Nov 1st Lanten village (Ban Soptud)

A bit of background on the Yao/ Lanten ethnic group we are focusing on today. The origins of the Yao can be traced back 2000 years ago starting in Northern China.
The Lanten or Yao Mun people are part of the larger Yao group and they immigrated to LNT from southern China 200 years ago. The migration was agitated by the opium trade and as the result of revolts in Southern China during this period.

The Yao Mun are known as Lanten, from "Landian" in Chinese which means “Indigo Yao” because they use indigo dye for all their clothes. They are also referred to as the Lao Huay, which means “Lao of the streams” because their villages are always located above a stream. The Lanten believe in Taoism, mixed with some animist traditions. They use Chinese characters for their written language.

The Lanten are known for upholding their culture and traditional dress. Lanten women wear hand-woven, dark blue indigo-dyed tunics with a pink tassel on the chest and short trousers. Men wear a simple indigo dyed jacket and trousers. Their clothing is made from hand-spun, hand-woven cotton, and indigo bushes are grown by each family.

Traditionally, young Yao Mun women pluck their eyebrows and comb their hair away from their forehead in a way that is very unique and different from other groups. Women also make very thin paper from bamboo shoots. The paper is used in the practice of Taoism.

Today we headed out in our Tuk-Tuk which is like a miniature pickup truck with bench seats and rod iron cage and canvas top over it to keep the passengers inside. There was wind all day in this vehicle, and it started out so cool that we almost wished we had a jacket. It was about a 40 minute drive on paved and then dirt road to Ban Soptud, our primary target because it is the Lanten village where Victoria filmed a safe birth ritual, which is performed by the shaman while the mother is in her first trimester. Today, while we did not see the Mother in the film, we did see the baby, now 7 years old now.  We also met with the village chief, Buakam, who is actually a woman and she remembered Victoria. The villagers were delighted with the picture we had of Victoria with them on our IPad. The head shaman, Lao Fan, who had performed the "safe birth" came to the leader's house so we met him along with 2 of his assistants. The chief and the shamen were quite proud to show that the ceremony had "worked", and kept pointing out the little girl, who we photographed having her nails done by another girl. The shaman brought out a photograph of themselves as four shamen as shown in Victoria's book, so we took an updated photo of the three remaining, as the fourth they said had passed away two years ago. The people were very sweet and the boys even stopped playing an active game of guns and war to sit and listen to a children's story (Big Brother Mouse) being read to them from one of the new books we brought to the village.They then read to me in Lao from one of the easier books. They were pleased with the various gifts we brought to the village, pencils, notebooks, a few story picture books in English and Lao, dried red chilli peppers, a soccer ball, etc. The chief took us around the village, showing us the women spinning, weaving, the indigo dyeing, and making of paper from bamboo.  she told us that she was fifty years old, had seven children, but only three were still alive. She invited us to come back for their New Year celebrations in January, and said they had a new spirit house where we could stay overnight. They were very hospitable.

Our next destination was the Kamu village Ban Sopsim almost an hour further down the rough dirt road along the same small river. Upon reaching the village we learned that the chief and virtually all the men were out harvesting in their fields, so we took a few pictures and drove back to see several Thai Dam villages. Most of these also had the adults off in the fields, including the chiefs, and in many cases the schools were closed because of the holiday. We did though find the women feeding their silk worms, spinning the silk thread from the cocoons, and weaving. We had never seen one small village so busy with the complete process of making beautiful silk cloth.  There is segregation in the work as one family raises the silk worms and another spins the silk and others weave.

Even a couple of the restaurants were closed because of the holiday, but our guide found a Thai restaurant for our lunch, and he and the tuk tuk driver shared our table.

We then headed for a large Lenten village, Ban Nam Lue, which was a little off the beaten track because it is just off the map used by tourists from Luang Nam Tha, and had a shamen named Mr. Lao Lee, who we had heard about on the Internet, and who our guide SomHuk said he knew well.  Stopping at the school, we were invited inside and given the local weak tea by the principal and five teachers, who were happy to get the added school supplies,as they said some students did not have enough money for pencils and notebooks. Leaving the school, we went up to see the shamen Lao Lee, who welcomed us showed us how he could read their holy legends about the origins of the Lenten in their Chinese script.  One of his older relatives, a woman who said she was 72 years old, managed to sell Leslie a typical Lanten black hand spun handwoven indigo dyed dress. We gave the shamen some dried chili peppers and fresh limes and left the village and returned to our hotel before 5PM.

We again had dinner at the Indian restaurant but were in bed by 8:30pm. Too tired to fiddle with the Internet to post this blog so will do it in the morning.