After tours around Vietnam’s major cities like Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City, spend a couple of trips to visit the landscapes and villages in mountainous areas will be a pleasant experience for travelers. Moreover, if guests are interested in and want to learn about the cultural and spiritual life of the people here, the fair is the place that visitors should not ignore. In the mountainous province, Ha Giang, Khau Vai Love Market is the most popular destination. Khau Vai love market has existed almost for 100 years, since 1919. The Market is held on a hill in Khau Vai village, Khau Vai commune, Meo Vac district, Ha Giang province, about 180 km from the city. The market is organized only once a year on 27th March of the lunar calendar.
According to local languages, Khau Vai means two types of rattan. This is to say that this place is the land of many rattan trees, also means that the couple’s love is as cohesive as rattan on surrounding mountains. The past story and today lives have something illusory and real which has contributed to the exotic appeal of the land here. At first, this market had almost no market seller, the buyers of goods were only a few people selling food and drinks serving people who came to the marketplace. Since this is the place for people to find each other, after a year (can also be several years) apart, mainly for those who have troubled relationship and really love each other, but for some reason, they could not marry one another, now everyone has their own fate. On this day, they agreed to meet here to talk, to inform each other of one’s own life, and to review the old feelings. There are many couples together going to the market; the wife finds her friend and the husband seeks husband’s friend. They are not jealous, not frustrating, but respect each other, respect wife and husband’s friend; they see it as a sacred duty and responsibility towards the spiritual life of their mate. Therefore, Khau Vai love market is also known as an adultery fair, the traditional night market of ethnic Hmong.
Chestnut recounts that there was a Giay boy who loved and married to a Nung girl despite rules banning the two peoples and the forbiddance of two families. Since this marriage, that two families hated each other. One day, when the couple was sitting together, they must witness the two clans fought fiercely. Because they knew that they caused this grudge, they parted in painful regret in order to resolve the feud between two ethnic groups. Later, the two people also had their own mates, followed the customs of the clan, but in their hearts, they could not forget the image of each other.
Every year, on 27th March, the day witnessed the grief in the past, they met on this place to share the feelings, resumed their love in a day and the day after they came back to their house. Later, the couples, who did not marry each other due to the absurd, take the day on 27th March to get to the land with full of painful memories so as to find each other like the couple in the past did, too. As a result, the love market was formed.
Not only for those who had a wife, a husband, Khau Vai love market is also a place for boys and girls to find a mate. When the sun goes behind the western peak of the mountain, mist darkens the sky, the huge bonfire was lit, and the great wine jars are brought out, this is the time that Khau Vai love market begins. The boy and the girl use the voice of singing, the sound of Khene to express their feelings. This is rustic singing but sincere, the simple and passionate love songs. The couples have blown the rustic and cute confession in their true loves on the night market. That is the separated beauty of each fair in highland markets.
After journey of discovery, experience Dong Van stone plateau, be immersed in the spectacular natural place, amongst towering cliffs dotted with lovely stilt houses, and the terraced rice fields on the hills, visit Khau Vai Love Market to gain better understanding of the cultural life of the people of the highlands, listen the legends and thrilling stories about markets will be an unforgettable experience for any tourists.
