Above the clouds

The La Chi are an ethnic group with a total population of eight thousand, who live in the northern*most tip of the country in Ha Giang Province.
I wandered into one of their villages in Hoang Su Phi and Xin Man districts, as the end of the Lunar New Year was nearing.     
   
     

Phung Ca Village in Hoang Su Phi District's Ban Phung Commune is 2,000 metres above sea level and resides
in the middle of an old forest The road to Vuong Ngoc Phuc's house cuts through the forest and terraced rice paddies, which continues to increase in altitude like a stairway to heav*en.
I was terrified as 1 was walked past a cemetery that was littered with buffalo skulls and later passed by a temple that was full of the craniums, as well. I watched as some beefr, young men herded buffalo out of the forest. The buffalo were very big and fat With their shiny black hide, they looked like wild buffaloes.
Vuong Ngoc Phuc, a medicine man, said that each La Chi family raise about a dozen buffaloes and some families raise sev*eral dozen. Phuc claimed that they take their buffaloes into the forest and leave them there. On occasion, they will take salt into the forest to give to their buffaloes, and once the buffaloes have acquired a taste for the salt, the animals rarely stray far from home.
For the La Chi, the buffalo is a sacred animal that can also be served up in deli*cious dishes.
Though the La Chi are impoverished, each family kills a buffalo to celebrate the coming new year.

The La Chi minority never raise cows.
According to their legend, their ancestor Hoang Din Thung used to love beef when he was alive.
If he heard the sound of catde, Hoang Din Thung would catch and slaughter the cows. Therefore, the La Chi refuse to raise cows. When they want to present offerings to Hoang Din Thung, they buy a cow and then offer it to him.

When a person dies, the family kills a buffalo, which is then given as an offering to
the recently departed. During their biggest festival, they loll buffaloes and then hang the buffaloes' skulls above fresh graves.
In one of their most sacred ceremonies, the La Chi minority take a few buffaloes into the forest to perform a rite that involves stabbing the buffaloes, which are then offered to the god of forest. When a young man wants to marry a girl, he must have present gifts including 12 silver coins, dozens of bottles of wine, bas*kets of pork, dozens of chickens and three buffalo.
Buffalo meat is an indispensable part of every offerings or ceremony. The animal is offered to ancestors, a new crop, new seeds, the spirit in the rice fields, to the god of the forest and as marriage gifts.
Leftover buffalo meat is cut into palm- sized pieces, mixed with salt and roasted with rice powder, and is then stored in pots or is hung over the stove for later use.
When they want to eat, people put the stored meat in hot ash for a while and pound it thoroughly before consuming it
However, the most interesting and impressive dish that I tasted was the smoked buffalo skin that Vuong Ngoc Phu gave me.
When slaughtering a buffalo, the T-a Chi skin the animal thoroughly. The buffalo skin is then cut into sheets that are 15-20 cen*timetres wide and about a meter long.
After cleaning the buffalo skin, it is then smoked and spiced before it is hung above the stove where it is smoked for days.
When guests visit or on important occa*sions, the La Chi take the smoked buffalo skin and put it in a fire before it is served. The buffalo skin is crispy and savory.
The La Chi place several buffalo horns on their ancestral altars in order to pay their respects to their departed love ones. Rach horn represents a dead family member and the horns are used as cups for their ances*tors to drink wine from.
When performing important rites, the medicine man always pours wine into the horns as an offering to the gods or to die host's ancestors.
During the rite, only the medicine man can drink wine from the buffalo horn because they are considered as equally as important as the host's ancestors.

Source:   _http://www.vietnamvisasupport.com/f@rum/content/378-above-clouds.html