This is our Sapa guide Chi and her son Jahn. She is five feet tall and made of muscle. She eats bamboo and dandelion greens from the side of the road, gave birth in her thatched-roof home, and has never heard of mail. She is a proud guide when there’s tourists and a happy rice farmer when there’s not. She never went to a day of school in her life.
In two days, Chi taught me more about Vietnamese culture and life in general than I learned on the rest of the trip combined, and I developed a deep affinity for her unassuming nature and no-nonsense style. Ten thousand miles from home she made me feel welcome and safe, and her easy manner made me smile for hours of hard trekking.
This is Chi, the only woman who ever has, and who ever will, get me to ride on a motorbike.
5 comments
Comments feed for this article
05/08/2012 at 8:49 pm
Lagos
Aw, I love Chi!
05/08/2012 at 8:58 pm
in80plays
I love your photos and Chi seems like an amazing woman… all in all quite inspiring.
05/09/2012 at 8:51 am
inspirationfiles
Thank you! She truly was inspiring, and I really became attached to her!
05/09/2012 at 3:05 am
prakashwagle
Inspiring Article – Chi seems to be very hard working and Happy woman. We never think of different lifestyle lived by different people on this planet.
07/30/2012 at 3:10 am
Sapa | oddjam.com
[...] At this stage, we were joined by another H’mong lady called Chi who was guiding a lovely American couple Pam and Scott from Baltimore. Our paths through Vietnam seemed to naturally cross (they were heading south as we were heading north) and we ended up banding together and staying at the same homestead. They told us that they loved photography and we talked about how fun it was to be enjoying this Sapa experience and how we might try to capture it in pictures and in words (which they have so eloquently done in their posts over at Inspiration Files). [...]