“The Ha Nhi’s cos­tume has blue stitch­ing and labyrinthine lines rep­re­sent­ing moun­tains and rice ter­races. The blue col­or rep­re­sents life. The tra­di­tion­al cos­tume is indis­pens­able in our cul­ture. If you look at our cos­tume, you will know it is the Ha Nhi and not blend­ed with oth­er eth­nic groups.”

Trụ’s hus­band had a wealth of infor­ma­tion regard­ing the cul­ture of his eth­nic group. We spent a good 7 hours with him as he impart­ed detailed infor­ma­tion and showed us around the Ha Nhi villages.

“This hair braid is a com­bi­na­tion of real hair and wool. In the past, old peo­ple used their real hair only.” 

“In the past, we grew cot­ton and weaved. But it isn’t pop­u­lar any­more. Most­ly, we buy the fab­ric, but we still dye the cloth on our own by using indi­go and sew our own clothes.”

Trụ, 30 years old
Ha Nhi Eth­nic Group
Lao Cai, Vietnam

Get­ting to this vil­lage in the fur­thest reach­es of North­ern Viet­nam, was a feat in itself. After a long jour­ney by motor­bike on some sketchy roads we were delight­ed to find a haven of tra­di­tion­al Ha Nhi cul­ture. We were fas­ci­nat­ed by the tra­di­tion­al hous­es made of com­pact­ed earth, dot­ting the hilly land­scape like mushrooms.