KY LUA MARKET

The village has a rather busy past, and the border might have something to do with it. The French, anxious to protect the railway line from Indochina to Kunming, had found it wise to place a garrison there. The old Chinese entrenchments were redesigned, linked together by covered roads, which in 1885 enabled the French to successfully repel Chinese attacks. Already long before, at the time when the Le, masters of the region, had kept the Chinese at bay, it was an important route of passage and exchange. Ky Lua, which has kept its tradition as an open village, hosts the largest market in the region. A daily market where peasants from the surrounding ethnic groups come down from the mountains. Young people from the Tay, Dao and Nung ethnic groups flock there to refuel, but above all to meet and discuss. Three or four days a month, the market is more important, people come dressed in their sunday clothes, each with their surplus agricultural production to sell or exchange: fruit, tobacco, cassava, vegetables, sometimes a pig or a buffalo, formerly opium. It is possible to find a beautiful weave, braided objects or silver jewellery, which these populations sell to buy seeds, more modern objects or clothing. Unfortunately, over the years, the Ky Lua market has lost much of its authenticity. It now relies on nightlife and if it is still lively, the picturesque has gone with more and more tourists.