Party on the Sapa Express
Last night, I took the overnight sleeper train from Hanoi to Lao Cai station, up in the mountains of northwestern Vietnam. The train was an interesting experience, to say the least. No announcements or information of any kind, just people pointing at you until you hopefully end up in the right place.
I had booked a “soft sleeper” berth, which meant each cabin had 4 beds with blankets and pillows, bottled water, and we even had a lamp. In my cabin, there was a Canadian couple who had been living in Korea for the past four years teaching English, and a Vietnamese man who immediately went to sleep on the top bunk as soon as we got on the train. The three of us Canadians determined that, between us, we had potato chips, chocolate, soda, and half a bottle of scotch that they’d brought with them from duty-free. We met an Aussie guy and a Belgian guy who were jealous of our lamp (or more likely, of the whiskey) so we invited them in for a drink. About five hours later, we had finished off the remainder of the beer on the train, and were having a right good time. The Vietnamese man slept through the whole thing.
At some small hour of the morning, we decided we should try to get some sleep, but that’s easier said than done on a bunk that’s barely as wide as my shoulders, and on a train that kept stopping suddenly for no discernible reason. We all dozed in snatches until there was a knock at around 5am and an official-looking train employee gestured that we’d arrived in Lao Cai.
Early morning
Rule number one: In absence of sleep, drink coffee. As we waited in a restaurant by the train station for the rest of the minibus passengers to arrive, we had some good strong Vietnamese coffee and felt almost awake, sort of. Then, fifteen people packed into a van with fold-down middle seats for the hour-long drive up to Sapa.
Now, when I’d booked the trip up there, I’d checked the weather forecast and it was supposed to be fairly warm. All I can say to that is, weather forecast FAIL. Sapa is at elevation, and was in the clouds the entire time. It must have been in the low teens as a high and it dropped down close to the freezing mark at night. Plus, the thick fog meant that you couldn’t see more than a few feet in front of you at any time. So much for the stunning picture-postcard views that I’d been hoping for.
The bus drove up the windy mountain roads into the thick fog, and I have no idea how the driver saw anything, but we arrived without incident. This is Vietnam; things mysteriously work here even when you think they shouldn’t. The first thing that happened when we pulled to a stop in front of the first hotel was that we were literally accosted by scores of local Hill Tribe women. They came up to the bus and started banging on the windows before the door was even open. This was the beginning of a theme, as they hung around for the entire time I was in Sapa, trying to sell cheap bracelets and embroidered goods or simply to get money. Their tenacity is legendary.
Sapa is a town built entirely on tourism; that’s its only industry as far as I can tell. It has a sort of ski town feel to it without the skiing. Every establishment is either a hotel, a restaurant, a patisserie or French bakery, or a hiking shop selling fake The North Face knockoffs. I have no idea how TNF became “the” brand to knock off here, but that’s all they sell everywhere – packs, shoes, jackets, you name it. And the tourists buy them, because it’s so bloody cold in Sapa. In fact, that might explain the false weather reports… hmmm…
The minibus dropped me off at the hotel where my tour was based, and I was fed breakfast (banana chocolate crepes, yum!) and given a room where I could take a much-needed nap for a few hours. I woke up refreshed, and after a bit of confusion, I was pointed towards a female H’mong guide leading a group of about 10 people and told “you go here”. Um, okay. I went there.
Hiking through the hills
We hiked about two or three hours down from Sapa to the H’mong village of Lao Chai (not to be confused with Lao Cai, where the train station is). The scenery is mountains and valleys of rice paddies as far as the eye can see… which was about five feet, given the fog. I would imagine that the vistas must be stunning on a clear day, but unfortunately I didn’t get to see a clear day. The hiking was good, though. The path was pretty easy, so there was lots of time to stroll along. The group was a typical backpacker mix of Canadian, French, German, Dutch, Swedish… and about ten of the local ladies who attached themselves to us at the outset and never let up for a second.
Every day, these women wake up at dawn, hike the 15-20km into Sapa, meet the tour buses, and accompany the groups on their hikes. Some were carrying babies on their backs. Each woman, by some sort of prearranged understanding, chose a target tourist to shadow like like man-to-man coverage in a hockey game. They made attempts at conversation, or would offer a hand to someone who lost their footing. What they were banking on, which is true, is that sooner or later everyone would feel bad about ignoring them, and would start to talk to them. Once you do, though, you’re stuck. Because when we arrived in Lao Chai for lunch, out came the baskets of goods and the hard sell began. I felt bad so despite my better judgment, I bought a little embroidered pouch from the one who had been shadowing me. Those who said no got harassed for the entire lunchtime, so I figured it was a couple of bucks just to make them go away. It sounds awful, but the truth is that giving money to these women is the wrong way to go about supporting the Hill Tribe communities; there are organizations who actually fund services and ensure that it gets to the right people, but they aren’t it. However, when you think about it, these women walk 30-40km every single day over hilly terrain, spending seven or eight hours each day, in order to sell a piece of junk for the equivalent of a dollar or two. It’s extremely sad, really.
In contrast to those women, the guide was also a local Lao Chai woman, but she was employed by the tour company and spoke quite good English. She answered a lot of questions about the life in the various tribes, and what some of the issues facing the people were. For instance, the women work extremely hard, but many of the men just stay home. Alcoholism is a problem, and so are absentee fathers. She told us how girls used to get married typically at 13-14 years old, but since recent laws against the practice, they now wait until at least 18 to marry, and some of the younger girls are not wanting to get married at all. Given that the women seem to do everything, it’s no wonder that they don’t see the use in a husband. All the children go to school in the villages and most go away to high school, and many take jobs in the cities afterwards; she said most of the women selling trinkets were those who married young and got stuck with no choice.
“Home”stay with the Zay
After lunch, we hiked another couple of hours to the Zay village of Ta Van. Each of the hill tribes has its own dress, language, culture and traditions, and while they mix a lot more than they used to, they tend to speak to one another in the common language of Vietnamese. The women selling trinkets disappeared after lunch, so it was a much more leisurely walk at that point.
Eight out of the ten people in our little group went back to Sapa to stay overnight in a hotel, but myself and another Canadian girl (we’re everywhere, I tell ya!) had booked a village homestay. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn’t a hostel-like building for tourists with a pool table and a dartboard… but no Zay family. Well, there was the owner, but he didn’t stay all that long, and his family was nowhere in sight. The homestay also didn’t have any heat, so we were all freezing. Four other people from another hiking group came to stay with us, including a French couple, a Portuguese lady who I’d met on the minibus from Lao Cai in the morning, and a Colombian guy who’d been living in Australia.
There wasn’t a whole heck of a lot to do at the “homestay” so we pretty much just hung out and tried to stay warm. We played darts for a bit, and then the Colombian guy found the balls and cues and had the bright idea to start a game of pool. Before he could get the balls racked up, a little kid who must have been about five years old wandered over from one of the neighbouring houses. He took the balls and began to arrange them in a triangle, meticulously, even jumping up on the table to position the last few that he couldn’t reach. Then, he took the cue and started to play. Like a scene from a Paul Newman movie, the kid started to make shot after shot, prompting some serious teasing of the Colombian guy for getting his ass kicked by a five-year-old. At one point, the kid, who must be around tourists enough that he’s picking up a few words of English, started to repeat something over and over again. At first, we couldn’t tell what he was saying, but eventually we realised he was saying “bull…shit… bull… shit”. Zay hill tribe kids these days say the darndest things.
The guides brought out an old-fashioned coal stove for a little bit of heat, and we all sat around it to try to warm up a bit. Then, dinner was a wonderful mix of rice, meats and vegetables, and we washed it down with some shots of rice wine for dessert. After dinner, we sat around the coal stove playing cards and chatting until the heat burned down, and then we grabbed as many blankets off the spare beds as we could find and all burrowed down in them for a refreshing much-needed 12-hour sleep.