Lisu festival meal, Doi Chaang Café

As the sun got more intense, some people moved two tented structures over the area where the dancing was occurring. The dancers barely paused for this and quickly readjusted the size of their circle to accommodate the new space. People would leave and rejoin the circle after eating or taking a short break, but I was amazed at the “die-hards” that were out there. Lunch and refreshments could be purchased inexpensively at several small booths, or you could join the masses near the primary school. Here, long tables were set up with equally long “benches” made from bamboo. A plastic packet of rice was ready at each plate and the servers came around plopping on veggies and pork on each plate. Water, tea, 2 liter bottles of Coke, and fresh ground coffee grown by the Lisu people was also available.

Leaving the festival, we began our drive on a winding, unpaved road at about 1,100 meters in elevation. Along the slopes were organic coffee bushes, planted around 1983 as part of the Royal initiative to provide the Akha people a meaningful income instead of poppies for drugs. Women carrying babies on their backs walked along the side of the road, wearing colorful character socks and sandals. Others were carrying items in woven baskets, including firewood. Along the way to the Akha village, we stopped by the Doi Chaang Café. Here we sampled some of its organic Arabica coffee, grown by the Akha people and part of a joint venture with a small Canadian group. Next to the café were buildings of the coffee academy, where people from all over the world come to learn about coffee growing.

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Lisu Kwakie Dancers and their costumes

Both young and old participated in the Kwakie dance, most of them wearing traditional (with contemporary changes) clothing and quite a number donning the traditional huto hat. The long red strings hanging down from the hats traditionally worn by unmarried women reminded me a bit of a Raggedy Ann doll. The hats of the married women were also black and had decorative silver beads, short tassels, and a few pink feathers. Both men’s and women’s hats were donut-shaped, with a large hole in the middle.

The women’s velour-type dresses were multi- colored, had an outer covering similar to a full apron, and “highwater” height pants underneath. Around their waist was a belt, to which a long collection of red strings formed a tassel in the back. Although most of the long red strings are now machine-made, some women braided their own. According to my Lisu acquaintance, a woman would be able to braid up to four strings in one day. Large, heavy multi-layered silver necklaces clanged as they danced. Some women had additional silver ornamentation on their “breastplate” which included extensive use of silver coins and smaller half-sphere pieces. Both men and women carried a pouch, which was draped diagonally across the body.

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Lisu Hill Tribe Instruments and Kwakie Dance

Although there were far fewer people in attendance today, there still was a sizeable gathering. Initially people were gathered in the shade, but as soon as a man began playing the fulu (a woodwind instrument made from bamboo and a gourd), quite a number of women and some men gathered and began a circular dance called the kwakie. The dance participants held hands and faced inwards, with the musician swinging in step in the middle of the circle. Just as there was little variation in the musical notes and rhythm, the steps of the dance were also very consistent and repetitive.

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Arrival at Lisu tribe festival

The next morning after more rice, greens, dried soybeans, and of course more tea, we said goodbye to our hosts and moved onward into the hills. Tee’s father came along, as he wanted to visit some relatives and friends in the hill village. On the way, we stopped to pick up a village resident friend of Tee’s father. Both older individuals shared a fondness of chewing paan, had their teeth blackened, and talked animatedly in the Akha language.

On the way to the Akha village Tee spotted a cloth sign fluttering in the breeze that promoted an annual festival of the Lisu hill tribe people. Able to speak some Lisu, he was able to inquire of some Lisu people walking alongside the road that the festival was indeed happening today. It was the last day of the three-day festival, but there should be some things going on. Traveling on a narrow hilly dirt road, we passed by some trucks with Lisu people in the truck bed who were traveling away from the festival location. Tee explained that some Lisu people would have traveled for over five hours to attend the festival, with some perhaps even coming from Burma (Myanmar). Yesterday, over 3,000 Lisu were in attendance. The school grounds in the village of Ban Doi Lan (meaning “million mountains”) was the site of the festival. Tee introduced me to one Lisu woman who spoke fairly good English. She was one of the organizers of the festival and saw it as a key opportunity to celebrate and promote the Lisu culture. Like Tee, she expressed a concern for the disappearance of her culture and language. One of her ambitions involved utilizing the internet as a tool for educating others about the Lisu culture and as a way for Lisu people to keep in touch with each other.

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