My visit to the Sunday market at Bac Ha was part of a day trip that included a couple other stops. After the market we drove just outside of town to visit a Flower Hmong village. It looked the way it might have 100 years ago, except for the modern school, the power lines, the paved path built for tourists ... okay, so it didn't look this way 100 years ago.
It was still interesting to see the difference in lifestyle between the town of Bac Ha and the village just a mile or two away. Here's the school, completely surrounded by patches of crops.
Walking through the village took about 30 minutes for all but one of us. We had to wait for one passenger who managed to get lost. The area we walked was about the size of a high school football stadium but this guy managed to get lost for 45 minutes.
It gave us plenty of time to watch the locals returning to their homes from the market. Notice anything missing from this pic?
Men!
We saw a few men walking but none of them carried anything. The women carry the gear home while the men ride their motos. It's nice to see a community where men and women understand their roles.
I'm joking. Really, I am. I would never make my wife walk home alone with a basket on her back. I would ride my moto nice and slow right beside her so I could tell her what to cook me for dinner.
Moving right along...
This hill is cultivated from top to bottom with people walking on a footpath about halfway up.
As we were walking back towards the van two little girls walked briskly past, each with a basket strapped to her back and a long, curved knife in her hand. We said hello and waved but they just kept walking. They had work to do.
They were cutting basil leaves from bushes along the path and tossing them into the baskets. At least that's what they were trying to do when tourists weren't jamming cameras in their faces. They absolutely did not want their picture taken. Ah, who cares what a little girl wants when there are people back home waiting to be dazzled by your photography skills.
I was secretly rooting for one of the girls to poke one of the intrusive tourists with a knife, but thankfully they're more civilized than I am.
We stopped on the way back to Sapa to drop some folks off at the train station in Lao Cai. I knew Sapa was close to the Chinese border but I didn't realize how close. Lao Cai is on the border. We stopped briefly at the river so we could see the border crossing.
The monument in the foreground is in Vietnam. The building in the background is in Hekou, China. In between is the Song Hong (Red River), one of the rare place names that sounds equally musical when translated! To the left is a bridge connecting the banks. These two countries have, shall we say, a complicated past, so I was a bit surprised that tourist vans can just roll right up to the border.
It was still interesting to see the difference in lifestyle between the town of Bac Ha and the village just a mile or two away. Here's the school, completely surrounded by patches of crops.
Walking through the village took about 30 minutes for all but one of us. We had to wait for one passenger who managed to get lost. The area we walked was about the size of a high school football stadium but this guy managed to get lost for 45 minutes.
It gave us plenty of time to watch the locals returning to their homes from the market. Notice anything missing from this pic?
Men!
We saw a few men walking but none of them carried anything. The women carry the gear home while the men ride their motos. It's nice to see a community where men and women understand their roles.
I'm joking. Really, I am. I would never make my wife walk home alone with a basket on her back. I would ride my moto nice and slow right beside her so I could tell her what to cook me for dinner.
Moving right along...
This hill is cultivated from top to bottom with people walking on a footpath about halfway up.
As we were walking back towards the van two little girls walked briskly past, each with a basket strapped to her back and a long, curved knife in her hand. We said hello and waved but they just kept walking. They had work to do.
They were cutting basil leaves from bushes along the path and tossing them into the baskets. At least that's what they were trying to do when tourists weren't jamming cameras in their faces. They absolutely did not want their picture taken. Ah, who cares what a little girl wants when there are people back home waiting to be dazzled by your photography skills.
I was secretly rooting for one of the girls to poke one of the intrusive tourists with a knife, but thankfully they're more civilized than I am.
We stopped on the way back to Sapa to drop some folks off at the train station in Lao Cai. I knew Sapa was close to the Chinese border but I didn't realize how close. Lao Cai is on the border. We stopped briefly at the river so we could see the border crossing.
The monument in the foreground is in Vietnam. The building in the background is in Hekou, China. In between is the Song Hong (Red River), one of the rare place names that sounds equally musical when translated! To the left is a bridge connecting the banks. These two countries have, shall we say, a complicated past, so I was a bit surprised that tourist vans can just roll right up to the border.
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