It was an accident how we got invited to join the party with an Ethnic family from deep village of Ja Rai. We were so excited to listen to the locals telling us everything about their culture, enjoying their food and immerse into their music. I knew this province is known as "Gia Lai" in formal Vietnamese, but today, I will call them by the way locals call their land, Ja Rai.
How we met the ethnic family?
It is a funny story how we met these people of Chu Păh.
Since we lived in Gia Rai for a while, all the famous places seems kinda boring to us even though we still love the nature of this land. If you visit Ja Rai as a tourist, you only can see what the internet or tour agency tell you. For a while, we avoid to come to those places. But on the last day of the Lunar year of 2020, we decided to go to the famous waterfall named "9 Floors" in Chu Păh, an ethnic town that is 27km far away from the city center. There is no one there when we first came since it is close to the tradition New Year, not much people traveling at that moment. It felt pretty cool and peaceful. However... when we were about to hike up to the waterfall, we met an ethnic family was on their way, they just finished the hike.
We have a long talk with them since one guy can speak English, he started the conversation with what is our favorite food in Gia Lai, and James answered without hesitate, "bamboo rice stick and grilled chicken". The whole family throw their head back and laughed when they heard a foreigner speak Vietnamese, as always. I felt like the guy is just one step from jump up, he said: "You know what, our family is making your favorite Ja Rai cuisine, just join us".
So I guess we have no choice but follow them to their village.
A damn on our way to the ethnic village of Chư Păh town
Coffee flowers blooming in the Spring of Chư Păh, Ja Rai
Our raw experience of a holiday with the ethnic community
This is "bamboo rice stick" which is "cơm lam" in Vietnamese
When we came to their house, the family is really preparing the food. They first cleaned up the bamboo stick then cut them to piece like 10cm. The sticky rice and beans were sitting in water for a night to get soften. They mixed them all with salt and coconut then put them in the bamboo sticks.
I ate this dish so many times before from different restaurants for $1 a stick, but watching how people really make this and and enjoying the meal with them is a brand new experience to us.
The landlord told me he used to host some foreigners to come to his village to learn about the ethnic culture, not for money, just for the fun out of it. He has a vision to help outsiders including Vietnamese from other regions to understand his culture, he wants to make everyone closer to each other. Unluckily the pandemic happens and he could not do it anymore. He was so surprised how we moved to this highland city, he confirmed that it is true that expats normally have a difficult time here because the people in Gia Rai is not used to foreigners and also the history of the War makes this province a sensitive military area.
We had a good talk with him before moving to the next step of cooking the traditional ethnic food.
This dog stared at me like he was going to rip me apart
After the preparing stage, the family cooked everything in their old Vietnamese style kitchen. They only use wood, no gas or electric at all. They said everything tastes better when you cook them this way, the smoke from the wood plays an important part. On the flip side, it took pretty long for the food to be cooked perfectly.
When we get back inside the house, we did not expect the whole "tribe" to show up, but they were already there waiting for us. And one of them brought a big ceramic bottle of wine for everyone to celebrate. They said this is the most vital part, get drunk.
Here you go, bamboo rice stick and grilled chicken Chu Pah version.
The wine they have us tried was so so so strong. Just one sip and I already felt like I was about to pass out. I does not taste like any types of wine I've had before. It is from the ethnic apples that was sitting in the rice wine for years.
We thought that that the most fun we could have for the day but h*ll no, they brought out the ethnic instruments and started a "home-made" live music. I could not believe in my eyes. They really put on a show. We clapped our hands following by the melody and the song they singing, I did not even know what they are singing about but we were lost in a surreal world.
Some kids still worked at the farm on the last day of the year. They're going home as we were.
They only let us go when the sun was about to going down. We promised to come visit them whenever we can and join the hike with the family next time.
So one side, we did not finished our plan of the day to hike the waterfall but an unplanned event happened that pulled us closer to the culture of the city that we love and have more friends out of our comfort zone.
In fact, they were the last people we met up before we left Pleiku.
Thanks for your time of reading and joining our adventure, we really appreciate that.