to maintain their houses in the style of those long ago times.

The town was named a world heritage site by Unesco in 1995, a designation that makes it eligible for United Nations preservation funds. Among other things, the residents are being offered traditional-style plaster instead of the big no-no -- concrete -- for refurbishment.

But the requests are being met with the kind of disdain that Manhattan residents often show the New York City Landmarks Commission when it asks for restraint in replacing leaky period windows in Art Deco buildings. In short, there is resistance.

''When we explain that timber is part of the tradition, they don't understand, because to people here timber is the material of the poor,'' said Emmanuel Pouille, a French architect and historian, who is the chief technical adviser to the Unesco project. ''Here, concrete is a symbol of being rich. They say, 'Why can't we live like the people in the suburbs of Bangkok?'''

The answer, Mr. Pouille says, is that there is a direct link between preservation and the rising tourism that is helping make them rich.

At last count, there were 129 guesthouses, some of them two rooms in search of a bathroom, and 14 hotels, a couple of them quite luxe, in a town of fewer than 20,000 residents.

Intrepid travelers arrive by slow boat down the Mekong, or by bus over bone-jolting roads. Recently, flights into the newly expanded airport have started bringing tourists bored with neon Bangkok.

Mr. Pouille says that without Luang Prabang's traditional look, even intrepid travelers will be less inclined to come.

''But people don't see the connection,'' he said. ''Most want to make the money very quickly and run.''

For many residents, the outsiders' passion for the old is misplaced, a cultural misunderstanding that refuses to respect their desire to spend a newfound wealth that has been a long time coming.

Laos remains one of the world's poorest countries with few natural resources, a miserable education system and a Communist government that declines to liberalize the economy in any meaningful way. The hammer and sickle on a red field still flies from the flagpoles of official buildings.

But the government has permitted Luang Prabang to forge ahead as a tourist destination, and the evidence of new money is evident in tastes that go beyond concrete houses.

At one restaurant frequented entirely by Laotians, male diners depleted bottles of Johnny Walker Black Label whiskey, followed by beer chasers. Outside, teenagers buzzed by on spanking new motorcycles, and a few of the really well-to-do cruised up and down the street in their S.U.V.'s searching for nocturnal fun.

Visitors are drawn by more than two dozen Buddhist temples, which for the most part have been maintained in good condition. Monks in orange robes with yellow sashes seek alms at dawn. During the day they can be seen on the grounds of the monasteries doing manual labor or casually smoking cigarettes.

Another attraction is the royal palace, an unremarkable white colonial building that has been turned into a museum with the artifacts of the departed monarchy. Bizarrely, they include moon rocks from Apollo 11 sent by President Richard Nixon when the United States was pounding the Ho Chi Minh trail, which snaked through the eastern edge of Laos.

Luang Prabang's royalty did not leave voluntarily. Soon after the Communists took over in 1975, the last king, Savang Vatthana, a reportedly laconic character who liked tending orchids, and his wife and a son were taken to a labor camp. They died in terrible but never fully explained circumstances several years later.

To keep all this history in its context, Mr. Pouille and his team -- a Japanese architect, two French environmental experts and a passel of Lao architects -- want the authority to enforce their aesthetic standards.

Last year they won a symbolic victory when Unesco stopped the construction of a concrete house that was being built behind a Buddhist temple. The juxtaposition was especially troubling, they say.

Now they hope they can persuade the authorities to pull down the concrete shell. ''It is unacceptable,'' Mr. Pouille said. ''We will call the TV to show people we can demolish.''

But Thong Parn Wattanacine, 24, a guesthouse manager who taught herself English with the help of an American boyfriend, said the outsiders were unrealistic.

''People are getting richer,'' she said. ''They don't want the old things. If they own a wood house, they will move outside the town and build concrete houses.''

Moreover, Ms. Thong Parn said, there was a practical reason why people preferred concrete in the tropics. ''A wood house is hot, concrete is cool.''

Photos: Two monks stand in front of one of Luang Prabang's many temples. Unesco is asking people to maintain their houses in the old style.; A hotel in Luang Prabang. The city, a Unesco world heritage site, draws tourists with its gilded temples and pagodas, colonial-era buildings and timber houses, but many residents would rather have concrete homes. (Photographs by Jerry Redfern/Asiaworksphotos.com, for The New York Times) Map of Laos highlighting Luang Prabang: Luang Prabang, on the Mekong River, was Laos's royal capital.