To Dong Hai
Ha Nhi, an ethnos of the Tibeto-Burmese language family, has a population of around 12,500 (according to 1989 figures), residing in Lai Chau and Lao Cai provinces, largely in Muong Te (of Lai Chau) and Bat Xat (of Lao Cai) districts. They have often stayed in separate and fairly enclosed areas, not intermingledly with people of other ethnoses.
Ha Nhi, formerly called U Ni before the present name is used according to the State regulation on ethnic names, has been divided into three main subgroups: Co Cho, Lao Mi and Ha Nhi Den (black Ha Nhi).
Some 300 years ago, the Ha Nhi people migrated from Human province (China) to Lai Chau area and settled down there before spreading to Lao Cai. They have practiced wet rice farming on terraced fields and milpas as their main form of agricultural production. They choose and reclaim new land, then build their fields even on high-mountain tops, provided that water sources are available for irrigation through canals and dams built by themselves. Fertilizers (chiefly manure) have long been used for agricultural production by Ha Nhi.
Besides, slash-and-burn farming has been also practiced by Ha Nhi, particularly in areas where water sources are hardly found, while husbandry and such handicrafts as bamboo weaving, loom, indigo dye… have also developed.
Nomadic Ha Nhi practicing slash-burn farming have often lived sparsely in quarters while the sedentarians have stayed in hamlets on high-mountain slopes, each accommodating dozens of houses, earthen or stilted.
Deep social differentiation was seen within the Ha Nhi community particularly during the feudal and colonial time when existed hired labor, leasing of production means including buffaloes and cows, paddy lending with interests. Most of the toiling people had to live in poverty and oppression with heavy taxes. Meanwhile, the rich and the rulers lived in luxury with numerous privileges. However, such good habits in their productive labor as work exchange, mutual assistance, collective work… have been maintained till today.
It is customary that Ha Nhi did not worship their ancestors in a common shrine like people of other ethnic groups, but in each family. Brothers worship their deceased parents on an altar placed at the eldest son’s. If the eldest son dies issueless, such altar shall be moved to the youngest son’s house. When younger brothers, their wives or children die, their dead bodies lie in state at the eldest brother’s house before their burials. If not, such people would not be worshipped together with their ancestors. Lineage telling is a custom followed for long now by Ha Nhi people. The ceremony is often organized annually on the last day of the year, during which the oldest person in a lineage tells others about its history. When a name of an ancestor is recalled, all male members of the lineage will repeat it aloud so as to bear it in mind. For Ha Nhi people in Lai Chau, such ceremony is held during a funeral so that the dead’s souls may remember their ancestors and return to them.
Possibly, grand families once existed in the Ha Nhi community, whose traces have been left till today as seen through the fact that married brothers have still lived in the same house with their parents. Yet, basically, small-sized monogamic families are very common among Ha Nhi. The intermarriage between children of brothers, sisters or of brothers and sisters is strictly prohibited. Any violation shall be considered incest. The marriages between two brothers and two sisters are also prohibited. When married, girls have to stay with their husbands’ families definitely. Matrilocal customs have not existed among Ha Nhi population. Yet, in cases where a girl’s family is short of manpower or meets with economic difficulties, the bridegroom may stay with his in-laws’ for 3 to 4 years or even more. During that period, the man works for his in-laws, foster his wife’s parents and takes care of their funerals if they die. The matrilocal man is entitled to enjoy part of the estates left by his deceased parents-in-law, but not obliged to change his surname to his wife’s.
When getting married, the Ha Nhi have to go through two wedding ceremonies. After the match-maker pays a plighting visit, the unmarried young couple shall promise to meet each other at certain time and certain place where the girl returns to the boy one of the silver coins brought as a plighting offerings to the girl’s family by the match-maker. Then the boy takes the girl to his home to salute his parents and kowtow to the memory of his ancestors. The first wedding ceremony officially baptizes the young couple husband and wife and from then on the girl may stay definitely at her husband’s. On the morning the next day, the boy’s family shall bring the wedding presents and offerings to the girl’s family for organizing the second-wedding ceremony.
The first wedding ceremony is organized at the bridegroom’s house for two days while the second at the bride’s for one day. Being very costly, the second wedding ceremony may be postponed for decades when economic conditions permit or even for life by some for whom, who die, a token second-wedding ceremony is held with a chicken and three sticky rice packs as the wedding offerings.
According to Ha Nhi customs, when a child is born, a stick with a conical hat thereon is put up in front of the house, to the right of the door if it is a boy or to the left if it is girl, as a birth notice to other people.
Funeral is held solemnly by the Ha Nhi with many complicated rituals and ceremonies. When a family member dies, a lattice screen of the parents’ room must be taken away and the family altar dismantled. The dead body is placed on a bed in the middle compartment with head turning to the dismantled altar. The offerings include an unplucked chicken, which is either sticked or not, then singed, and a can of uncooked rice. The coffin is made of a tree trunk. It will be sealed off with beeswax or mud when the corpse is placed therein.
Ha Nhi customary laws have been formulated on the basis of patriarchichal concepts. When the parents die, family property shall be left to the eldest son or the youngest son if the oldest dies issueless, for worshipping the parents and ancestors. The private ownership of property is respected. Violation of this is severely punished like burglary and thievery.
The building of a new customary laws system for Ha Nhi people must be based on the abolition of feudal outdated elements which have existed for long now and been turned into bad habits, and, at the same time, on the preservation of good and healthy customs and practices. Only so can a new life be built for the Ha Nhi people, which is rich with their own cultural identity and conforms to the current social development, thus ensuring a stable and sustainable development for this ethnic group.-