Trek to Hmong mountain village

Laos' majority and dominant population is, not surprisingly, Lao. Along with a few other groups of low-land dwellers they make up the larger group known as Lao Loum. Around Luang Prababng there are two well known minority tribes that live further up in the mountains. They are the Khmu and Hmong.
We arranged a private one day trekking tour of three minority villages. Our tour guide, Li, is 24 years old, and is studying to be a teacher. He is originally from a Hmong village, and came to live in the city when he was nine. We walked with him for about two hours, through a Khmu-Lao village, and part way up into the mountains to a Hmong village. Here wee stopped for a couple of hours, in the hopes of having some time to experience a taste of life in the village and maybe play with some of the younger children.
Most of the village was further up the mountain, working on the ricee fields. There was one older man in the village making baskets, several older woman - some sowing - and a gaggle of young children mostly just staring at us.
We are cleearly not the first westerners they have seen. Many more have passed through here before us - but only in the last decade - this is the first generation with any substantial exposure to western culture. I think my overgrown beard was especially strange to them. None of the Lao, Hmong or Khmu people that I've met could grow a beard like me.
Li told us a lot about Lao and Hmong culture, and asked us a lot of questions about our own culture. He has never been outside of Luang Prabang, but I would not have guessed that from the thoughtfull questions he asked. We talked about government, school, work, relationships...
There is NO free school in Laos. Of course, it is very cheap by our standards - but most Lao make VERY little money. I think that $50 a month is not uncommon. The government is making some effort to get modern resources to the minority villages, and as such many villagers are moving out of the high mountains and closer to big towns. This particular Hmong village moved closer about 7 years ago in order to be near a school and have easier access to trade goods with the towns people. They still live without electricity or running water, but only two hours hike away is a more modern village with sattelite TV, convenience stores, and a school.
I played kick-kick with Li and one of the village boys. The boy enjoyed it, so I gave him the kick-kick. I don't think kick-kick is a Lao sport - I've only seen it in Vietnam and Cambodia. In fact, I underestand that it is the Vietnamese national sport! If you don't know what "kick-kick" is that's probably because "kick-kick" is local slang for "kick-shuttlecock", and if you don't know what a "shuttlecock" is, that's probably because badmitton isn't a very big sport in the US. So you should understand by now that "kick-kick" is badmitton with your feet. But more frequently, it's just played in the street much the same way we play hacky-sack.
Getting back to the trek... we didn't spend very long with the Hmong villagers before we had to start back to our jeep. The hike down was much quieter than the hike up. Brooke and I were mostly deep in thought about what we had witnessed in the village, and Li seemed to understand this, so we walked quietly most of the way back.