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Published: January 13th 2007
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Xavier:
On Wednesday Sarah and I went for our most epic jaunt yet - an overnight trek. This one was all about visiting ethnic minority villages in some of the mountains in Luang Prabang. A surprising large proportion of the country's population live in quite basic rural villages, and we got to visit several.
Our tour guide was another soft spoken Lao (Lee) and we had a 30 year old American Taiwanese lady on our trek (Ann). We drove out to our starting point (hair raising mini van that screeched around all corners). We had to cross a river at a most idyllic setting and passed through the first village - khmu people. The houses were all thatched and there were no roads, but they did have a school which is by no means a guarantee in these places.
We walked through the forest. Our first stop was at a peaceful bend in the stream. Here there was an old man sitting fashioning grooves in a long piece of wood with a machete. The tapping sound and the brook and the solitary man created a very peaceful scene.
Even though we were in the high country and nights
are cold, it still got hot during the day. We had a good hard uphill slog from this point so we were pretty buggered by late morning.
It wasn't like those travel programmes where your guide is a real talker, and whenever you meet locals everyone laughs and hugs and becomes the best of friends. Lee had interesting answers to our questions, in halting english, but if we didn't ask anything he was quite happy to stay silent.
The next village was much higher up the mountain, and was a Hmong village. To describe it simply, Hmong like to live on the tops of mountains, Khmu half way up, and Lao in the valleys. So everyone gets on!
Hmong people are big on livestock. In this village a huge number of animals co-existed with the people - not separated at all. When we arrived the horned cows were lolling in the shade, mum pigs were serving up lunch milk to the little ones, plus many many chickens.
We had lunch in the chiefs home, even in the heat these huts were nice and cool (and dark - certainly no electricity here).
We kept on with
our journey moving on beside the limestone mountains to our right. Even though it was a cloudless day and we had an unimpeded view, we couldn't see very far into the distance. Perhaps due to fire smoke, or dust, or hardly any wind and no rain or all these things, around Laos (and Thailand) at this time of year, there is a permanent haze. If anyone out there knowing what this is all about, please explain. Pristine clear skies are a very good reason to be happy to live in NZ.
Because Sarah and I didn't want to overdo the walking at the expense of spending time in the villages, we chose a trek that was a bit shorter, and thus our party arrived in the next village for the night at 3:30pm. We were in shock and a little bit perturbed because we had nothing to do - our guide just sat down by the villagers and twiddled his thumbs. I would never blame her, but Sarah is very strict on packing, we will never be in danger of overpacking - heaven forbid! So we hadn't packed novels, mp3 players, travel games or a pack of cards. All
we had was our Laos lonely planet which as the photo shows, the kids in the village found utterly fascinating. Sarah slowly showed these kids the colour photos for a good ten minutes.
Our village had two names. Its Laos name was the evocative Thain Pha ("Behind the mountain"). Its Hmong name was the slightly less evocative Fi Yung ("Mountain where nothing grows"). Via Lee, we asked the kindly chief why the Hmong like living on the tops of mountains. He said, he was born in mountains and his parents were born in the mountains, so that was what he was used to. This chief had remained chief of the village for 26 years, even though 'elections' were held every three years. He was very relaxed and was always playing and laughing with the baby of the family.
Fi Yung was less set up for tourists than others apparently, so rather than sleep in separate quarters, Ann and Sarah and I slept in the same hut as the chiefs family. In the evening candly light, the family quietly wound down for thie night. One of the daughters was engaged in the painstaking process of sorting through tomorrows rice
- flippling and sifting it on a large woven flat dish. As we went to sleep the transistor radio played trippy chanting music and the indoor bonfire simmered away.
Fi Yung had basic facilities. 21 families live together with no electricity, they had to walk to the nearest stream for water, no television, internet or toilets (the villagers just walked off into the scrub somewhere to do the business). Concerning the latter, I was finding a private spot to 'have one on the house' as my father would say, and my sixth sense led me to believe that I was being followed - by somebody or... something. I bravely proceeded on with the task at hand and a little pig came along and drank it! Inspiring synergy between Man and Beast.
It was an unforgettable experience staying on the hill with the Hmong people. When we arrived at the Khmu village at the foot of the hills the next day, it seemed like the height of urban sophisticated living by comparison. Sarah and I returned to civilisation with a renewed sense of gratitude, and didn't even mind so much that our hot shower at Som Jith guesthouse barely
achieves tepid status. But then again - when you're paying $5 a night who's complaining!
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Malcolm
non-member comment
Haze
Apparently it mostly comes from Indonesia as a result of land clearance by burning. The problem has been severe since the late 1990s though there is an agreement intended to address it involving a number of countries including Laos, Indonesia, etc. Other countries feel Indonesia isn't doing enough to prevent it. El Nino weather patterns make it worse as monsoon rains are delayed. I saw the same phenomenon in Ghana - hot days but you couldn't see the sun - burning is a traditional agricultural method in Ghana and other countries. I'm really enjoying your descriptions and photos, looking forward to next instalment.