Tribasia Blog

Northern Vietnam is full of surprises. When you think you have come across all the minorities in one given area, you quickly realize that you are short of a few.

The official number of ethnic minorities recognized by the authorities (54) falls short of the real-life picture. One grouping often hides many different sub-groups and cultures.
Although they might not exist in the official eyes, these minorities still lead their day-to-day life.

Before leaving Sa Pa, we ventured north, towards Lao Cai. We were convinced that we had seen all the minorities in Sa Pa's immediate vincinity: Black Hmong, Red Dzao, Dzay and Xa Pho.

We were proven wrong when we came across a different sub-group of Dzao people living in a hamlet, 18 kms north of Sa Pa. As they do not speak English and we do not speak Dzao language, we could not establish the name of this sub-group.

These Dzao people use different stitching patterns and headdress from the Red Dzao.
They wrap their head in a colourful material adorned with flowers and arranged in a conic shape. We were happily surprised to come across this village and be kept on our toes in our tribal quest :))

Sa Pa region is not only full of 'ethnic' surprises but also surrounded by magnificent landscapes. Every curve on the mountain road unveals landscapes more spectacular than the ones you previously saw.

We leave Sa Pa with great memories of its ethnic diversity and natureal beauties. Soon it will be time for us to leave Vietnam altogether.

Labels: Black Dzao, ethnic diversity, mountains, nature, northern Vietnam, Sa Pa

We were back on our feet for a long trek yesterday, south of Sa Pa (Northern Vietnam). We first went to Lao Chai, a Black Hmong village located in a very scenic valley. Beyond the beautiful rice fields, we spotted vast areas of maize and hemp cultures.

Hemp was introduced following the interdiction of opium by the authorities. To which extent this is successful, we cannot really say as the lush greenery of the mountains is an easy hideout for plants of any kind...
Hemp is of course used for clothing. Many Black Hmong women can be seen with strands of hemp on their shoulders which they prepare for weaving. The typical weaving machine consists of a wooden wheel around which the threads of hemp are rolled. The wheel is actioned by foot, just like a bicycle.

We also came across lots of Red Dzao -whenever you see Black Hmong in Sa Pa area, there seems to be a Red Dzao village just nearby.

We continued our walk towards the village of Ta Van, the home of Dzay people, also called Giay.
Please have a look at our 'Ethnic Groups' section (http://www.tribasia.com/ethnic-groups.html) for further information about this group.

From Ta Van to Giang Ta Chai, a Dzao village further south, we were escorted by an unsolicited trio of Black Hmong women. One of them sported a red dot on her forehead. We had already spotted a few babies and women in the market with these marks and were curious about its meaning. Was it a sign of protection as in the Hindu religion?
The eldest of the three women told me that Black Hmong actually applied a freshly boiled cut buffalo horn on their forehead to cure them of diseases. The best placebo on earth no doubt. With medical means out of reach -either financially or logistically- for many minorities, many resort to traditional methods.

We trekked all the way back from Giang Ta Chai up to Sa Pa with the sunlight bathing the valley of its fading light. A beautiful sight!

All in all it was a sunny day full of wonderful views and without any hassle. What best!
After these 25 kms walk, we are ready to put our feet up :))

Labels: Black Hmong, Dzay, Lao Chai, northern Vietnam, Red Dzao, Sa Pa, Ta Van

On 14th June, we took the mini-bus from Sin Ho to Lai Chau (North Vietnam), a 60 kms ride up and down a narrow mountain road. All was going well until the bus started to stink with a smell of alcohol.

One of the passengers at the back had the bright idea to have a few servings of his home-brewed tipple and was probably too drunk to notice that one of our bags was under his feet. Great!
We arrived with an alcohol-scented bagpack!

We had to spend the night in Lai Chau as we missed the last bus. It is a proper town and people here have long assimilated Kinh (=Viet) ways of dressing, except for Hmongs coming from their surrounding mountain villages.

On 15th June, we left Lai Chau by mini-bus to go back to Sa Pa where we have a few more areas we wanted to have a look at. After all these bus rides, we start by resting for a good few days! See you!

Labels: Black Hmong, Lai Chau, northern Vietnam, Sa Pa, Sin Ho

4.45 am on 13th June. So early! Too early to be true but we have to wake up to take the only bus of the day leaving Dien Bien for Sin Ho.

After a bumpy ride, we arrived at destination just before midday. Sin Ho is a big village of 8,000 people located in the middle of a green valley surrounded by paddy fields and lush landscapes of mountains and untouched nature. Once you enter the place, you understand that here stops the postcard picturing of the place.

Sin Ho is not used to tourism, at least not of the foreign kind. People welcomed us with icey glances and seemed to have a keen interest in our belongings. We try to get moving by finding an accommodation for the night but this is no easy task. After much drama and crossing dozens of barking dogs along the main road -the only one in the village- we managed to get a room in the end.

We ventured for a long walk outside Sin Ho but loving dogs -an average of two per hemlet- waited us at every corner and we decided that it was time to go back. On Sunday, we woke up early again to spend time in Sin Ho's market. A wealth of ethnic minorities from the surrounding area had come to trade or do their shopping: Tay, Hmong Dau (Red Hmong), Hmong Du, Hmong La, Dzao and Lu, we saw them all!

'Hmongs' are a complex people to classify. This group is in fact a collective name for many different sub-groups. Each of these sub-groups can easily identified by their attire:
- the Red Hmong (they called themselves "Hmong De" in this region) sport a giant headdress made from red pleated wool and hair

- the Hmong Dau (again, this is the name they gave us when we asked who they were) wear black skirts with colourful stripes, colourful long sleeved cropped jackets whose sleeves' pattern (stripes) differ from that of the body (flowery or block colour).

- the Hmong La wear a conic shaped hat and black clothing adorned with flashy colours.

- the Dzao from this region are different from those of Tam Duong or Sa Pa. They wear indigo or black dyed clothing and headdress, similar to the Lanten from Laos. They have cropped trousers stitched with white, red and green design at the helms. All women sport a rigid brass necklace, similar to a choker and colourful wool strings with colourful beads and coins on their backs, hanging from their neck line.

- the Lu from this region are similar to that of Tam Duong area. They also sport a headgear made from wrapped black material adorned with fake flowers for a dash of colours :))

We also spotted a Tay woman -not to be confused with a Thai minority woman- doing her shopping! This maze of minorities lifted our spirits up in what was otherwise a difficult stay.

Sin Ho is really not a welcoming place at all: we got people throwing stones, or whatever they had at hand, at us. Therefore, we decided not to linger too much and on Sunday 14th, in the early afternoon, we 'escaped' by mini-bus.

Labels: ethnic minorities, northern Vietnam, Sin Ho

We left Sa Pa district on 26th May for Muong Lay where we were hoping to encounter other groups in a different environment. Indeed, Sa Pa is the coolest place in Vietnam being at a relatively high altitude while Muong Lay benefits from much warmer climatic conditions.

We rode through the towns of Tam Duong, Lai Chau and beautiful sceneries. Road works still made the ride pretty bumpy at times but after six hours, our bus finally arrived in Muong Lay.

What a disappointing sight! Mechanical diggers, concrete constructions and dust have transformed this place from a sleepy country town into a hellish hole. What a shame!
Even the locals seem to have given up on their town as only one hotel cater to travellers and what a disaster! It takes advantage of its monopoly by asking exhorbitant prices for a mediocre service.

Muong Lay had a much glorious past than its present demise. It apparently used to be the provincial capital of its namesake district but the authorities believed it would be swallowed by rising water at some point and moved the provincial capital to today's Lai Chau. I saw more dust than water around but here we go, that is the official version.

The cherry on the cake was the dogs! They bark and display their fangs at anyone -even locals this time- in the town itself. Imagine going for a stroll out of town! As we were on a sadomasochistic streak, we still went for a walk, armed with a long stick. As expected, we got a warm reception from our canine friends at every turn. Luckily, we managed to encounter local minorities such as the White Hmongs.

We decided to leave Muong Lay the following day and head back to Hanoi to let our wounds 'crust' over nicely, recharge our batteries and extend our visa for another piece of Vietnam. Told you, we are on a sadomasochistic streak :0)

Labels: Muong Lay, northern Vietnam

After much trekking, it was time to hire a bike again to cover the 55 kms from Sa Pa to Lai Chau district to discover its colourful markets and minorities.

The road from Sa Pa to Lai Chau crosses the highest mountain pass in Vietnam, the Tram Ton at over 1,900 metres, and therefore offers unique views of the mountain range and Vietnam's highest peak, the Fansipan. From afar, mountains proudly show their natural curves with curly green vegetation rolling down their sides, in contrast with the sharpness of cultivated fields down the valleys at their feet.

Amid such natural beauty, the destruction caused by recent mass public works is a sore sight.
Mechanical digger arms are like abscesses on the scenery. We all know it takes billions of years and a succession of natural phenomenons to make up a mountain; it seems so fickle that an army of excavators could turn it to ruin for the sake of a modern age in less than a year!

Going back to the local people, touch wood, local cultures have not so far been as negatively impacted as the environment they live in, although they directly suffer or benefit from its changes.

It is really striking how ethnic minority groups differ from one distric to the next. On the one hand, Sa Pa area is mainly populated with Black Hmong and Red Dzao as we recounted in the last few posts. On the other hand, Lai Chau district is the home of Lu people as well as Black Dzao and Red Hmong. We are aware that all these names sound rather similar except the colours are mixed up but once you see these groups in real life, there is no confusion possible!

In terms of traditional outfits: the Lu are recognizable with their wide black headdress with colourful teasels at each end and their blackened teeth -although the practice is now less common among younger generations.

The Black Dzao of course wear black linen/cotton clothing but what makes them unique is their headdress again. They sport a silvery inverted spiral on top of a solid black base, sometimes covered by a cloth, particularly under the sun as it gets very hot! They are tenacious but not aggressive in their endeavors.

Red Hmong contrarily to their name cannot be spotted because of their red clothing but the way they hold their hair in a giant swirl around their head. It provides their hair with so much volume that any shampoo manufacturer would die for it. We do not have the secret to their hairdressing but we will sure try and find out! Red Hmong are more aggressive than the Black Dzao when it comes to interacting and communicating but we are now used to their ways... although still not to their dogs :))

After so much excitement discovering new faces, the road works spoilt a bit the fun for us. With so much sand, mud and big trucks with blind drivers on the road, it was inevitable that we would have a difficult time riding. And we did! We ended up slipping on the road surface, luckily at low speed, and with a few scratches but we are well. After a few days' rest, we will be back on track!

Labels: Black Dzao, Fansipan, Lai Chau, Luzon, mountain, northern Vietnam, Red Hmong, Sa Pa, Tram Ton Pass

Today we rested our legs and opted to rent a motorbike to drive 35 kms south of Sa Pa. This is where we came across a Xa Pho minority village. It was the first time we encountered this group.
They no longer wear the traditional attire on a daily basis but only for special occasions such as festivals and ceremonies. Xa Pho women dress with a black long-sleeved top adorned with white stitched crossbow figures and a tube of black clothing tied at the waist and stitched with bamboo tree-liked shapes and colourful helms for skirt. The patterns used are very typical of this minority. They wrap their hair in a simple colourful shawl.

When walking through their village, you can grasp that Xa Pho are poor -much poorer than the average Hmong, Tai and Red Dzao- and that each thatched grass hut is home to an extended family. They were probably late settler in Vietnam compared to other minorities. As a result they got little choice when it came to settle down and their village is located on a steep slope of a mountain: not an ideal location when it comes to farm land and torrential rains.

We also went through Tay villages. Tay women are highly recognizable with their facial features and although the younger generations do not always wear their traditional clothing, we can identify them more easily than any others among the minorities' maze!

After 8 hours of biking around, it has been another rewarding day full of great views and sunshine. Fingers crossed, it will last!

Labels: discover, northern Vietnam, Sa Pa, Xa Pho Minority

Labels: Black Hmong, northern Vietnam, Red Dzao, rice planting, rice terraces, Sa Pa

When trekking to the West of Bac Ha, we met a girl from the Tay minority (beware the spelling: 'Tai' means 'ear' in Vietnamese) named Huong. She invited us to her house in her village, Na Anga, 4 kms away from Bac Ha, where we met her parents, uncle and cousins. They offered us to share their local brew of fire water made from corn (bought from Hmong women) and luckily for our stomachs, a lunch of steamed rice, tofu, green vegetables, sour plums (eaten with salt) to soak it up!

Labels: Bac Ha, Flower Hmong, northern Vietnam, Nung, Tai

We left Hanoi on 9th May and headed in the overnight train northwest to the village of Bac Ha in Lao Cai province. This place is famed for its huge Sunday market where all local indigenous groups -and unfortunately, hordes of tourists on express tours- come to sell, buy and bargain it all.

The market is divided in several areas: one for trading water buffalos, horses, pigs and dogs (yes, dog is not only a man's best friend here but it also makes a toothy security guard and at times a good supper!), another for handicrafts and souvenir, another still for local firewater brews (made from rice, cassava or corn) and a meat, vegetable and fruit market. You can also encounter traditional medicine doctors, saddlers, blacksmiths and of course hairdressers: a healthy man with a well-saddled horse is nothing without a good haircut after all :))

The market is a good representation of the demographics of the minority population in the vicinity. The Flower Hmong, whose women are highly recognizable with their richly embroidered skirts, puttees and tops, flood the market with electric colours. Other minorities such as the Dzao, Tai and Phula are less numerous and wear more subtle attires. They are also more camera shy and weary of foreigners.

Although we only witnessed 5 different groups this Sunday, a total of 10 Montagnard groups are living in the area, namely the Flower Hmong, Dzao (or Dao), the Giay (also called Nhang), Han (also called Hoa), Xa Fang, Lachi, Nung, Tai, Phula and Thulao.

Bac Ha market is the biggest market in the area but not the only one as there are three others on Sundays. There is also a popular market in Can Cau on Saturdays and another in Coc Ly district on Tuesdays. In a nutshell, open-air markets are central to the life of 'hill tribes'.

After an exciting day among chaotic stalls and ethnic crowds, we decided to stay beyond the colourful Sunday market to get acquainted further with the local people and Bac Ha surroundings. Tomorrow, we are off trekking!

Labels: Bac Ha, ethnic minorities, hill tribes, Lao Cai, Markets, northern Vietnam