November 8 Phongsali and close environs to Akha Pixor and Akha Oma villages

The day started at 5:30 am with a loudspeaker blasting the "news" that continued till about 8 am and also started up in the evening. We suspect the the "news" had a particular slant. We were up early as we had made an appointment to meet a potential guide at 8 am at the tourist office. 

We headed first to the market to see if we could capture with photos any interesting hill tribe people. We were disappointed in that there was not much to see. We had breakfast at a small guest house just across the street from the market. The chefs here seem to use lots of oil in their cooking even with scrambled eggs. We then headed slightly down the hill to the tourist office to discuss a plan for the next two days. The gentleman at the tourist office said they did very basic treks and did not wander too far out of the valley. As we were particularly interested in visiting the Akha Nuqui group which is over 150 km away further north towards China on unpaved roads, he advised we go to the Amazing Lao travel office which was up the street and further down the road. So we wandered over there and met Xai who is the manager for the office. We arranged for an afternoon car trip to villages of the Akha Pixor and the Akha Oma that were about an hours drive from Phongsali. ($90) (email sivangxay@yahoo.com  GSM +865-20-55774354).  At the Akha Pixor village, after sitting with the the chief and being offered some Lao Lao rice whiskey, we went off to the school to distribute note books and pens.  The chief decided to come along carrying one of his grandchildren on his back. After this we toured the village but only a few women were around as most were still out in the fields working. The Akha women do just about all the work for the family, like working in the fields, cooking, cleaning, making the family traditional clothes etc. The men take care of the young children at home.

Akha Oma head dress from the back

One of the tribesmen, who do a lot of hunting, shared his basic .22 single shot rifle with home-made stock with David and the guide. Each took a couple target shots and David hit the bulls-eye on the 2nd shot. The first shot indicated which way the rifle's sights were set.

David trying a tribesman's rifle

Akha Oma school bag

We then drove about another hour on an unpaved new road to an Akha Oma village. We arrived after school was out for the day, and the women were returning home from the fields, so we took the notebooks and pencils and gave them to the teachers to distribute to the class later. We also gave them some of the Big Brother Mouse books we were still carrying. The best sight was the women bathing in their sarongs, and water buffalo getting into the act by licking the soap off the "laundry area". The Akha Oma are skilled needle workers and spinners, weavers, and indigo dyers. We saw some young boys enjoying a game of Pétanque using rocks instead of balls, their beautifully adorned school bags tossed carelessly on the rocks.

While visiting at the chief's house, his wife brought out some headscarves she wanted to sell. She modeled how to put it on and in the end Leslie bought one (an easy sales target). We then headed home and arranged to go with Xai and the same driver once he confirmed the battered van could make the trip we were planning for the morrow. A price of $220 for guide, driver and car was agreed on and a pick up time of 7:30am.