Legend of the Love Market

I woke up the next morning at the smell of breakfast. As I was sipping my cup of coffee, I carefully put down my thoughts in a pocket diary, along with the recollection of what I had witnessed.Still there was nothing I could mentioned about the sensational "Love market" as I had heard though a lot of money had been spent for bracelets, scarves, hats and photos. So far it was all about charity and admiring the beauty of Sapa composed by its mountains, valleys and rice paddies, its people and the simplicity of their lifestyles...But the journey didn't stop here as I packed up my things and said goodbye to the Tay host family. With Loc, my tour guide we left Bản Hồ and trekked up the long and winding footpath to reach the checkpoint right on time for the transfer back to the hotel in motorbike.

We had a switch of tour guide in the afternoon during the visit to Lai Châu. Minh speaks fluently English as we had now a dutch tourist on the trip. Unluckily we ran into hostile reception at the gate of the village. According to Minh, the presence of foreigners let the chief of the tribe believe that missionaries are coming to distribute propaganda leaflets: the locals are afraid of losing their religion and theirs wives. Needless to say, we were ordered to refrain from taking pictures and were asked to depart at once. The itinerary was diverted onto the next village, where a Lự family surprisingly showed a great deal of interest in our visit. There we were showed weaving scenes performed by a Lự woman. For nearly half and hour, we were invited to share a typical Lự family lifestyle and quickly learned how single, married or widow woman dressed up differently. We continued our route in motorbike, and occasionally stopped to chat with small groups of Green H'mong wandering in the middle of the road, probably heading to market..Exchanges like that were quite common as we were rushing back to the Hotel in the mist and thin rain...

I spent the rest of the afternoon drafting a checklist of things to do for tomorrow's trip back to Hanoi. Later on, I had E. a young anthropologist working in Holland who joined me for super. E. had just come back from a 2 days trekking to Fansipan, a 3143 meters Vietnam�s highest mountain 9 km from Sapa. My congratulations on her efforts came right on time as I learned that she had also reached another birthday(E. was born under the year of the Snake) when conquering the top of the mountain!. A kind of friendly comfort she just needed as she'd been waiting for news from her boyfriend which never came. As we went on exchanging our trekking experiences, a wedding celebration between an American groom and a H'mong bride captured our attention: though it took everybody by surprise, the event brought a sense of enchantment and became a subject for discussion around the tables. Past midnight, all the activities seemed to calm down at the last candle light, and the dining room soon was emptied...

That was a great evening, and I felt quite relaxing about the trip. Realizing I was going to leave Sapa tomorrow morning, I just accepted the fact that tonight's wedding festivities had indeed confirmed the existence of the Love Market. Question was, where and when was it held. For my comfort, to make the sleep come easier and the night even better, I decided to open the window partly: fresh air slowly got into the room. It was dark outside, and across the street, there was a lamp post illuminating the sidewalk where a group of H'mong teenagers still gathered for a street party. Back into my bed, I wrapped myself in thick drape sheets and gently fell asleep at the sound of soft voices whispering , the breeze of young girls humming and laughing, and chorus singing throughout the quiet night. It was my last night in Sapa...

Thanks to the hotel's wake up service, I was able to get off my bed and packed my luggages before sunrise. During breakfast, I asked Lộc to help me board the bus. Pretending he saw me at the windows side last night (probably to find the sleep), Lộc politely explained to me that those were the young men and women who sang and hummed: "they were courting each other, and if the tunes rang in harmony, they became a couple!". And he went on commenting about the Love Market as the bus was not ready to depart yet: "In the early days, they had to stay over in Sapa for a while until the market ended before returning back to their tribes. That was how young men and women got dating and romancing during the evening get together party". But sadly, strict rules between different tribes forbid them to marry each other, and often they ended up marrying someone else of the same tribe for convenience. As there were so many heartbroken stories like the one of Romeo and Juliette, Lộc had learned from his grand mother that the Love Market was initially set up to reunite long time lovers, once in a while after years of unjust separation... As Lộc was about to finish his stories, the chauffeur ordered us to check our belongings for the last time. The sound of the gaz throttle got louder and we can feel the bus moving slowly. I shouted over the car window to thank Lộc for the stories and promised to get in touch with him. Though the rear window glass, I saw him and the hotel staff waving goodbye: I waived back with tears in my heart and watched them getting smaller until I lost sight of them at the right turn...