It
was a nice trekking experience but we were exhausted after
reaching Sapa. We ask Chi and Lang to join us for dinner
in return for the hospitality that they have shown. They
were ok to the idea but got cold feet when I suggested going
to Faispian Resturant or any resturants on the main road.
Instead, Chi suggested eating at the market where she always
patronised. "Very cheap!", she says. I wasn’t
very interested, to be frank, because I was egoistic and
felt that only by treating Chi and Lang to a nice resturant
can enable me to display my gratitude. I was wrong. We settled
for Faispian resturant in the end.
After
ordering some food, we saw some Vietnamese playing with
a cat that have strayed in. Chi gave a tug and told me that
the Vietnamese like to call the Hmongs "Cats".
God knows why. Neither did I realise that there may be a
reason to it which I only discovered when I came back to
Sillypore (This website
explains that the Miao, which is Hmong in mandarin, if pronouced
in a wrong tone, means Cat in Thai). To top it up, a group
of Vietnamese were feeding the cat on the table! To be diplomatic,
I wondered whether it was a coincidence. Felt very bad when
I realised Chi wanted to eat in the market initally because
she was afraid that the Vietnamese would gossip (e.g. like
getting a tourist to buy them a meal or something). The
cat incident didn’t help either.
After
dinner, we checked out the Saturday night "LOVE"
market near the church. Not a big deal other than to see
some Vietnamese crowding around a Hmong couple while cheering
them to dance with a pile of dong. Ok, even the Farangs
aren’t interested. I guess it was high time to get
back to my room to catch Chelsea-Spurs with my Bia Hanoi.
Leaving
a nice place was always eventful and next morning was as
well. We had to wake up early for the Bac Ha village trip.
Chi and Lang were waiting for us near our guesthouse. We
went to the market for the last goodbyes and they gave us
a couple of wristbands. Tears gathered around my eyes though
I somehow managed to keep them in check. tears not due to
the gifts but the stark realisation on whether we will have
a chance to meet again.
The
journey to Bac Ha was long (3 hours) and not very interesting
other than a funeral procession we observed along the way.
The Sunday market was an eye-opener though. Afterall, I
had my first Bia Hoi and local corn whisky in Vietnam. One
main difference is there were alot more Flower Hmongs rather
than Black Hmongs in Bac Ha. And people was just interested
in doing their marketing rather than sales pitch. I was
telling Bb (my ex) about this and 2 old ladies came up immediately
to get us to buy their bangles!
After
visiting a typical tourist Flower-Hmong village, we set
back to Lao Cai for our night train back to Hanoi. Since
there were about 5 hours left before the train departs,
we made a detour by crossing the border to China’s
HeKou (river mouth in chinese) for dinner. Thought that
it was more built up than Lao Cai but I still see people
spitting everywhere. *yucks* |
