THE ISLAND THAT REMEMBERS

                                                        by Jim Goodman


    Most people traveling to Quảng Ninh only seem to know about Hạ Long Bay and Cát Bà Island.  But of Quảng Ninh's historic temples, mountain monasteries, ethnic minorities, border trade posts and even the ports and islands of the rest of its coastline virtually no advertising exists, no photos posted to entice a visitor.  Hạ Long Bay gets it all, for no trip to the north is complete without a journey there.  But Quảng Ninh has other attractions, also in beautiful surroundings, perhaps even more enjoyable, with an atmosphere far less commercial, and personal encounters more natural.

Bái Tử Long Bay

    The nearest such place is right next door to the east, called Bái Tử Long Bay.  In addition to the kind of islets and big boulders jutting out of the water like Hạ Long, Bái Tử Long also contains, at its eastern end, the large island of Vân Đồn.  An ancient port here, probably at contemporary Cái Róng, was Vietnam's original maritime connection to the outside world.  In use off and on during the last centuries of Chinese rule, it was reconstituted as a port and administrative district in 1149 under King Lý Anh Tông. 
    Cái Róng has a couple big empty beaches and a lovely harbor studded with rocky islets and jammed with fishing boats.  But as a destination in Bái Tử Long it is less popular than Quan Lạn, a long and narrow island in the southern part of the bay.  It has big, clean beaches at both ends, an 18th century đình in good condition and a grand festival every summer that commemorates the island's role in Vietnam's defeat of the third, and final, Mongol invasion in 1288.

Ngọc Vừng

    While it’s possible to get there from Cái Róng harbor the usual way is by taking the ferry from Hòn Gai, a lovely, four-hour journey of 55 kilometers that begins in the northeastern part of picturesque Hạ Long Bay.  Boats of all types ply the waters:  fishing vessels from one-man sampans to big trawlers, ferries and tour boats, long barges carrying industrial goods, like the coal from Cẩm Phả, and, further out, huge international commercial liners.
    The Quan Lạn ferry makes two short stops en route, at Tháng Lợi and Ngọc Vừng.  Both are small island towns with batches of houseboats floating off shore.  From the latter it’s a short ride to the pier at the southern tip of Quan Lạn Island and another two kilometers to Quan Lạn town.  Of the island’s two main settlements, this is the larger one, with several modest guesthouses and small restaurants and a market near the đình. 

horseshoe crab

    The smaller settlement, Minh Châu, lies near the northern tip of the island, with its own pier and harbor.  It is close to a military camp as well as the island’s only real industrial unit—a silicon extraction plant that turns part of the beach into glass.   Most of the islanders are farmers, for the land is mostly flat.  Fishing is more of a supplementary occupation.  Islanders cannot compete anyway with the big trawlers.  But they do manage to catch the usual run of fish, prawns, squids and clams, plus a load of horseshoe cabs every day.

    This creature, at least double the size of an ordinary sea crab, looks like a live miniature ancient tank.  Vendors only sell them in pairs, explaining that they cannot separate married couples.  Since females have eggs, giving them more edible parts than males, without this excuse vendors could only sell the female crabs.  The entire species would then soon die out.
    The town’s few restaurants usually open only during the day.  It’s best to inform the guest house in advance you want to eat there at night, so that the staff has time to buy the ingredients before the shops all close.  This is, after all, a remote area, with electricity only in the evenings and no nightlife or entertainment to speak of, other than television and bia hơi.

Quan Lạn festival procession

    Visitors don’t come here looking for a lively disco scene anyway.  They come for the beach, the peace and quiet, the fresh air and seafood and the friendly people.  This is a place to relax, eat well and sleep well.  Even the fishing activity here is rather subdued compared to other islands.  The tidal changes leave great sections of exposed mud flats at low tide.  At times ferry passengers going to Hòn Gai have to cram onto small, motorized rafts on a scary ride across the shallows out to where the ferry is anchored.  Hence the fishing boats are never close to shore, where they could be something to watch.

    For someone wrapped up in the hustle and bustle of urban life Quan Lạn Island offers an environment that is the exact opposite.  Yet for a few days each year the island fills with visitors as its residents make their annual commemoration of Quan Lạn’s part in the nation’s finest hour—its defeat of the third Mongol invasion in 1288. 

Trần Khánh Dư in Quan Lạn's chèo drama

village boat races

    Just three years earlier the Mongols had been ignominiously driven out of Vietnam.  With every place they captured they found the people had left and taken all their food with them.  Forced to forage the Mongols suffered so many losses they had to retreat to China.  This time they sent half of their roughly half million troops by land across the border passes and half by sea.  And to solve their food problem the Mongols hired a pirate captain to follow them with 150 ships laden with supplies.
    Trần Khánh Dư led the Vietnamese navy against the Mongol fleet when it reached Hạ Long Bay but was defeated.  The Mongols sailed upriver into the delta heartland while their land forces occupied Thăng Long and then awaited their supplies.  Atoning for his defeat, Trần Khánh Dư had ships built to replace his losses and then, basing himself at Quan Lạn, prepared to engage the pirate fleet.  When it entered the bay the Vietnamese ships pounced on them and sank all but one, which escaped back in the direction it came.  The victors allowed a few captives to go to the Mongol headquarters to reveal what happened. 
    As a result the Mongols were stuck trying to forage again and soon had to leave Vietnam.  And their navy, which had easily swept past the Vietnamese before, was trapped on stakes in the Bạch Đằng River and completely destroyed.

13th century style dragon boat

    Quan Lạn marks this event the 15th through 18th days of the 6th lunar month.  The đình sponsors the festival and hosts the rituals honoring Lý Anh Tông, Trần Khánh Dư and Phạm Công Chinh, one of his officers who hailed from this island.  Teams from the northern and southern parts of the island hold processions on separate days.  A stage goes up in the square between the đình and the waterfront and hosts folk songs and shows one night and a chèo drama about Trần Khánh Dư the final afternoon.

    The main attractions, though, are the boat races.  The first involves five long boats, built in the 13th century style, rowing across a stretch of the bay in front of the đình.   Crews from both parts of Quan Lạn and three neighboring islands compete.  The race the final day is between two teams, one from the island’s military camp, one from the civilians.  They set out from the dock by the đình, round stakes in the water a few hundred meters from shore and return.  Spectators watch from the shore or from boats sitting out in the bay.  When the race is over most of them will take their special tour boats back to Quảng Ninh, just a few staying one more night.
    The next day Quan Lạn life reverts to normal, to its unhurried, quiet and relaxing atmosphere.  Except for the motors on the boats and the evening electricity, it is hard to imagine it was much different even back before the Mongols came.

dragon boat race

                                                                   *  *  *
   

WHERE SALT WAS KING

                                                            by Jim Goodman

riverside houses by the abandoned wells

    At first glance Heijing is just a charming little town along a clean but shallow river in the mountainous middle of Chuxiong Prefecture, in central Yunnan.  Terraced fields step up the slopes on both sides.  The blue-grey humps of higher mountains loom to the north.  Smooth red sandstone lines the Longchuan River banks and is the main building material in the town.  It’s not spectacular, but anyway pretty.  Only after entering the town does one begin to get an idea why the provincial government has begun promoting it as Yunnan’s latest undiscovered tourist spot.  Until 1949 Heijing was one of the most important cities in Yunnan and its residents among the province’s wealthiest.
    The evidence is at once apparent in the fancy sculpted gate and monuments at the southern entrance.  Down the road past this gate and off the lanes in the upper part of town across the river stand many fancy, capacious Qing Dynasty houses.  Some have long been unoccupied and are badly in need of restoration, including the magnificent Wu family mansion, with five stories and 99 rooms.  Others vanished with the shrinkage of Heijing, for they were home to a species of businessman that became extinct within the founding of New China and the reorganization of the nation’s commerce—the wealthy salt trader.  Those black holes in the riverbank are abandoned salt wells.  Heijing once had eight functioning salt wells and supplied most of northern Yunnan, including Kunming.  Now only one remains operative, while most of the salt used in Yunnan today comes from the eastern provinces.

roof carvings on a salt merchant's house

    The town’s name is a contraction of Heiniujing—Black Buffalo Well.  It was named after the black buffalo that discovered the well 2000 years ago when taken for grazing in the area by a local Yi girl.  Later on the buffalo fell into this well and, according to legend, metamorphosed into a huge boulder still there at the bottom.
    This was the first salt well in the vicinity.  Serious production only began in the Tang Dynasty.  It peaked during the Ming and Qing Dynasties, when the government organized and supervised the salt trade and regulated its distribution. By the end of the Qing Dynasty salt tax collection constituted 47% of the provincial revenue.
    Heijing produced its salt from wells that were up to 80 meters deep.  Seven or eight men turned a huge wheel, to which was attached a wide pail two meters long to scoop up the brine.  The work crew them boiled the brine in big cauldrons until only a residue remained.  This they pounded and cleaned, laid out blocks of it on the riverbank to dry and then cut these into cakes for transport.   

decorative Heijing house roof

    Caravans of pack mules or porters conveyed the salt from Heijing to various destinations in central Yunnan.  Six sentry stations were erected in the vicinity to watch for smuggling which, given the nature and importance of the commodity, was always rampant.  Porters themselves chipped off bits of the salt cakes they were carrying and sold them later.  Arrested smugglers had their salt confiscated, but were jailed for only two nights.

    In order to acquire the right to participate in this lucrative trade an aspiring Heijing salt producer first had to purchase a license from the provincial government.  Government agents established quotas for the registered producers, allocated the brine and collected the tax on the spot.  But producers devised various schemes to obtain more brine, produce past their quota and sell the surplus on the black market.  Even without cheating, though, licensed producers could grow wealthy just meeting the government demands.

housepost base

    By the end of the Qing Dynasty 84 families were in possession of such a license.  They were the richest folks in town, with multi-story houses and large household staffs. They employed artisans from Dali to make their furniture and outfit their homes with decorative plaques and door panels, screened windows, arched roof supports, painted tiles under the courtyard eaves, dragon-headed water basins and sculpted lion heads on the bases of the house posts.  

entrance to a salt merchant's mansion

     That anyone at all got fabulously wealthy dealing salt may seem extraordinary at first.  Nowadays salt is easily available, sells for 1.5 yuan (7.5 baht) per kg and as a preservative has largely been replaced by refrigeration.  Rice costs an average 1.8 yuan (9 baht) per kg.  But before 1949 salt was worth much more than rice.  One liang, known to Westerners as the Chinese silver dollar, bought 1.8 kg of salt or 7-8 kg of rice.

    With no competition and a constant heavy demand, Heijing’s salt trade generated wealth for everybody in town, not just the 84 license holders.  Porters only had to work 3-4 hours per day to make a good living.  Itinerant merchants made frequent stops and the town hummed with prosperity.  Even the vegetable vendors wore ornaments of gold and jade.
    But it was the rich who defined the public life of the city and patronized religion.  Before 1949 the town and its environs boasted fifty temples and mosques, plus one Christian church.  Contemporary Heijing has but four:  Zhetian Buddhist Temple in the lower town, Zhenjuechan Buddhist Temple high up on the west bank hill, Feilaisi, dedicated to the Chinese trinity of faiths—Buddhism, Daoism and Confucianism and just above the upper town, and the Wenchan Confucian Temple in the centre of the upper town.

Zhenjuechan Buddhist temple

     Above the upper town’s cobbled streets and two-story shop-houses two tall columns mark the boundary between burial plots of those who died normal deaths and those who died violently, accidentally, or without having married.  High above this lies a smaller cemetery called the Monk’s Tomb.  Here is the grave of a former warlord who abandoned his military career to become a monk.  After he died a former officer of his built this special tomb and erected six statues of monk-guards to protect his soul.  This site is one of the few extant examples of this old custom.
    To the Wenchan Temple, with its own ceremonial gate, pond, elephant-headed roof struts and old dormitories, the salt traders sent their sons to study.  For a small town, Heijing had a high number of accomplished scholars who passed the final round of examinations in the imperial court.  Their descendants today proudly keep the commemorative boards issued to them by the court in Beijing.

carved doors of a wealthy house owner

    Besides the reverence for education the salt traders cultivated a sense of Confucian ethics.  They honored virtuous wives, defined as those who embodied Confucian principles when they became widows, as did the Qing court, especially in the years of the Dowager Empress Ci Xi.  The Memorial Gateway for the Chaste and Dutiful Women at the head of the lower town was erected during her time to honor several such Heijing ladies.  Even today the Confucian tradition is still influential, for Heijing’s older generation is known for its conservatism.
    That may explain the subdued contemporary nightlife, for there’s little to do after dark.  But in its heyday nightlife in Heijing sparkled with parties and public spectacles hosted by the rich.  The main street was lined with opium dens and mah-jong parlors, where the porters tended to spend the greater part of their time and wages.  Food vendors worked the residential lanes where the salt traders lived.  From the upper stories of their high-walled houses the customers lowered a tray by rope, the vendors filled it with various dishes, the household hoisted it up and then lowered down the money. 

Wenchan Confucian temple

    Aside from the opium addicts, most Heijing residents spent the evening watching one of the public opera performances sponsored by a rich family.  For ten months of the year at least one opera, often more, was performed nearly every night by professional Beijing and Yunnan Opera troupes whom the salt traders paid to come to Heijing.
    Life in old Heijing was easy and good.  The salt traders devoted much of their wealth and leisure to the pursuit of culture.  In doing so they enriched not only their own lives but also those of all the town’s residents.  When they disappeared as a class no one took their place.  Heijing shrank and took on the character of an ordinary small town in Yunnan.  Evocative relics remain, from the memorial gates and vacant mansions to the carvings on the posts and doors, and even the ancient salt wells.  With a little imagination the visitor can conjure a vision of Heijing in its prime, when houses were works of art, scholars were venerated, high culture was glorified and salt was king.

the Monk's Tomb

                                                                      • • •

TO DANCE AS A GODDESS

                                                   by Jim Goodman

Liẽu Hạnh, Phủ Tây Hồ

    In the third lunar month the festival schedule for northern Vietnam kicks off with a ten-day program at Phủ Giầy temple, Vũ Bạn village, near Nam Định city. It includes traditional chèo drama in the evenings and several other events.  But the main feature is the continuous hầu bóng dance performances in honor of the deity honored in the temple—Liễu Hạnh, the top-ranking member in the pantheon of Holy Mothers.  She is the focus of a cult developed in Vietnam’s feudal period, a cult that has survived every challenge from royal disdain to the secular influences of modern times, a truly indigenous cult that has no counterpart anywhere in Asia.
    The 16th century was a chaotic time to live in the Red River Delta.  A civil war between the Mạc family who had usurped the throne and the Lê family who sought their own restoration periodically raged across the countryside. Armies trampled the crops, confiscated the food, took away the young men for their armies and conscripted others for building their fortifications.  Buddha, Quan Âm, Taoist gods and the village guardian spirits seemed to have all become helpless.   The people began craving new deities to aid them in these chaotic and dangerous times.

bà đông with flaming incense

    The most prominent and enduring of the people’s new spiritual allies was Liẽu Hạnh.  According to legends she was the daughter of the Taoist Jade Emperor.  At a heavenly banquet hosted by her father, in a fit of anger she broke a jade cup containing an elixir of immortality.  As punishment, her father sent her down to earth, to be born in a poor family in Ý Yên district, Hà Nam province. She grew up, got married, bore a son at 18, died at 21 and returned to Heaven.
     Having enjoyed her stint as a mortal she beseeched her father to let her return.  So she was reborn as Liễu Hạnh in Nam Định province, one of the major battlegrounds in the war at that time between the Mạc and the Lê-Trịnh armies.  She grew up beautiful and intelligent and married a poor student who was the reincarnation of the husband she had in her first spell on earth.  She is said to have traveled widely throughout the north, something women rarely did in those days, and to have composed poems in the company of Confucian scholars.

young bà đông

    After her death she was entombed in Phủ Giầy, Nam Định.  But she is said to have been reborn once more, this time in Sòng Sơn district, Thanh Hoá, and to have visited many places in that province and Nghệ An.  At the end of her third incarnation she returned to permanent residence in Heaven, but periodically made secret journeys to Earth to reward the virtuous and punish the wicked.  It was the latter trait that distinguished her from the principal Buddhist deity Quan Âm, who never brought harm to anyone.
    Another, obviously Buddhist version portrays Liễu Hạnh as a rebel who refuses to return to her celestial abode after her 21 years exile on Earth.  She travels around the country stirring up passions everywhere, arousing royal ire and eventually the Buddha’s intervention.  He persuades her to change her behavior and follow the Way of the Buddha.  As a result, she becomes a Buddhist goddess as well, associated with births and fertility.
    Thus Liễu Hạnh became connected with all the religious belief-systems prevailing in the country.   A member of a celestial Taoist family, she was also a Buddhist deity.  Born into poverty she grew up intelligent enough to impress Confucian scholars.  And as the most important Holy Mother, she was part of a pantheon that included deities from the northern ethnic minorities and the ancient Chăm goddess Po Nagar.

The cult of Liễu Hạnh and the Holy Mothers never became a religion.  Even now it has no organization, no order of priests or anything similar, no missionaries trying to spread the faith.  Access to Liễu Hạnh is via a medium, usually but not always female, who becomes one in much the same way shamans come to take on their roles in pre-industrial societies.  An inexplicable illness strikes the person.  No medicine or remedy works.  Then someone already a medium comes to inform the afflicted person the illness comes from the spirits, who are demanding that person become a medium.  Agreement leads to instant recovery and a new commitment for life.

Temples to Liễu Hạnh started going up in Thanh Hoá at the end of the 16th century.  The restored Lê government, distrusting any new religious cult, ordered them demolished.  Epidemics and other natural disasters ensued, causing the superstitious, as well as members of the Lê Court, to believe they were the wrath of the offended Liễu Hạnh.  The Court ordered the temples rebuilt and later erected the Tây Hồ Palace, on a finger of land jutting out into West Lake, as Liễu Hạnh’s place of worship in the capital itself.

ông đông performance

keeping it up with rice liqauor breaks

    To contact the Holy Mothers the medium goes into trance, real or simulated, and dances before their altar, changing costumes to incarnate different members of the pantheon. The performance known as hâu bong, which means “service to the spirits [of the deities, in this case the Holy Mothers].”  Vietnamese also refer to it as lên dông, “falling into trance,” while the medium carrying out the performance is called ba dông, if a woman, or ông dông if male.  Attendants sit to the side and provide the elaborate, colorful costumes and props for each skit.  (Sets of these costumes are sold on Hanoi’s Hàng Quạt.)  The dancer maintains energy for the hours-long performance by periodically drinking a cup of rice-spirits, smoking cigarettes and chewing betel.  Musicians on two-string lute and small drums sit to the side, accompanying a singer whose soft, lilting, melodious tunes greatly enhance the entertainment aspect of the medium’s performance.

Holy Mothers images

    The choreography for each skit is similar, though the performance depends on the nature of the deity being incarnated as well as the personality of the dancer, variations which are easily apparent when, as at Phủ Giầy’s festival, several dancers perform at the same time, each before a separate altar.  The most popular prop is a pair of flaming bundles of incense, which the dancer twirls in circles.  Halberds, swords and umbrellas are among other props used.  The dancer also periodically hands out to the crowd of devotees the items piled up at the altar as offerings to the temple.  These include fruits, soft drinks, cans of beer, crackers, cookies, cigarettes and crisp, clean currency notes of 1000, 5000 or 10.000 đồng and one U.S. dollar.  Sometimes the medium distributes the money by flinging the notes into the air above the devotees’ heads.  Other times attendants pass them around.

different props for different goddesses

    Besides the show at Phủ Giầy, hầu bóng performances take place at many smaller temples, both inside Hanoi and in the countryside, the third lunar month because that is Liễu Hạnh’s birth and death month.  Hầu bọng performances are part of several festivals in the eighth lunar month, too.  And anytime a devotee wants to call upon Liễu Hạnh for a favor and is ready to sponsor the performance, and many still do, including the nouveaux riches, a hầu bóng dancer is ready to perform.  It could happen anytime anywhere. 
    So the next time you are out wandering through the back streets of Hanoi, or any big northern city, and you happen to hear some enchanting music coming out of a little temple, take a look inside.  You might be witnessing a four hundred-year-old custom, persisting into contemporary times, just as popular, authentically Vietnamese and downright entertaining as it has always been.

                                                                 

distributing rewards to the devotees  

The Longest Dinner in Yunnan

                                           by Jim Goodman

Hani village surrounded by its irrigated terraces

       One of the great unpublicized pleasures of Yunnan is hiking in the Ailao Mountains.  This is the range running along the right bank of the Red River, from central Yunnan southeast to Hekou, and on into northern Vietnam.  No snow peaks in this part of the province and the summits rarely rise above 2500 meters.  Deep valleys sometimes, but no outstanding gorges or major waterfalls.  But throughout Ailaoshan the slopes of the mountains are wonderfully terraced and usually irrigated, so that they remain flooded all year.  The swirling lines of the terrace walls follow every conceivable contour and the eye never tires of them. Villages speckle the mountains, home to several colorfully dressed minorities, of whom the Hani are the most numerous and among the most hospitable people in the region.

Hani rice terraces, Yuanyang County

      Lower Ailaoshan, the four counties between the Red River and the Vietnam border--Honghe, Luchun, Yuanyang and Jinping--is the Hani heartland.  Six sub-groups live in Yuanyang alone, differing in costumes and minor cultural aspects.  But all of them share the same material lifestyle, growing rice in irrigated terraced fields, said to be the prototypes for the entire region.  Some terraces are still in use since being described by chroniclers of the early Song Dynasty.  And in recent decades, thanks to fertilizers and new strains of rice, their annual yield is greater than ever.  Collectively, the Hani have advanced from mere self-sufficiency to a small measure of prosperity.
       Though one may prefer to simply wander all day along paths through the fields, and marvel at the engineering skills it took to create this special landscape, one cannot get very far in Hani areas if there around anyone's meal time.  Often the first encounter in a remote Hani village leads to an invitation to drink and dine.  The Hani of Ailaoshan see the arrival of a visitor as a welcome interruption of the daily routine and strive to make the most of the event.  Hospitality is second nature to these people, an indication of a basically friendly, honest and outgoing character, brimming with self-confidence.

traditional Hani houses

        This innately gregarious people will turn the dinner invitation into a social event.  Many are those in Yunnan who advise their guests to "eat slowly," but the Hani take that as an order.  Without guests the meal might not take too long, but having guests is considered a better way to dine.  And when guests are on hand, male guests in particular, then the meal will be augmented by lots of alcohol, tobacco and conversation.  Women and children, who don't drink, finish soon, while the men may drag it out for up to two hours.

       The table will hold several dishes.  Meat, fish, chicken, bean curd, leaf vegetables, beans and radishes might comprise the fare, perhaps seasonally supplemented by edible fungi and insects, small fish, snails or baby frogs netted in their flooded terraces, and cassavas, which used to be the main filler when the previous year's rice ran out.  Rice itself, as well as soup, is only served to the women and children in the beginning.  The Hani follow the general Yunnanese style of dining, in which those who are going to take alcohol with their meal, whether it's beer or distilled spirits, first conclude their drinking before having rice or soup.

heavy drinking is part of a big meal

       Thus the men, all of whom must drink, for it's a social affair after all, nibble at the several dishes in between repeated toasts with cups of strong liquor.  Every fifteen minutes or so one of the men passes out cigarettes and hands the water pipe to one of the diners as all the men pause for a tobacco break.  Hani men consider eating, drinking and smoking as related pleasures and so partake of them all at the same time.
       Several of Yunnan's minority groups are fond of tobacco.  Among the Wa, for example, the women smoke constantly in long, ornate silver pipes.  But others rarely smoke during meals, while for the Hani it is normal procedure.  When calling on a Hani house the guest is first given a clean, freshly filled bamboo water pipe, a pinch of Yunnanese blonde tobacco and a lighter.  Then the host will prepare tea.  In other societies the tea precedes the smoke.
       And at funerals, though Hani women in general don't smoke, whether the deceased is male or female a tobacco bong is placed at the side of the corpse and its spirit is invited to have a smoke.  When the body is buried a few tools and implements used by the person when living--knife and crossbow for a male, for example, and spindle and cooking pot for a female--go on top of the grave.  A tobacco bong is included for both.

three stones: for humans, animals and crops

       As the dinner drags on the water pipe needs cleaning and refilling and the dishes get cold.  The women, who have finished much earlier, keep watch over the meal.  When one man has finished smoking a woman takes the pipe away to ready it for the next.  As the contents of one or more dishes become half-consumed a woman comes to refill them.  If they turn cold she takes them back to the kitchen to reheat them.  When the bottle of spirits has been emptied she is there with a fresh one.
       Men's work in this strongly patriarchal society consists of heavy labor like terrace-building and repair, plowing, construction and long-distance trade.  But minibuses have replaced the old caravans and Hani men only work steadily part of the year.  In contrast, the women work all the time, in addition to their domestic chores.  In the fields they do the planting, weeding and harvesting, and together with the men the threshing.  They also do all the gardening, make the family's clothing, and do the bulk of he buying and selling at the periodic market days in their vicinity.  Besides trade, Hani women come to socialize, quite freely without the men around.  Perhaps because so much of their daily life depends on the women, Hani men accord them a great deal of respect and freedom of choice in matters of the women's own interests; marriage partners, for example.

Rhamatu rituals

       Among the items for sale at these markets are the components of Hani women's costume, as well as those of their neighbors the Yi, Miao, Dai and Yao.  Hani women of all ages wear traditional clothing every day and most are well off enough to afford three or four sets.  Silver jewelry in the Hani style may also be on offer, though the women save this for special occasions.  Women of other ethnic groups in the four counties also prefer their own traditional costumes.  Even the teenagers working temporarily in urban shops and restaurants usually dress in ethnic style, for their aesthetic sense is still within the tribal parameters.  Lower Ailaoshan, dominated by proud and self-assured ethnic minorities, may well be the most colorful part of the entire province.

dressing for the festival in Huangcaoling

       Because their material culture--terraced fields-works so well, and there is no way to mechanize that kind of farming, their mode of agriculture is likely to endure. Hence, the non-material aspects of their culture are also strong.  The women's preference for ethnic clothing is one example.  Use of the language in the urban areas is another, as is the maintenance of food preferences and domestic manners.  But, after costumes, the most public aspect is the continuation of traditional annual festivals.  Among the Hani, programs for events like the Swing Festival, Installing the Village Gate and New Rice will automatically include, besides the ceremonies, a leisurely banquet.
       The grandest feast of the year, however, is reserved for Rhamatu, the most important of the annual Hani festivals.  The event honors the dragon-spirit guardian of the sacred grove, a patch of woods at the edge of the traditional Hani village.  The spirit is incarnated in one of the trees and its deputy, the rhama-abaw, chosen at the outset of the festival, emcees the rites and activities.  Beyond its esoteric religious value, however, Rhamatu celebrates the unity and solidarity of the Hani village, for its main feature is a collective dinner held outdoors on the main street of the village.

reading the liver

      Rhamatu is a dry-season event, but different Hani sub-groups stage it at different times.  In Yuanyang County, for example, northern villages near the hill town of Xinjie hold it in late November, but around the southern township of Huangcaoling another sub-group begins it on the first tiger day following the Lunar New Year.  In Jinping and over the border in Vietnam it comes a month later.  Besides separate dates, the various sub-groups also differ in the ritual details.  Elaborate feasting is the main feature common to Rhamatu no matter which Hani sub-group.

   The first day mainly involves preparation for the second day.  The women are especially busy preparing food for the great feast.  A smaller dinner, requiring the presence of one man from each household, transpires the first evening in front of the dragon-spirit's tree, which has a modest fence installed around it.  Within this sits the rhama-abaw, beside an altar holding offerings like tiny cups of liquor, pieces of the sacrificial pig, painted eggs in bowls of colored glutinous rice, silver coins and a balance-stick.  A resident specialist comes to read the pig's liver and make prognostications.  Soon darkness falls and the men take their meal, and their liquor and tobacco, on the grounds in front of the tree.

Rhamatu feast,Huangcaoling

     Next day, though they are about to partake of a meal lasting the entire afternoon, that does not stop Hani men from having their ordinary mid-morning repast, along with the usual accompaniment of liquor and tobacco, consumed in the customary leisurely manner.  By the time they have finished it's nearly time to bring out the food for the public meal.  Just after mid-day members of each individual household carry tables laden with dishes from their homes to the main village street, setting them side by side in a long line occasionally broken by a space to allow men to pass to the other side of the tables and sit.
       Before taking seats the men stand in line at the far end to donate gifts to the rhama-abaw, consisting of a small amount of liquor and two cigarettes, one for the rhama-abaw and one for the dragon-spirit.  Then they choose a place to sit, pour a cup of liquor, pick up their chopsticks and start eating...slowly.  As every household must contribute one table's worth of food the quantity and variety is enormous.  It looks as though the village is displaying its wealth in the form of food. Every part of the pig, cooked in sundry different manners, will dominate the dinner, but chicken, beef, half a dozen or more species of fish, three or four kinds of edible insects, usually deep-fried in oil, green vegetables and cassavas, eggs and fruit are also part of the feast.
       The nibbling at the bowls of food, like the sipping of alcohol, is slow but steady, only interrupted (often!) by turns on the tobacco bong or the smoking of cigarettes.  About midway through the afternoon the men at one end of the line of tables call out to those at the other end, standing up and toasting their health.
       Meanwhile, in the open ground next to the rhama-abaw's end of the line the young women and children perform dances.  Though it's only the men taking part in the feast, the women dress in their newest and nicest traditional costumes and this is definitely the day to put on silver ornaments and accessories.  Not many of the dances are truly traditional, however, for in larger villages and townships a dance leader, usually a slightly older young woman, will create choreography just for this festival, often to Chinese tunes or even pop songs.          

Hani dancer at Rhamatu

Hani drummer girl

      Not until after five o'clock do the people begin to remove the tables back to their homes.  Guests, fully sated and quite as inebriated as their hosts, then have to find excuses to decline persistent invitations, now that the feast is over, to their new friends' houses for dinner and drinks!  This is, though, the chance for the women to enjoy some of the food they have so lovingly prepared.  An evening song and dance show rounds out the festival, a mixture of traditional dances and contemporary acts, also created for the occasion.
       The next day all is back to normal.  The traveler moves on to another section of Ailaoshan for another walk among the terraces, hoping for a splendid sunset to bounce colors off the water-filled terraces.  Failing that, one can hope for the next best alternative--an invitation to a Hani dinner.

one family's contribution to the collective feast

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                for more on Ailaoshan and the Hani, see my e-book The Terrace Builders

THE BEST BEER IN HANOI

                                                by Jim Goodman

    On a recent trip to Hanoi I got a phone call one afternoon from my closest Vietnamese friend, asking me if I’d like to try “the best bia hơi in Hanoi.”  Sure, I replied, always ready to enjoy a new venue for one of my favorite refreshments.   Bia hơi is fresh draft beer, brewed daily and delivered to several hundred places throughout the city and to towns and villages near the capital.  Larger bia hơi establishments open by late morning and serve food as well.  Small ones start serving only in the late afternoon, have no food or snacks and customers sit outside on the sidewalks on small stools, observing the bustling street life while they imbibe. 

Tạ Hiền bia hơi corner

    In either case, though, the beer is cheaper than that in bottles or cans.  Prices range from 5000 to 9000 đồng per glass or mug, which comes to about 25 to 45 cents US.  The cheapest bottled or canned beer is 10,000 đồng.  In a bar or restaurant, of course, it will be higher.  Bottled beer is available at most bia hơi places, but usually sold only after the shop has run out of bia hơi.  There may be a few customers in the crowd that prefer the bottled brew for one reason or another, but like to drink it in the bia hơi joints because, well, the whole bia hơi scene is so different from that of a bar.

    Hanoi people are quite sociable.  They like to go out with friends in small groups to dine at a streetside restaurant, drink coffee at a sidewalk café or meet for a few glasses of beer and some snacks at a bia hơi place.  In Hanoi, beer is cheaper than coffee and bia hơi the least expensive drink of all.  The atmosphere at a bia hơi joint is always friendly and after a group of friends have concluded their bia hơi session they will often vie with each other to cover the entire cost of the evening, rather than divide up the bill.  Occasionally, upon learning that his friends are too busy to join him this time, a Vietnamese man will go to his favorite haunt alone, confident that before he can order a second glass of beer someone from another table will invite him to come join them.

bia hơi for lunch

    Beer was not a traditional Vietnamese alcoholic beverage, but, like coffee, introduced by the French.  In fact, just a few years after the French formalized their control of all of Vietnam they set up the Hummel Beer Factory.  The customers were mainly the colonists themselves.  But when the Vietnamese finally evicted the French they simply took over the Bia Hummel brewery, renamed it Bia Hanoi and in 1957 removed it to a new location on Hoàng Hoa Thám Street in Ba Đình district.
    The production and distribution of fresh draft beer, bia hơi, did not begin until the early 60s.  The idea was to produce an inexpensive brew that the masses could afford in their leisure.  Even the glasses were made from the cheapest materials, without handles, to keep the overall costs to the minimum.  Fifty years or so after the first bia hơi establishment opened for business in an alley off Lý Nam Đế Street, most bia hơi venues still use those same cheap, fluted, “traditional” bia hơi glasses.

filling the glasses

    Tourists to Hanoi quickly learn about bia hơi and at some of the better-known bia hơi places foreigners make up a sizable percentage of the patrons.  One of the most popular venues in Hanoi’s Old Quarter is the Tạ Hiền bia hơi corner, halfway between Hang Bạc and Hàng Buồm Streets, which starts filling up from 5 p.m.  Young Vietnamese also like to congregate here, mostly at the Phồ Cổ shop, while foreigners dominate the shops opposite it and the ones running up Lương Ngọc Quyến Street.  In the past year a new bia hơi joint has opened on Mã Mây Street, just past the Backpacker’s Hostel, catering mainly to foreigners.  Another, at the corner of Tạ Hiền and Hàng Buồm, has a mixed clientele of foreign residents and local Vietnamese youth.  Both, like most of the Tạ Hiền corner shops, open around 5 p.m. and charge 5000 a glass.
   My Vietnamese friends disparage these cheaper venues, claiming the beer is too adulterated and always take me to other joints.  The beer might cost 9000 đồng a glass, but does taste better.  I’m in Hanoi a few months per year and it seems with each visit they introduce me to a new bia hơi establishment.  I was a little skeptical when invited to “the best bia hơi in Hanoi.”  What would make it the best?  A nicer sort of building?  The snacks were especially delicious?  The waitresses more beautiful than elsewhere?  How could the beer be much better than the 9000 đồng variety we got at other bia hơi joints?
   I was to meet him at his shop at 5:30, which was an hour or so earlier than our usual link-up time for cold beers and warm cheers.   Then shortly afterwards he called again, requesting I come at 5 instead.  When I arrived I hopped on his motorbike and he drove me to 115 Quán Thánh Road, near West Lake, to the No 1 Club, adjacent to the Hanoi Tennis Club, which was part of the No. 1 Club’s facilities.  A security guard confronted us as we drove inside the compound to park the bike, but when my friend told him we just came to drink beer he waved us in. 

the best bia hơi, but bring your own food

   The place has a security guard because the No.1 Club membership is restricted to high-ranking Party officials and their families.  Facilities include the tennis courts, an indoor gymnasium and swimming pool next to the courts and “the best bia hơi in Hanoi.”  The Hanoi Beer Company (Habeco) brewery on Hoàng Hoa Thám sends its best quality fresh beer to the No.1 Club every day, while every other establishment in the city receives a lesser or diluted quality in their allotment of 50-liter barrels of brew.  The best is reserved for the Party elite, one of the perks of high office.
About four years ago, without fanfare, announcement or advertising, the No. 1 Club began allowing us ordinary commoners the opportunity to drink this top-quality bia hơi, under certain conditions.  The beer is only available from 4:30 to 6:30 in the afternoon ̣(which explains why I met my friend earlier than usual) and sold by the pitcher.  Patrons must purchase tickets at 40,000 đồng per pitcher (about $1.95 US), which comprises about five glasses of beer.  Sales cease at 6:30, but patrons can get a last pitcher or two before that and remain on the premises until 8 p.m., when everyone has to leave.

bia hơi at the No. 1 Club

   The venue for drinking is the area between the tennis courts and the indoor gym, both of which are still off-limits for non-members.  Very little in the way of snacks is available, so people bring their own food and consume it there with the beer, which is entirely permissible.  I found it very easy stuff to drink, quite tasty, with a pleasant, energizing kind of high.  Satisfied regular customers, who are in general rich and successful businessmen who prefer this beer for its quality rather than its rather modest price, claim that no matter how much you drink of it, no headache or hangover will follow.  In fact, the only complaint anyone has here is simply that they can’t hang around and drink for a few more hours.

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Up the Sword Ladder

                                                                  by Jim Goodman
     

Hua Lisu woman, Tengchong County

       Imagine that you're a young Hua Lisu man in western Yunnan in the isolated mountains of Tengchong, Lianghe and Yingjiang Counties, who wants to powerfully impress a certain eligible young Lisu lady.  Like her mother and sisters she is a very old-fashioned Lisu and prefers the colorful traditional costume of a long-tailed blue jacket, with extra flaps around the shoulders and trimmings in red, yellow, white and green.  (The eye-catching jacket alone justifies their name, for Hua Lisu means Flowery Lisu in Chinese.)  This she wears over trousers that fall just past the knees and bright puttees wrapped in lacquered black rattan rings.  She looks especially charming when she puts on her collar-ring with silver pendants dangling from it down her chest, and dons the round turban embellished with white discs cut from shells.  She is certainly worth impressing and in traditional Hua Lisu culture there's a sure way for you to gain prestige, in her eyes and in the eyes of your rivals, a way to win a reputation as one of the boldest, most outstanding young men in the village--up the sword ladder.

Hua Lisu man

       Or picture yourself as an older, middle-aged man, raising a family, with teenaged children inclined to challenge your authority on the broader issues of life.  You need to enhance your prestige so they will heed your guidelines on proper Lisu behavior.  You also must participate in discussions with other household heads over issues like contracts with the logging companies, how much of the forest to cut, where to graze the animals and so on.  You would like to add more weight to your opinion, to have it listened to with greater respect.  To elevate your prestige so to achieve this, as well as to enhance your authority at home, the route is the same one taken by the aspiring lover--up the sword ladder.

       The opportunity for this takes place once a year, the 8th day of the 2nd lunar month.  On this day the Hua Lisu erect a tall ladder, with as many as 60 or 70 machetes for the rungs, sharp side up.  The ladder must be scaled barefoot and bare-handed and the entire effort can be totally wasted if the climber suffers so much as a single small cut on the soles of his feet.  It's an imposing task and would be difficult even with gloves and boots, certainly for anyone afflicted with a more than normal amount of acrophobia.

the ascent

action on the Sword Ladder

       No one is compelled to climb.  No draftees from selected families.  No casting lots to determine who goes up.  It's entirely voluntary.  And because it's a fairly dangerous thing to do only the most eager, or most inveterate, status-seekers make the try.  About a dozen men on average attempt the climb in any given year.  Half of them will be old enough to be the fathers of the other half.

       The Sword Ladder Festival dates back to the time the Lisu migrated to western Yunnan from their original homeland near the banks of the Jinshajiang (Upper Yangzi) in southwest Sichuan.  Midway through the Ming Dynasty, in the early 16th century, they began moving to the Nujiang Valley (Upper Salween) and the western hills of present-day Baoshan and Dehong Prefectures.  Some continued into Burma and today the same sub-groups live on both sides of the border.

going up and going down

safety mudrss by the emcee

       The Ming Dynasty only took full control of Yunnan at the end of the 14th century.  The western frontier remained a security problem all through the following century and in the early 16th century the Ming minister Wang Ji arrived intending to pacify the area.  The newly-arrived Lisu at that time were subject to regular harassment by bandit incursions and many of their men joined Wang Ji's forces.
       Wang Ji himself was a charismatic, fearless leader with great appeal to the Lisu.  He led the campaigns personally and in the end laid down his life in defense of the frontier and the Lisu who lived on the Chinese side of it.  Among his troops he had the reputation of being able to walk through fire and climb a ladder of swords in his bare feet.  While this is a Chinese metaphor for exceptional bravery, the Hua Lisu took it literally.  On the day of his death, the 8th day of the 2nd moon, they emulate Wang Ji by walking across hot coals the night before and climbing the sword ladder that day.

picnic at the festival grounds

       As night falls on the day prior villagers set fires at the edge of the settled area.  When the fires have burned down to a layer of glowing coals the boldest of the village men dash barefoot across the "sea of fire," as they call it.  Like the climbing exercise the next day, the soles of their feet must emerge from the ordeal unscorched and unblemished.  And they do.
       Unlike some other mountain people in the region, the Lisu do not ordinarily go barefoot.  So the men's ability to run across the coals and climb the sword ladder does not come from a build-up of thick calluses on the soles of their feet, which are every bit as tender as a city dweller's.

Hua Lisu elder

       The swords are not razor sharp, but honed enough to cut bamboo and sugar cane and swords that are obviously dull or nicked are rejected as rungs for the ladder.  The inexplicability of this feat, repeated annually since Wang Ji's death three centuries ago, has even helped preserve Hua Lisu traditions in general, for it was the reason why the Christian missionaries gave up their conversion campaign.

       It began in the 1920's when the Frasers, husband and wife, entered Tengchong County from Burma and headed for Hua Lisu settlements in the hills northwest of the county seat.  They happened to arrive the same week as the festival.  Mrs. Fraser, who later authored the memoir of their missionary work, was sure there was some kind of trick involved in the "sea of fire" exercise and poo-poohed the accomplishment of those few who did it.  It was dark, after all.
       Yet they could not figure out the sword ladder climbing, which they witnessed close-up in broad daylight.  The only explanation they could divine was the power of the Devil, coming to the aid of these pagan climbers.  So, because the Devil's influence was so strong among this branch of the Lisu, as Mrs. Fraser wrote, the missionaries left Tengchong and moved north to proselytize among the Black Lisu of Nujiang.  Today the Black Lisu are largely Christian, while the Hua Lisu to this day have resisted conversion and remain the largest sub-group of non-Christian Lisu.
       The Hua Lisu way of life has not remained static since their migration to western Yunnan.  They evolved from a mainly hunting and gathering society to one of agriculture and animal husbandry by the time of their encounter with the Frasers.  Since then the Hua Lisu have largely abandoned slash-and-burn in favor of fixed field farming and were until this century involved in the logging business.

stepping on the swords

at the top

       Yet the Sword Ladder Festival has endured with no major modifications since its beginning.  It remains the highlight of the Lisu year, combined with a carnival in the adjacent field, where Lisu villagers amuse themselves at various stalls until the actual climbing commences.  Some of the stalls offer small market items, others noodles and drinks and still others the dice game popular in western Yunnan.

dice game at the festival

       In this one three large dice are mounted on a bar at the top of a slightly slanted tray.  When the game master yanks the cord to pull away the bar the three dice tumble into the lower tray lying flat just below.  At the far end of this tray people place their bets.  Usually the dice fall together, but sometimes they drop one by one.  When two have landed a player may anticipate being a winner, only to see the third one finally fall and knock over one of the other two, thus changing the final configuration.

       Around noon is the erection of the ladder.  Long lines of men pull the ropes attached to the ladder's top and hoist it upright.  After the ropes have been secured to stakes three men begin fixing the swords in place, from the bottom up.  As they get higher up the swords are delivered by pulley rope.  This operation takes over an hour, followed by a break of around two hours to wait for the auspicious moment to begin climbing.  Meanwhile, those in attendance hold picnics, play the dice game and wander about the carnival grounds.

examining the feet after the climb

       On this day the women don their best costumes and all their beads and jewelry.  But Lisu men for the most part also dress in the traditional style, one of the few minorities in which the men do so.  They wear a long-sleeved, side-fastened jacket, usually blue, a wide belt, knee-length trousers and striped leggings.  On special occasions like this they will also don a turban, embroidered shoulder bags and a bandoleer or two of silver dollar-sized discs cut from shells.  Those going up the ladder are the most resplendent.

       Without fanfare or announcement the start of the climbing is signaled by a man placing a bundle of burning incense sticks at each of the stakes holding the ropes attached to the ladder.  Then an older man removes his shoes and commences his steady climb to the platform full of pennants at the top.  He removes a few of these, hurls them to the ground and sets off several strings of firecrackers.  Then as he descends another begins to climb.  About halfway up the ladder is a narrow platform.  The one ascending halts here until the previous climber has passed him on the way down.

       When the descending climber reaches the last rung he steps onto short bamboo poles and lifts his feet for inspection by the emcee.  Observing that no cuts or blood mar the soles of the feet, the emcee rubs them with ashes and gives the performer a small cup of liquor.  No one applauds the success, lest that distract the others on the ladder.  While awaiting the next to descend the emcee, gazing intently at the climbers, makes magical gestures to insure no mishap occurs.

festival dance

       After all this year's climbers have completed their turns, a loudspeaker begins broadcasting traditional Lisu songs.  The climbers and their wives then join hands for a ring dance around the base of the ladder, with alcohol served them as refreshment partway through the performance.
       This is the last act of the festival.  The ring breaks up and the crowd heads for home.  The ladder remains standing until the following day, when the men gather to take it down, remove the swords, disassemble the components, and put them away until next year.  And already those who considered it, but failed to muster sufficient courage to climb this year, have witnessed the new esteem bestowed on the climbers by their admirers.  And already they have begun telling themselves that if their neighbors or rivals can succeed without any problems, why then next year they, too, will have what it takes for that tried and true way to social prominence--up the sword ladder.

the last act--dancing around the Sword Pole

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