Family Fun Adventures by Dulce Zamora
It's hard not to become a gawker in the northwest Vietnamese province of Lao Cai. From the majestic Hoàng Liên Son mountains to the meandering Muong Hoa Valley, my family and I couldn't help but gape at the awe-inspiring landscape. Nor could we avoid rubbernecking at what some declare as impending disaster. For some ethnic minorities, whose homes and farms have been displaced by growing tourism and by the country’s burgeoning demand for hydropower dams, catastrophe is already in progress. Yet, this is not a simple case of urbanization versus preservation. Some of villagers seem to be faring better with the outside world creeping in. The question is, where is the line between honoring old ways and introducing new ones?
It’s easy to see why people want to keep Lao Cai pristine. My family and I had the chance to experience the countryside, thanks to two Black Hmong women from Sapa Sisters Trekking Adventures, a female and minority-owned business.
Sy was our first guide. Although she was already seven months pregnant, she led us on a nearly six-hour hike through steep mountain trails near the town of Sa Pa. In a blog post called A Hill Tribe Woman's View, I shared some of her thoughts on gentrification and other matters like motherhood, social media, and courtship.
Our second guide was Lang. She led us on a trailblazing tour of sprawling green tea plantations, local villages, and bucolic fields. I described the excursion as "trailblazing," because Lang generally led us through rugged terrain, eschewing designated walkways. We zigzagged up and down steep hills and squeezed in between scratchy shrubs. We wandered into uncharted spaces and backtracked when we realized the way was blocked by big rocks, mud, or water. When we were in small hamlets, we sometimes ducked into small alleyways to check out something interesting, or to avoid overenthusiastic, unleashed dogs.
The kids in Phuc Khoa village smiled eagerly and waved at us. It was not unusual to see two or three children sharing one banana bike seat, and to see their heads simultaneously turn as they cycled past us. On the other hand, many of the adults paid no mind as they went about their daily chores, either pouring baskets of unhusked rice grains into milling machines, squeezing water from dyed clothes, or transporting bamboo sticks on small motorbikes.
One old woman and her grandson did approach us. We did not know how to speak their language and they did not know ours, so Lang translated for all of us. After answering some of their questions about where we were from and what we were doing in their village, I asked how old the boy was. The grandmother said, "Seven," to which the boy quickly shook his head and made a face. We did not need translation to understand that the old woman had made a mistake. Turns out, her grandson was already 8 years old. We all laughed. Some interactions are universal.
During our walk, there was something meditative about letting mother hens and their chicks slowly cross our path or observing ducks incessantly quack while meandering around flooded rice paddies. It was relaxing to watch buffaloes chew grass while the tinkling bells around their necks harmonized with swishing tall reeds. The only creature that seemed to mind our presence was a striped gray cat who looked annoyed that we had disturbed its nap.
In the afternoon, Lang took us to the village of Banbo, where she picked flowers, examined snails, and poked at things with a stick. Her co-worker, our driver, snapped many photos of the landscape as if he were a tourist himself. To me, the place was how I imagined my parents’ provincial Philippine town must have been before urbanization took hold. I had seen traces of the rural setting when I was a child, but the natural streams and greenery had since been replaced by man-made structures. I wondered how long before the same fate would befall Lao Cai.
Lang said the construction of dams have stopped the flow of water into some of the rivers in the area. Locals used to fish in those waters, but now they needed to buy their seafood elsewhere.
Yet, hydro-powered contraptions are not new in these parts. At Banbo, there were several water mills that had been around for a long time. Lang could not tell me how old they were; only that they had been around for generations. The water mills were a feat in old-school engineering, built entirely of bamboo and reeds. There were no nails or screws. The apparatus funneled water from the river to the adjoining rice fields. None of them were motorized. The river current powered the wheels and wire-encased rocks served as both filter for debris and guide for the water to flow toward the mills.
Across the river from the water mills was an extended open-air hut with a thatched roof and raised flooring made of thin bamboo planks and covered by reed mats. A couple of women in tribal dress beseeched us to sit down and have a snack. They prepared warm sticky-rice wrapped in leaves. We were the only guests at the time.
As we ate and soaked up the picturesque scenery, I asked Lang if this was a popular tourist spot. She said Vietnamese sightseers liked to dress up in tribal wear and take pictures by the river. Otherwise, the most popular domestic sightseeing destinations included Heaven’s Gate, the Love Waterfall, and the Fansipan Cable Car. Many western visitors, on the other hand, preferred trekking through the mountains.
Lang and the other locals I met shared how eager they were for foreign tourists to return. They lamented how tough it was without the income from holidaymakers. With her job as tour guide, Lang said she could help provide for her family. In the past, women solely managed the house and children and helped with the family farm. They relied on the men in their lives for money.
Jobs in tourism gave women more choices. They had the power to leave abusive husbands and to save up enough money to buy their own farmland. As she shared the benefits of work, Lang reminded me of social activists I met in community rallies or saw on TV. The difference was: She did not hold a protest sign, shout into a microphone, or rally supporters. Instead, she roamed the countryside and navigated Sa Pa town with a quiet air of confidence and a clarity of purpose. She knew who she was and how she wanted to move around in the world. She could do the things she loved – explore her homeland and share its beauty with others – while putting food on the table at the same time. She didn’t fret about the future. She embraced it while still giving voice to the old.
Lang may not be able to solve the world’s problems, but, in the unassuming way she moves through life, she models how we can hold space for both the known and unknown in our lives.
 | Dulce is an award-winning journalist, blogger, and speaker. She has written three children’s books and hundreds of news stories. She currently shares perspectives on her blog (www.windsweptwildflower.com), and on Instagram and Facebook as Dulce Zamora.life. She lives in Singapore with her husband and two daughters. |
