Sunday, March 9, 2014

Going Ethnic in MHS

Rak Thai Village of Yunnan Chinese

 Tucked in the rolling high mountains of Shan Hills bordering the north of Thailand and Myanmar, the isolated and pristine MHS province has a rich make up of ethnic tribal groups. The province’s 7 major tribes are Shan (known as Tai Yai), Karen, Hmong, Lawa, Lisu, Lahu,Chin Ho, whose sub-tribes differentiate themselves from one another with dialects and daily costumes. Their settlements are in different topographies and their lifestyles vary. Some have become MHS city people. A few populate the province’s night market as vendors. Others live in the mountains, connected to towns via concrete roads and have been utilizing electricity. Others are totally cut off from the modern world and can only be reached by days of trekking into the deep jungle.Our ethnic tribe tour started off with a Tai Yai group, who make up the major population of MHS, at a small village called Muang Pond hidden in a valley of KhunYuam district.

The settlement in Muang Pond started over 150 years back as some Tai Yai migrated from the nearby Shan State of Myanmar, established a community, and traded with Chiang Mai city and Mae Sariang town via the connecting Pond River. The village of around 40 houses is now rustic and peaceful with smiley villagers.As the village started a community-based tourism project initiated by an NGO, it now offers 10 houses operating as homestays. The most basic 2-day package offers an overnight stay, 3 meals with the host, village sightseeing and workshops to learn about the local’s ways of life.We arrived to meet our host just in time for breakfast.  



The auntie used lots of herbs and veggies collected from her backyard, incorporating chilies, gingers, lemongrass, red onions, sesame seeds, and the ‘smelly beans,’ which are soybeans ground and seasoned for preservation. These, including sesame oil, are the common ingredients in Tai Yai cuisine which is famous for being super organic.    

And after our stomachs were full, the village tour started. We first visited a koop tai (กุบไต) traditional hat maker. We have a saying in Thai, ‘to know what you’re doing so well you can even close your eyes and still do it,’ and that explains exactly how the uncle works. The caps, priced at 350 baht and the hats at 450, were small money for quality. The uncle had to teach all his family members the craft just to keep up with purchasing orders from fairs and stores in downtown MHS.




We moved on to the next lesson, to see a traditional Tai Yai house. And we ran into a few elders dressed in traditional Tai Yaiclothes. The shirt called taekpung (แต้กปุ่ง) and the khon tai (ก๋นไต) fisherman pants are worn daily by elderly men.  

At Auntie Kam Lu’s, the family was busy receiving field-trip student visitors. Her house was a good sample of traditional Tai Yai style, always in teak and built without any use of nails. The houses remain cool thanks to the roof, made of leaf sheets placed on top of one another to rainproof, and built to be tall and airy to allow the wind to blow through.The water bowls in front of the house serve as drinking water and feet cleansing before entering the house. Horoscopes and fortunes are often read off a traditional calendar. Inside, there is always a Buddhist altar but supernatural powers and spirits are influential in Tai Yai’s life as well. 
A traditional Tai Yai house's roof made from dried leaves 

Close to Buddhist Lent in October, you may also see a chong para(จองพารา) made of paper, representing Lord Buddha’s rest house according to the belief that the Buddha returns from heaven to greet and preach to devotees during this holy period. We caught up with the artisan who made chong para and who also made tam kwuang(ตำขว่อง), the special flags used for funerals.  

The village’s temple looked elegant and peaceful. The teakwood sermon hall, which is the temple’s oldest part, was built over 150 years ago as the landmark of the villager’s settlement. The hall hosts ancient paintings depicting scenes in heaven and hell with Tai Yai language captions. 

From Muang Pond, we headed to another tribe’s village. Huay Sue Tao, being so close to MHS’s downtown, only 17 kilometers away, probably sees tourists and visitors much more than any other hill tribe village in the province. This village of about 20 Padaung or Long Neck families is a campsite for political refugees. Over years and years ago, the first generations of the villagers migrated from Kayah State, 100 km away in Myanmar, settled down in Baan Nai Soi, 3 hours away from here by foot, and resettled again here. 

The villagers, now registered as displaced persons, are waiting for the political situation in Myanmar to ease so they can go home or be relocated in a third country. We agree this wasn’t the best way to visit a hill tribe and it appeared somewhat sad. But our presence, tourists and visitors, finances their daily life if we buy souvenirs from their stalls as the villagers don’t own any land they can use to grow crops to feed themselves.   

The stalls offer all sorts of souvenirs and the lady vendors did their best at calling visitors to take a look their stalls. I wondered why they would put on such full make up and costumes, but when I saw how much attention they got from cameras, it answered my question. Since they are going to be photographed, why not just to look their best? 

Up the hill where their houses sat, there was a cute little Catholic church. We were told though they were converted to Christianity - animalism and spiritualism was still deeply rooted in their beliefs. 
For the next ethnic village, we headed to Baan Rak Thai, north of MHS’s downtown, which is a settlement of Chin Ho or migrated Yunnan Chinese. Led by generals who fought against and fled Mao Zedong’s communism,the people were divided in groups, some of which resettled in the mountainous area of northern Thailand, including the group following General Tuan.(ต้วน) With the cool temperature year round, Baan Rak Thai is MHS’s another great town to escape the heat, famous for its cozy atmosphere enclosed in beautiful landscapes, and the best fine Chinese tea in MHS.


The village is famous for 3 tea types: Mountain Top De, Sweet Osmanthu, and Gingseng. We enjoyed watching the owner of the shop prepare our tea as she explained the essence of the tea preparing process to draw the best aroma out of the tea leaves. Apart from the enticing fragrance, she told us hot cups were very useful especially during winter to warm up different parts of the body. 

MHS is a wonderland of hill tribes each with a unique way of life. For information about which province’s villages are open for community-based tourism and homestays, visit www.cbt-i.org. Otherwise, a few travel agencies in MHS’s downtown can organize village treks to the meet the province’s remote ethic tribes.
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