Chiang Mai Hilltribes

 The Hmong (Meo)

• The Hmong or Meo are are spread around the mountains in the northern most provinces of Thailand, Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai and Mae Hong Son. They are the most nomadic of the tribes, villages splitting and migrating to new areas to gain independence and the term "Meo" has become a sort of collective name Thai people use for describing the hill tribe people in general.
  
  

• Wherever they are they keep their traditions and as with all the other groups the most important is the New Year ceremony held at the end of the agricultural cycle, which usually coincides with the Christian Christmas or the new calendar year.
  
  

• Basically it can be said that they have a desire to be left alone, to be independent. They will fight for space, for their future if they think it is threatened. In Thailand they sided with the communists because they were promised freedom; in Laos they sided with the anti-communist forces because communism threatened their culture.

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