Chiang Mai, Thailand: Hmong Village

The Hmong are a unique indigenous people who have populated southern China for at least 8000 years. Unfortunately, in the 18th and 19th Centuries, they were targeted by the Qing Dynasty for extermination. This prompted most of them to migrate to other countries in southeast Asia: mainly Laos, Vietnam, and Thailand.

Masumi and I first encountered the Hmong in northern Vietnam in 2010. Here I am being greeted by them at the train station in Sapa, not far from the Chinese border.

More recently, on our return trip to Thailand — we were last there in December 2019, right before Covid shut down the world for travel — we visited a Hmong Village near Chiang Mai.

This is a real, functioning village. At the same time, it has been made “tourist friendly”, to encourage travelers to visit, learn about Hmong culture and crafts, and hopefully inject some money into their struggling community. It’s not easy for non-indigenous people to survive in Thailand. There are no factories or fast food restaurants to provide employment. All income for the town is generated within the closed, internal economic environment of the town.

There are some beautiful areas in the village, but most of it consists of bare-bone shops and rather shoddy residences, far from what could be called luxurious.

Let’s start with the gardens.

The town looked fairly typical of this part of the world. Lots of corrugated iron; crafts, clothing and jewelry shops; populated with friendly people and cute kids.

Now, those who’ve been following my writings here know that one of Masumi’s and my favorite things is to dress up in traditional costumes for the various and exotic locations and cultures we’ve encountered in our travels. We were in luck! The Hmong Village afforded just such a diversion. We frolicked around in one of the gardens for an hour, dressed as Hmong!

Without a doubt, that was the highlight of our visit!

[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . https://jdrachel.com ]

Chiang Mai, Thailand: Hmong Village | John Rachel

Wild and Crazy in Chiang Mai, Thailand!

What were you doing New Years Eve?  The usual.  Or the unusual.

As is standard operating procedure for us, Masumi and I were well off the beaten path . . . we certainly weren't in Times Square.  We weren't wearing a beer guzzler cap.  We didn't do vodka jello shooters, smoke DMT or put magic mushrooms on our eleven-cheese pizza.  We never even got around to singing Auld Lang Syne.

Here's the very short, edited version of our New Years Eve celebration.

This was the climactic end to seven days in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

To put it mildly, it was a unique and highly entertaining visit to a country I've been to before, but always finding intriguing.  My wife Masumi, however, has never been to Thailand, so this short adventure was especially exciting for her.

Doi Inthanon National Park is about an hour drive from Chiang Mai, and is home to the highest peak in Thailand.  On our way there for two days in nature, we went through a Hmong village, where they happened to be having a New Years festival.

The park and surrounds were outstanding.  Unfortunately, since Doi Inthanon Mountain itself shrouded in a cloud, while we were there the visibility at the top was limited.  But as the day progressed, the air cleared and we got to do some hiking and experienced stunning views of the countryside.  We stopped at a few villages sprinkled around and sampled "real life" in this rustic, relatively underdeveloped part of the world.

For easy access to the park, we did a homestay at Nongtao, a Karen tribe village actually within the great expanse of Doi Inthanon National Park.  People were shy but amicable.  Our host was truly superb, helping us decide what to do and how to get places.

Not far from our homestay was an elephant park.  These were no ordinary elephants.  They had all been in the parade celebrating the recent coronation of the new King of Thailand.  You can sense from their regal bearing and sophisticated manners their royal blood lines.

What would a visit to Thailand be, however, without spending time at a few of the literally tens of thousands of temples and shrines?  We capped off sacred site hopping by visiting the world-famous White Temple, a short distance outside of Chiang Rai.

We were so comfortable and fit in so perfectly, I'm sure no one suspected for a moment that we were tourists.

[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . https://jdrachel.com ]





Wild and Crazy in Chiang Mai, Thailand!