rice

Thai villages

During our weekend in Mai Chau, we were able to visit some of the local Thai minority villages. They have their own language (similar to Lao) and culture, and are predominantly rice farmers. The Thai people are the second largest minority group in Vietnam, comprising about 1.7% of the population (according to Wikipedia). The houses are built on stilts and underneath many of the women weave beautiful fabrics. One night some of the locals who worked in the place we stayed performed some traditional dances for us.

Mai Chau

We had a great weekend in Mai Chau, a town about 4 hrs drive out of Ha Noi in Hoa Binh province. It is a beautiful area of mountains and rice fields. We stayed in a great place and got to visit some of the local ethnic villages on a bicycle tour.

Wedding #3 in the countryside

We went to another wedding of a friend of Greg's from work. This one was in the countryside, in 2 different provinces. First we went to the bride's family in Hoa Binh province. They are Muong Vietnamese, a different ethnicity to the majority and have a different traditional dress as you can see from the photos. Their village was in the beautiful green countryside, very rustic.Then onto the groom's family in Ba Vi district for more festivities and more eating!
Of course, everyone wanted to have their photo taken with us, we were local celebrities for the day in these 2 small villages!

The newest member of our village