Commodification of hospitality the localized process of constructing ethnic tourist market and identity in mai chau northwest upland of vietnam

COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY: THE LOCALIZED PROCESS OF CONSTRUCTING ETHNIC TOURIST MARKET AND IDENTITY IN MAI CHAU, NORTHWEST UPLAND OF VIETNAM Assist Prof Achariya Choowonglert, Ph.D Introduction The Tai in Mai Chau district, Hda Binh Province in the Northwest Upland Region of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV), are one of fifty-three ethnic minority groups in Vietnam, as listed in the official ethnic classification system used by the country's government Before integrafion of the region into the SRV's admintrative structure, the Tai in Mai Chau (Mudng Mun in the past) were dominant within the multi-ethnic, semi-independent polity that existed at that time a tributai7 to the empires of Vietnam for hundreds of years Historically, While Tai has been connected to the Vietnamese court/state for a long lime It would be meaningless to talk about While Tai ethnic identity without placing it in this context - their long relationship with Vietnamese state Because it is this relationship - their commercial, political, and social negotiation with state ~ which have produced their modernity Presently, Mai Chau is considered a place of ethnic and cultural diversity and as the gateway to the Northwest Upland Region It is located inbetween Hanoi and the northwest region (where the ethnic majority population is Tai), and is connected by national road no.6 It is also a strategically important place in terms of the tourism market, for in the early 1990s, after entering into the market economy, Mai Chau was promoted, by the government as a cultural tourism area, and this put the area on the tourist map Presently, Mai Chau is considered a,s an "ethnic homestay village", with each ethnic (White Tai) homestay providing the tourists with accommodation (an overnight stay), meals and cultural shows As an anthropologist with a fair grasp of the Vietnamese and While Tai languages (speaking, reading and writing), I have been collecting data for over five Assistant Professor at Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Faculty of Social Sciences, Naresuan University, Phitsanulok, THAILAND Email: aehariyach@gmail.com 472 COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY years, during 2007 - 2011 mainly as a result of infonnal discussions with inlbrrriants and long-term observation while underaking a variety of roles in the study area Such roles have included being a tourist, a student studying the While Tai in Mai Chau and also a researcher This study highlights the integrafion local culture into tourism business in the context of global tourist market In market eonslruetion, people are actively manipulating tourism instead of just coping and negotiating with global forces This notion regards the hosts as active agents who are able to lake advantage of tourism This paper reveals that local people are able to turn global force into "localized process" (Pieard 2003: 109) which can be seen through their construction of identity as "entrepreneur" In the process of cultural eonstrucling tourist market, they are able to transfrom themselves from peasant to entrepreneur by means of converting social and cultural capital into economic capitals; while in some situations, they can also negotiate for changing the local relationships This study then, represents an attempt to point out how these processes reconslmet the contemporary identity of the White Tai in the contemporary world Articulating with the Market Economy in Transition (1986 - early 2000s): Forming the Tourist Market Throughout last two decades Vietnam facilitated tourism development and developed tourism infrastructures with the hope that they will benefit her people Mai Chiiu had been constructed and represented as a tourist landscape According to Lonely Planet, the famous travelling guide book, Mai Chau is one of five highlighted tourist atlractions of the Northwest region of Vietnam Mai Chau represents the beatiful landscape and traditonal White Tai stilt house White Tai traditional custom and weaving had been well documented in travel articles during the 1990s (Lan 2000: 118) In Mai Chau, government have used tourism as a means of development, which includes promoting villages as handicraft centers The beautiful landscape, idyllic paddy field valleys, and as well as its traditional stilt houses combined to make it a successful tourist destination The villagers open their house to welcome tourists to have meals and stay over night Thus then Mai Chau is known as ethnic tourist attraction and a homestay village Besides, to foreign tourists, is Mai Chau known as a place for trekking to minority villages The household economy during the market transition period is significantly different from the period of eollective farming The significance of Ddi Mdl, by promoting handicraft villages in particular, on the community is profound It brought about important stmctural changes in the economic and social life of the people There are various and differentiated economic activities that the villagers of 473 VIET NAM HOC - KY YEU HQI THAO QUOC TE LAN THlT T U Ban Lac and Ban Pom Cogng have made for their engagement in tourism business since 1994 Now most of their incomes (81.53%) come from tourism activifies At present, tourist business plays an important role in the villages' economy, in fiie sense that it has been regarded as the main source of income for nearly all households Tourist business activifies in the villages encompass different services for homestay, cultural shows, local tour guides, eampfire, motorbike taxi, and bicycle for rent; the sale of local food and local wine; diverse productions of local souvenirs (such as traditional fabric weaving, embroidering, and wood crafting) and souvenir shops; and hired labors The tourism related businesses, the wet rice cultivation and livestock are supportive of one another First, the homesla>-, as a main tourism business, supports many economic activities such as souvenir shop, cultural show, and waged laborers who work for homestay services, sale of firewood and other businesses pertaining to eampfire, bicycle rental and motorbike taxi service Meanwhile the homestay gets support from rice cultivation and livestock, as well as a small amount commission from cultural show, sale of firewood and bicycle rental Second, souvenir shops help people who are making craft, including weaving traditional fabric and making embroidery Almost all households engage in at least one of those activities all year round There are 30 registered homestays (out of 114 households) in Ban Lac and 16 registered homestays (out of 76 households) in Ban Pom Cogng There arc a few non-registered homestays in both villages This means that almost one third of the total households in both villages are doing homestay business Moreover, around 50 households in Ban Lac and 20 households in Ban Pom Cogng, or about 44 per cent and 26 per cent respectively, are running souvenir shops According to my survey in the two villages, there is only per cent of Ban Lac households and 10 per cent of Ban Pom Cogng that not engage with any tourism businesses This preference, among the villagers to engage in business rather than agriculture, is explained by a Vietnamese sociologist as a symbol of being savvy which certainly help them to eam significantly higher income The produefion in village depends on the tourism market But they continue to farming Kerkvliet (2006) offers an insight into the interaction between tourism and agriculture: the market helps villagers to decide what products should be produced In these tourist villages, subsistence economy is still the main basis of the villagers' livelihoods Villagers of these tourist villages not free up land, or sell the use rights of the agricultural lands as what has been happening in the small town of Mai Chau Presently, villagers still base their livelihood on wet rice cultivation and swidden fields They paddy cultivation twice a year for both household's 474 COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY consumption, for eaming income, and to support the homestay business since they provide meals for the tourists Most of the villagers, whose harvest is more than their household requirements, sell their rice Both agriculture and tourist business are looked after by family However, if both jobs need intensive labor at the same lime, a family will hire labor for tourism business and as well as for agriculture Agriculture does not depend much on the machines since it is just a small plot of land Now let us look at the ways how market and tourism industry affected the village economy The villagers tend to see marketization and privatization of land' as secjrily {dam bdo) of their life They believe that transition into market oriented economy have opened up opportunities for local people In most cases, in Iransilon period, villagers' quality of living is seems to be quite good They possess moden faeilifies such as washing machine, satellite TV, computer and internet Almost all households have motorbikes and many of them possess two to three motorbikes One homestay household has a seven-seated ear for pick up and drop of tourists Between 2007 and early 2011, I have visited the villages every year, and econonie development in the villages seems to improve year by year There are some new and bigger houses, souvenir shops, and grocery stores; additionally the Mai Chau market has been enlarged as a response to the growth of tourist market in the district Tourist market is significantly different from their previous market Previously, they had produced and traded opium with various Tai groups and highlanders in Yunnan and upper Red River valley which was dominated by French troop Michaud 2000: 344-5) and monopolized by some elite families which was advanageous for a small number of villagers But the tourist market spreads wide opporunilies to each household In fact, Tai people in Ban Lac have been familiar with tourism for nearly half a century (47 years) The year 1963 was a milestone for Ban Lac when it had its first h:)meslay - the first homestay village of Northwest Vietnam In 1963 Chieng Chau >ub-dislrict of Mai Chau district was chosen to be the ease study for revising the elmination of superstition as well as for increasing the yield of rice plantafion At thiX time, the historical informant was a commune official, a vice chairman of the Ciieng Chau cooperatives Because the chairman of the cooperatives was not literati, his house was often chosen when district officials held a meeting on the TofillowLand Law 1993 and its revised versions in 1998 and 2003, paddy land is allocated to eich household unit for twenty years, counted down from the year 1993 In other words, mos of villagers conceive that 2013 will be the year offinishing20-year-granted paddy land and itarting new round of land allocation In fact, there is unavailable at any authority level on sich new land allocation yet 475 VIET NAM HOC - KY YEU HQI THAO QUOC TE LAN THlT TU issues The vice chairman is also an adopted child of the former Lord of Mudng Miin Unintentionally his house became a homestay for staffs from district, provincial and central govemments whenever they were sent to work in Mai Chau Besides them, many international visitors (who worked with the provincial and district officials) found his house familiar and convenient place His house began to welcome the experts and the foreign ambassadors; notably the ambassador of China was the first group, followed by groups from Soviet Union, Bulgaria, and Rumania There were so many ambassadors from other countries By 1976, six ambassadors of various countries have visited and had lunch at his house He hosted many intemational visitors without any compensation from neither the local authority nor even any charge collected from customers for 31 years In his point of view, it was considered as a polifieal task - diplomacy, which of course he must While only selling tradifional fabrics was allowed Rice was cooked for guests to eat as village's rice was a lot The guests or govemment officials had to bring the meat, pork or chickens for cooking However, sometimes they didn't bring anything then the homestay owner, by hospitality has to take their chicken or fish to make a meal for them free of charge Certainly they recognize that as a loss in terms of economic The Foreign guests, by words of mouth, came to visit his homestay for vacation In addition, the government officials usually came to his homestay to eat steamed-fish Ban Lae and his homestay, therefore, were becoming a famous tourist place At that time, the bathroom and toilet were in local style; bath was taken next to a stream while latrine was made on the ground Electricity have not anive Ban Lac then However, such atmosphere was a fond of Western tourists The time during 1993-1994 was a peak of tourists' visit The homestay of the informant in quesfion received 30-40 tourists staying overnight a day In view of that, he pressured the local authority to pennil him to charge the tourists Gradually, his political capital was transfonned into economic capital A second homestay business was eonstmcted in 1982 The owner of the second homestay was quite a visionary He knew, besides being suggested by the first homestay owner, that tourism in Ban Lac will grow So he decided to invest in this business When his daughter went to the university, he oriented her in studying tourism These two homestay owners were right Following her university graduation, she worked for a govemment hotel in Hda Binh province, where she was able to build contacts with many tour agencies from the whole country She suggested the tour agencies to open lours in Mai Chau and stay ovemighl at her father's homestay Nowadays this household is considered by villagers as the richest Homestay in Mai Chau 476 COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY In fact when this homestay opened for business, after refumishing his home with modern amenities, it was flooded with guests or tourists He began to accommodate the guests to his two sons' homes Therefore, his two sons were also converted into homestays gradually These three homestays monopolised the market and had eontraets with travel companies (public or private).These three homestays belonged to members of the same family I was told that there was another homestay which belonged to another family, whose sister worked for a stateowned provincial hotel of Hda Binh These four homestays were located in the center of village, they were large and comfortable enough, and had modem facilities for receiving guests from the tourist agencies This was followed by a boom in homestay business in Mai Chau Many other villagers, anticipating the market demand, made contract with tourist companies and refiimished their houses with modem amenifies They began to build their own networks from social ties Noticeably the houses and homestays were built in the Tai style, which is not specifically for the "tourist gaze" (Urry 2004 (1990) but sfill is pan of their normal everyday life In northwestem Vietnam, almost all Tai keep staying in their traditional house style Contradictorily, in negotiating with modernity, homestay business has to mix the sense of home (comfortable) and the exofic feeling so that the toilets have been made modem without any element of local style Perhaps, this mixture of tradition and modernity went well with Vietnam's desire to promote tourism as a means of developing villages as handicraft centers, as place where traditional and modem coexist harmoniously By 1997 about 25 households in Ban Lac have become homestays Most of them are located in the center of the village which makes it easy for tourist agents to contact In the early 2000, Ban Pom Cogng, the village nearby Ban Lae, entered the touris: market by building conneefion with tour agencies While villagers of Ban Lae could not build connection with many tour agencies at that moment, Ban Pom Cogng's villagers could Some households in Ban Pom Cogng have invested in university education (particularly in tourism or business administration) for their children Their children, after graduafion, worked in the field of tourism Most of these homestays flourished after Mai Chau (1994) was allowed to charge the tourist for homestay by the district officials Initially the district appointed bill collectors to direefiy take the money and set the standard price for ovem.ght tourists However, the villagers did not conform The office of disfiiet, therefore, abolished the charge regulafion in 1999, and instead started applying value added tax to homestays 477 VIET NAM HOC - KY YEU HOI THAO QUOC TE LAN THlT TlT By early 2000 homestay business peaked More than 36,000 tourists visited these villages annually by 2007* And by 2010, more than 45,000 tourists visited Mai Chau for sightseeing, recreation and relaxafion, of which around 9,000 were foreigners (interview a tourist police of Mai Chau District, April 2011) Only five homestays in Ban Lae have been eonstmcted up to now; Ban Pom Cogng has eight registered homestays Nevertheless four homestays in Ban Lac have gone out of business In doing homestay business, the villagers have generally started their business from building their tourist soeio-business networks An old man, who was die pioneer of homestay business of Ban Lae and former head of the cooperatives, observed that families that have no connections or friends outside the village are hardly making their lives prosperous Thus the best way to prosper is to have associated business Homestays that has no access to tourist company's networks have attempted to establish networks by utilizing their own social acquaintances Currently, homestay networks in the villages can be differentiated into ibur types According to the questionnaire survey (with sample made up from 37 homestays or 77 percent of populafion of both villages) 25 percent of homestays have close connection with tourist companies The number of networked companies is in average, in minimum and 10 in maximum Thirty one percent of homestay depend on connection with tourist companies and social networks The average is 2.44 companies, while company is in minimum and companies is in maximum The Thirty nine percent of homestay mainly depend on social relation / lied networks; those that has less than tourist company in their contacts The last one is the other homestays which occupy percent (field survey in 2011) Homestays have close connections with tourist agencies in Hanoi and Hda Binh province Usually the first homestay owners in Ban Lac are more "professional" and tend to receive most of foreign tourists The ways the first four homestay owners have linked with tourist companies This evident confums that the first stage of building a tourist market in the villages came from personal networks, which linked villagers to private and govemment businesses as well as government officers Accordingly, whoever had beforehand a relationship with business and govemment sectors has taken the opportunity to engage with tourist market Some years after entering into tourist market, only two homestays in Ban Lac and eight in Ban Pom Cogng were able to build business network with tourist companies firmly The reason being some of their children studied at the universifies in Hanoi, and/or Source: Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Vietnam, cited in hltp://vietnambusiness asia/exploring-villages-of-northwest-ethnie-minorities, 2008 478 COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY worked for tourist companies Every week these homestays received foreign guests Their market structure depends on some middlemen like tourist agencies For this reason, these homestays can be seen as participating in a "vertical structure", where the interrelationship between hosts and guests are distant In addifion, they are in a position of disadvantage in relation to tourist companies; at least they cannot determine the amount of the share between them and the companies A homestay owner said to me, although he gets a lot of guests (from tour agencies) and almost every day, he could not save money If he gets a lot of independent tourists, he will be richer, he said So this ease demonstrates that to be secure (in firm connections with lour agencies), villagers have to pay (getting less share from tour agencies) a lot Even though the homestay business opened up in 1992, it was much later when they began constructing the souvenir shops at the first floor of their stilt houses In fact, in the late 1980s the villagers sold their traditional fabric at their house, more precisely in the living room on the second floor They did not know that their tradifional fabrics could be sold When their visitors asked for buying they didn't know how to set the cost of such fabrics After many years of selling, they have just known that the prices they sold were pittance Customarily, White Tai has to stock some pillows, blankets, fabrics, and seat mattress for their (non-market) guests slaying ovemighl at the houses, or for preparing for marriage of their daughters, or even for giving gift Once engaging in the tourist market, they are active sellers When they found the tourists stroll pass their house, according to their customs, they liked to talk with them and to invite them into their house, drank tea and talked if they were compatible The fabrics could then be sold, but it depended on the interaction and emotion of the guests rather than commercial intention of the hosts This means that they had never convinced tourists to buy In terms of business, some households hanged their fabrics on the windows so that they are easily visible to tourists Then they are saleable Then many shops weave traditional fabric, carpentry, embroidery, and wickerwork by themselves since they have not much money to buy any goods from the suppliers, or try to save cost For weaving, the raw material silk thread is produced by villagers in Ban Lae, but cotton thread is bought from "Kinh" merchant in the Hda Binh or Hanoi province For carpentry and wickerwork, the raw materials are from the village Thus they rely much on their natural resource management The success in emerging tourism businesses is not from the outsiders It comes from the way the villagers articulate the old living and new one: agriculture and tourism Tourism in Mai Chau begins with ufilizing the local capitals such as household labors, mral atmostphere, and agricultmal products Also culture of 479 VIET NAM HOC - KY YEU HOI THAO QUOC TE LAN THlT TlT hospitality in particular and ethnic heritage, such as, the backdrop of Tai stilt houses Therefore, tourism is not external culture penetrating into community After Dol Mai, the villagers see the demand and opportunities of engaging with market As Buyandelgeriyn (2008) argues, during the post-socialist transition, the economy has been built upon cultural values and relationships, rather than market rules They realized that their cultures have been valuable for both economic and social aspects They construct the cultural products Intensive Engagement within Cultural Constructing Tourist Market (Early 2000s - 2011) There is no denying the fact that a lot of local entrepreneurs are actively engaged in building the tourist market To me, the market is not dominated by outsiders - i.e state and tour companies By this I not mean outsiders have no role in the making of Mai Chau a tourist site after all what is a tourist village without "outsiders" who come to visit it What I want to point out is that, the variety of conneefions made by local entrepreneurs, in cooperation with tour agency and the tourists, illustrates the abilities of local people to manipulate, in their own limited capacities, the global market into local process The first four homestay owners, who built their business by connecting to tourist agencies can be designated as the "pioneer homestays" And the other homestays which emerged later, comprising about nineteen homestays in Ban Lae and Ban Pom Cogng, had to contend with contact with small tourist companies, and build their network through social ties I classified them as "social-fie homestay" The "social-tie homestays" usually built their networks before investing any capital in constructing homestay houses To play safe, they have to make sure that they have their own customers or market As mentioned earlier, because of their position of disadvantage in relation to tourist agencies, the entrepreneurs may end up putting lots of money and gefiing less profit In addition, because of their late entry into the tourist market, these homestays have no or little conneefion with tour agencies For these reasons, they have to mainly organize their business from networks of social ties/relations A few of these homestays are located in the center of the village The rest are located at the periphery of the villages Their target customers are Vietnamese However, unlike the pioneer homestays, the liming and number of guests coming to these homestays cannot be predicted For that reason, their business is rather unstable This ease indicates that in a lime of uncertainty and rapid transformation, economic anxiety and instability, culture and intimate relationships have been used to operate the economy (Buyandelgeriyn 2008) 480 COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY So as to intensively engage with the tourist market during the transition period, this group started expanding their network with the help of their Vietnamese friends and their children's friends or even friends of Vietnamese visitors/guests who came mostly from Hanoi Their modus operandi is same as the pioneer homestays But they try to get hold of foreigners by making business connections with motorbike and taxis drivers in Mai Chau town These drivers bring backpackers to their homestays A few of them have connections with bus drivers on the Hanoi - Mai Chau or Hanoi - Son La road The drivers would inform the homestay owners about on-board tourists The homestay owners would then wail to pick the unsuspecting tourists at the drop point or bus terminal The number of guest/backpackers a motorbike taxi driver would take to a household depends on connection and compensation the homestay pay to them One example of successful "social-fie homestay" that impressed me is the one owned by a middle age woman living at the periphery of a village She put in much effort to acquire tourist guests through faee-lo-faee communication She taught herself English and practiced the language by talking to foreign tourists She did this by acting as a local guide, taking tourists for trekking around the nearby villages Sometimes, when tourists strolled pass her house she cordially invited the tourists (and tourist guides) to sit inside her house She would then strike up conversation with them, offer them tea At the end she would offer them her namecard and also present them with small souvenirs This way she hoped to expand her network Surprisingly, all of her guests actually come from recommendations by such tourists or their friends Apart from this, what I found interesting was the way she bind the tourists to her On most occasions she would tie the wrist of her guests with thread It can be interpreted as a (mind) commitment between her and the guests This practice is usually followed when villagers like the guests This is one instance of how imaginative homestay entrepreneurs are trying to explore other techniques of expanding their business network outside the traditional methods of social fies and contract with tour agencies Another such example is: a few homestay owners, with help from Kinh friend living in Hanoi (with home profit is shared) market themselves via internet The choice of advertisement is usually kept secret among villagers Another example is the practice of offering discount to tourists Homestays which cannot get in touch with any network outside village can get tourists transferred from homestay which are full Some homestays, even if they already have well established networks, occasionally accept tourists transferred from other homestays 481 COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY want to point out that economic capital differenfiafion exists among villagers During the eolleefivizalion period and early period of Ddi Mdl, the economic capital did not matter The commune authorities' houses were acceptable to be a homestay for govemmenl's guests Once Mai Chau is linked to the free market economy, houses which were big and looked comfortable were able cash in on the emerging tourism business without much investment The pioneer homestays gradually accumulate their profit Within five years, after the boom (the mid - end of 1990s) in tourism market, the first group of homestays have enough economic capital to rebuild their homestay without or with a small loan from banks Other homestays have to invest in rebuilding their houses so as to compete with established homestays They, therefore, raised huge loan from the agricultural bank To raise this kind of loan, they must meet four eondifions - mortgage, income information, occupation information, and project plan Almost all the later homestays were set up with loan from the agricultural bank According to my questionnaire survey, the loan accounts for 44 percent of their investment More than half of their investment comes from their savings Usually, White Tai people are afraid of debt, because they fear that indebtedness may make them lose their land Without land, they have no idea of making a living Even though they are engaging in the tourist market, they still agriculture In addition, they not want to take risk So far every homestay owner has been able to pay debt For the newcomers in the business, their saving money comes from two main sources First, the souvenir shops As discussed, only a few home.slays could invest in homestay business after 1990s For these few homestays, monev accumulation from selling souvenirs, must have been done before the end of 1990s This would mean that their souvenir business must have started at the end of the l')80s or early of the 1990s My guess is, the households which possessed traditional fabrics/clothes accumulated before Doi Mdl would have gained maxinum benefit from souvenir business And a family which consisted of large femali numbers for weaving and making traditional clothge sinh in the collectivization period must be more benefited The second source is their old treasures, such as, silver necklaces, bracelets and belts inherited from their ancestors before French colonial period The last treasure is made of gold In all probability made from gold dug in mid or end of the 1970s The villagers (both pioneer and new homestay owners) who possessed the old treasures belong to the category of aristocrat families or govemment officers Once homestay investments are advanced, the rest are spent for modem toilet and kitchen enlargement where the owners often stay when guests are taken in 485 VIET NAM HOC - KY YEU HOI THAO QUOC TE LAN THlT T U Moreover, the villagers not completely invest for business in one lime They would gradually rebuilt their homestay and built the toilet and bathroom For example, first, they have to collect the matress, pillow, and blanket Then they have to build the modem toilet and bath room which were important for gelling tourists After refumishing toilet and bath room, they may rebuild the house by enlarging it or fixing it with a good quality of woods, or make private bed rooms Even though most homestay owners have little economic capitals, lhe>- and especially the new investors try to accumulate "social capital" in eonslmeting businesses by expanding their networks Many of them consider money not as the critical factor for engaging in tourist business; because money can be borrowed from the agricultural bank or the social policy bank run by the govemment Instead the most important things for their business are "networks", "friendship" and/or a "partnership" Having money without network is meaningless, many said to me Thus they need a partnership to circulate and accumulate their social capital This way of thinking for "sustainable" business is similar to what they did for water management previously described The most powerful networks, according to Ihcni, are their former guests who are potential endorsers of their homestay to their friends or acquaintances They help to publicize and expand the network The general opinion is that, "if we give good service to them, the guests will come back to our homestays again or introduce our homestays to others" In practice, every homestay owner ranks good service and distribution of their name card among the most important things they will pursue to build such a network Strong social lies make their business plans feasible In fact proof of these fies help when submitting projects and request of loans from banks Labor is another crucial capital The critical hairier to ethnic tourist market is not social or economic capitals, but labor In my interview with two poor families, they asserted that they can gradually accumulate blankets, mattresses, and pillows by their own production Likewise, they can borrow from the agricultural bank to have their homes renovated and fix modern toilets Building networks, just as finding capital, is also not hard Networks are established slowly by giving good services to children's friends (as their guests) and the effects of word of mouth communication will help expand their network automatically But the only problem is, as pointed out by them, the quantity and quality of labors needed to accumulate all capitals for such as business The presence of too many dependent members in their family tends to discourage them from venturing into homestay business Let me now describe a rare but puzzling phenomenon at Ban Lae It involves their attitude to English or French The homestay owners and villagers, at the centre 486 COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY of the village, seem to be to be less eoneemed with learning either of the two languages In most ease, I had to act as translators between my host and the tourists My host or his family members never asked me to teach them English, despite the obvious language problem in his family in dealing with tourists In contrast, when I go to the homestays, souvenir shops or homes located at the periphery of Ban Lac they eagerly asked me to teach them some English I was puzzled by these two contradictory attitudes towards English language I asked around I was told that most homestay owners are offered English training courses by provincial government Some of them hire school English teachers as private tutor This is enough to help them interact with tourists The most important aspects of homestay business are networks, modem toilet and hospitality Once the villagers get all of these, there is no need for English or French speaking skill Moreover, it is the tour guides who are required to talk directly to the guests It occurred to me, it is not the problem of language as such, but the attitude towards the language The people at the periphery see it as an asset The villagers at the periphery of the village are newcomers or new settlers Generally they control limited resources compared to the inhabitants at the center In their struggle, in the tourist market, they see proficiency in the foreigner's language as a resource: a resource untapped by the established homestays If we take a broader view, capitals required in homestay business include every resource the villagers occupy, especially labor (both quality and quantity), knowledge, intangible cultures and habits which will be revealed in the way they manipulate and liviing with tourism in following secfion Entrepreneurship and the Commodification of Hospitality In the transition period, the households began to change their mode of economic operation Market opportunity and White Tai culture worked like alchemy - to transform them into enterpreners, no longer living off subsistent agriculture This transfomation was triggered by dynamic households' capital accumulation To give one example, as seen in the previous section, traditional hospitality is transformed from socio-cultural relation into economic relation of commodity And those who possessed the needed initial capital - locafion and position - were able to gain access to soeio-business network, and accumulate economic capital fast This success (which is going to be elaborated the way they in this section) cannot be measured in terms of their location and position alone But we must also consider their "entrepreneurial attributes" - an attribute that made them see what others could not foresee in the ethnic tourist market 487 VIET NAM HOC - KY YEU HOI THAO QUOC TE LAN THU TU Entrepreneurship is an important factor in process of peasant transformatiori from living with agricultural economy to living with market economy (Bull and Comer 1993) Of course, entrepreneurship underlies in the expansion of new small tourism businesses in Mai Chau Theoretically, the term entrepreneur is firstly relevant closely to the notion of "innovation"; once he or she lakes an opporluniity to create new business enterprises by individuals or small group (Kent, Sexton, and Vesper 1982), or creating something new, or provide innovation under environment uncertainty (York and Venkataraman 2010) It can be described that the enlerprener is the innovator who is creative in the process of capitalism Secondly entrepreneurship indicates the risk-taking propensity So, by his or her proactive manners, product innovation, and competitiveness, he or she can create new strategy handling with risk (Covin and Selvin 1991) Importantly, the definition of entrepreneurship is not limited to innovation, creativity, and risk handling, but also about capital accumulation, mobilizing the resources to achieve their entrepreneurial objectives (Bull and Corner 1993) In Bull and Comer's idea (1993), the transition of the peasant family to be the entrepreneur needs the capital accumulation as well as land purchase and economic enterprise Whereas the freeing of labor from agriculture for industrial work is not a factor So as an entrepreneur the household earn income from the two economic activities (agriculture and business) However, to be entrepreneurship in this case is the combination of the traditional capability and ability to adapt to the opportunity By this process the peasants increase entrepreneurial spirit (in the sense of seeking out the best opportunity, organizing time, and exploiting skills learned impendent employment) More specifically, the White Tai's entrepreneurship is understood as doanh nhdn ("entrepreneur" in Vietnamese) which, in this ease, emerges from villagers' ability to transform traditional hospitality (gift) to be saleable hospitality (commodity) through the process of capital accumulation and Iranfonnalion The question is how this transfonnalion of traditional hospitality as commodity takes place? Or, what change villagers' perception of hospitality? As hinted in the previous section, the transfomialion should be seen in the context of the changing social relation The culture of hospitality was changing with shifting social relation In the past, the hosts and the guests get in touch directly or in "pure relationship"' Taking from the concept of "reflexivity", people watching the behaviors of both them and other people in the "pure relationship" It is different from the relationship between historians and sources, or between people via medium which is considered as "representational relationship" 488 COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY according to Giddens (1990) The hospitable relationship is based on kinship, or neighborhood, or reciprocity, or even humanity Or in the other word, this is the horizontal relationship Furthermore, customarily, they accept every one passing by their house, even the strangers They are glad to provide drink; meals and aeeommodalion Habitually, the horizontal relationship of hospitality of the White Tai can be considered as an institutionalized social practice binding people with reciprocity So hospitality is considered as a gift In addition, this institution is to secure trades and connections among people of the same/different societies and cultures Far away from the traditional one, the modem hospitality at the first glimpse is in contrast The commodification of hospitable relationship is made by the "medium" The tourists are not the direct guests of the host They are the guests of the govemment officials and/or tour agencies (the medium) who take them to the village So, hospitality as a cultural task becomes political (i.e diplomacy) and/or economic tasks The horizontal relations became the vertical relationship which is considered as a power relation of the interplays of host-guest/minority-majority groups Among them and officials is vertical But between villagers and kin and among them is still horizontal Secondly, what differentiate hospitality as gift and commodity is the purpose of Iravelling and staying at the homestay In the past, they accepted guests for humanity reason They helped the travelers, who travel for trading, or visiting their relatives The tourists' aims are mostly for recreation, or gazing/consuming the exofic people/culture In addition many domestic tourists who have purchasing power come to Mai Chau to be served by the minority people So the definitions of "hospitality" and "guesf' have changed After engaging with tourism, the terms to refer to guests (which in the past they did not distinguish, but called them, Khdeh huan- meaning "(our) home's guesf) are differentiated into two kinds They bon-ow the terms from Vietnamese These terms are Khdeh vdng lal - meaning the "tourist or visitor"(bring the sense of business transaction) and Khdeh thdn tinh — meaning the "guest" (who are based on socio-cultural relations) By changing of relationship, the generalized reciprocity (belated paying back with (un) equitable quantity) of the past became a balanced reciprocity (paying back measured in terms of equitable quanfity) in the notion of Sahlins (Narotzky 1997: 46 -7) Thirdly, the frequency of by which guests are accepted is also one of the factors for commodification of hospitality Long ago, villagers rarely accepted the guests compared to that in tourism business nowadays Another factor points to the number of guests they accept Just one or two years before getting money from homestay service, the villager received mass tourist, which is about 30 to 40 tourists 489 VIET NAM HOC - KY YEU HOI THAO QUOC TE LAN THU TlT for overnight stay In the past, they accepted just one or few guests For this reason, plus the frequency of the tourist's arrival, the host (without compensation) fell there was too much burden for them to take care of guests who they not know in a "pure relationship" Finally, what leads to commodification of homestay is the behavior of the local authority As discussed, even entering to the tourist market since 1986, the villagers were not allowed to gel money from homestay service till 1994 At that time they just got income from souvenir selling, whereas according to the deseendent of the pioneer homestay, the local authority charged from the tourists The host realized that in fact their homestay service was saleable Afterward, they put an effort to negotiate with local authority to let them lake the service charge The pioneer homestays had experienced the changing relation (from horizontal to vertical plus ethnic power relations), saw the market demand and realized that their hospitality can be sold As acknowledged earlier, business investment is risky How could they, as farmers take business opportunity with risk? The first homestay have been converted into a homestay, for political reason, for years without any economic benefit Meanwhile the second homestay had a long vision and invested for their daughter to take tourism degree at the university Then, of course after graduation she worked for the government hotel and is able to build contacts with many tour agencies Therefore, being local authority, the first homestay (and his sons' homestays) as well as other local authorities' homestay, they can monopolize the governmental networks of tourists by opening up the connection, whereas the second homestay grabs the network of tour agencies generated from the provincial government owned hotel These networks become "property" for commodification of hospitality which enclose them in the tourist market; and meanwhile of course, exclude others from such market This property cannot be accessed for all So, at the early stage of market formation, the entrepreneurship is the result of power relation or nexus of polifical-market relation (Nevins and Peluso 2008) Moreover, the notion of benefit converts the homestay service into a commodity And in the power relation, the homestay owners did not want the authority to take advantage of their culture and take control and benefit from commodity they produced Instead, they are in the process of negotiating for their new identity as entrepreneurs The new identity is also a way in which they can negotiate the authentic White Tai, which henceforth should not be understood only within the agricultural realm, but also as part of a frozen White Tai cultures and language, as if they were in a primitive world However, they are now asserting themselves within the business 490 COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY realm; praefieally negotiating their authenticity as modem people - linking themselves to the global market and with other people in the world In short, the authentic While Tai people at the moment are more like entrepreneurs and "modem people", than "primitive peasants" What I would like to point out is, when a host in Mai Chau claimed to offer "authentic While Tai", such as, local foods, traditional stilt houses with local mattress, blanket and pillow, tradifional fabrics as well as ethnic cultural atmosphere, what they sell is not these things per se It is not the meaning added to these things (Appadurai 1986) either Rather, the meaning comes from the relationship between the two people (Goddard 2000) - i.e hosts and the guests through their practices That is to say, the relafionship of the two, which goes beyond the meaning of things per se, constmcts the "meaningful relation" of the host and the guest It can be called "authentic relation" That is similar to what Goddard (2000) found in the distinction between gifts and commodities in relation to praxis and intention rather than exchange Even though the commodity has its own meaning, in the other way, the meaning comes from the relationship between two people So, it can be a conflict or a coincidence of meaning or anything else In this ease, to transform the hospitality from the gift to be commodity, the meaning eonstmcted through host-guest relationships is a vital factor The authentic relation of warm hospitality and impression as something abstracted can be sold However, if the abstraction of hospitality is sold, therefore, the commodity White Tai sell (i.e food/drink, slaying overnight) is entangled with a gift (warm welcome and friendliness and so on) This means that in the process of commodificafion of hosphality, the boundary between gift and commodity is blurred However, as discussed before, many other members of villages began to participate in the tourist market But the problem is most business connections were already monopolized by the pioneer homestays So a daunting task for these newcomers into the business is how to create new forms of network Political and economic networks are already exhausted avenue: they need to tap on other avenues in order to be successful entrepreneurs In the villagers' perspective, they are doanh nhdn (entrepreneur), the business owners who are innovative, able to invest and handle the risk In the following discussion I will discuss the ways the new homestay owners (or what I called "the social-tie homestays") transform the culture of hospi.ality (gift) to building the homestay business (commodity) And conversely, how the gift is interwoven in the commodity This is not to say that the commodity is socially alienated from the producers (the hosts) as visualized by Marxist tradifion Moreover, there is no clear distincfion between gift and commodity Gift can become commodity and commodity can be a gift (Goddard 2000) 491 VIET NAM HQC - KY YEU HQI THAO QUOC TE LAN THlT TlT What am trying to draw attention, so as to make my argument more cogent is about the strategy a White Tai employs to make friend with a potential gujst for his/her future homestay (who is currently a guest of an established homestays) My anthropological curiosity is aroused by the ways they struggle for share (i.e exactly is market segment) in the ethnic tourist market Normally, villagers are embarrassed to approach a tourist directly or explicitly Customarily, a Whte Tai always welcome guest in a friendly way It is very easy for them to make friend with outsiders or customers of their souvenir shops Some guests are invited to have tea in their houses, which is a gift (normally in Vietnamese society there is no free tea in business space) Such habit makes it easy for them to strike up friendship for future business connection This is just a positive impact of being friendship, not really intended consequence of the While Tai Addilicnally, according to their structure of sentiment, getting guest from other homesfiys, in the villager's world view, is not a sin as long as they not say sonulhing negative to the homestay where the guests are staying By inviting the lourisis who are strolling pass or buying souvenir at their homestays to drink lea, and/cr chat with them, if the tourist appreciate them, they can be the guests of ih'; new homestays for the next time The villagers perceive this phenomenon as "the tourists' choice" The;- have rights to stay with any homestay they prefer So, what they is to reconstriel fiie meaning of hospitality so as to stmggle for taking tourists of another network (market segment) It is interesting that according to interview with lour guides, generally the villagers not invite them, like they to the tourists Taat is because, if they invite tour guide to drink tea, it is obvious that they are hijicking the network Thus, in general, the cuUural of establishing market nelw)rk is acceptable among villagers, and is not percieved as a hard competition once aiyone can interpret and practice their cultures for their own purposes In so doirg, the struggle to create market segment is a "creative competifion", which cm be percieved as mutual cconstmclion of market (network) between culture of hosiitality and economy; meanwhile it also leads to developing a creative produefion (giving choices to tourists) The question then is: what type of practices adopted by homestay OA^ners gives hospitality an ambivalent identity - as a sold commodity or as a gift? It is a commodity, in the sense that the villagers provide extra deal (tea and talk) to the customer buying the souvenir And it is a gift in the conscious praxis tfat the 492 COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY tourists appreciate what the souvenir seller offer The point is, in such a business transaction, which at the first glimpse is considered as a transient transaction, however the social integration/obligation, as argued by Marcel Mauss, emerges (Graeber 2001) Habitually, the homestay hosts also try to make a moral impression upon their guests to keep them in the business network by giving some gifts, such as, discount on goods, free motorbike taxi ride, and so on Therefore, in the homestay business, we cannot separate the commodity from the gift and vice versa Another point about market competition i.e., what makes homestay owners in homestays based on social tie network take advantage of market segmentation is their ability to see gaps in the market As new comers in another market segment, they are also in the process of constructing their identity as entrepreneurs That is, most of the guests of the pioneer homestay are foreigners and also dependent domestic tourists who are the rich Their competition is usually for the domestic tourists They offer them cheaper accommodation if ease they would come second time or suggest to them that they would cheaper rate to tourists recommended by them By making market segmentation, they can gain a lot of domestic tourist whereas the pioneer homestays is confined to the segment of foreign and dependent tourists Table shows distribution of tourists by homestay type and their network It is found that the share of the new comers (the social tie network) is more than half of the total tourists visiting Mai Chau Explicitly, the homestays depending on tour company network, which are 36.0% or 1/3 of total homestays, gets 43.1%, of the total number of tourist or almost a half; whereas the homestays based on social ties network, which are 64.0%, gain approximately 61% of the tourist In a very rough calculation, the homestay which depend on tour company network gel the tourists more than that of the homestay based on social ties network around one time This means the homestay based on social tie network can obtain 1/3 of the market share However, if we calculate the percentage of profit share, since they not need to divide profit with any tour agency (unlike the homestay connecting with tour company), we can say that they are rather successful in engaging with tourist market And because these two types of homestay uses different market strategies and position themselves in different market segments, intense conflict seldom occurs 493 VIET NAM HQC - KY YEU HQI THAO QUOC TE LAN THlT TU Table 2: Distribution of Tourists by Type of Homestay's Networks (%) Types of Tourist Type of Homestay's Foreign & Networks Dependent Independent Tourists Total Tourists Foreign &Independent/ Backpackers (29) (11) (7) (47) 70.7% 40.7% 17.1% (43.1%) (12) (15) (34) (61) 29.3% 55.6% 82.9% 56.0% Total (41) (26) (41) (108) [25 [100%]] 100% 100% 100% 100% Tour Company Network [9 [36.0%]] Social-Tie Network [16 [64.0%]] Domestic Source: Field survey in 2011 Notes: Figures in ( ) are percentage of tourists Figures in [ ] are percentage of homestay networks Secondly and importantly, as mentioned previously, these type of homestays interpret and practice their culture of hospitality (as a gift) to gain access to the market to bypass the networks in which they are excluded by the pioneer homestays So, by interpretation and pracfice of culture, cutlure become mechanisms for free entry into market They can get around the already closed political-business network Therefore, this study argues that in the "cultural economy" no one is excluded from the (cultural) capital, resource (network) and market (economy) These new entrepreneurs, who belonged to similar culture, therefore by their ability to see the market gap and positioning themselves in proper market segment, can transfomi their cultural capitals to be a resource (network) called "social-fie network" Also, by this phenomenon, the boundary between the gift (perceived as things to build social obligation) and the commodity (things alienated from the producers, and fetishism) are blurred They may be seen in mutually interchangeable relationship 494 COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY Conclusion This paper, while tracing this transition, will argue that within the tourist market space, villagers and their cultures are not just the objects of sign and image of tourist gaze In eonslmeting tourist market, they actively carve out new social (market) space for local determination and manipulation Tourism in Mai Chau cannot be perceived as something that substituted agriculture based economy Rather, it has reconfigured the relafionship of people to their land Through tourism, people accomplished While Tai culture of hospitality, transforming it into a rational businesses platform In engaging with tourism, instead of considering themselves as pciwerless people coping with global forces (Pieard 2003), they try to and at times sueeessfully turned it on its head Thus, Mai Chau tourist market is constructed by cultural practices, entangled networks of actors and agents embedded in network of ealculalive actions (Fligstein and Dauter 2007) Tourist market weaves villagers into increasingly complex soeio-business networks, linking them with privale/govemment businesses, middlemen, tour guides, local authorities, ethnic neighbor and so on Engaging with the tourist market has had tremendous impact on the villagers' livelihood and ethnic identity Tourism development fits and links with existing economic system (agriculture in particular) and culture (i.e craft making, and hospitality) The global market forces are manipulated into people's life project, increasing livelihood options even for the poor people Tourist market provides the diversifieafion of both farming and non-faming economic activifies which are not contradictory but of mutual support On the other side, tourism helps to reinforce agricultural economy and culture while the agricultural products are used in homestay businesses Besides, the three types of households' strategies points to the difference of capitals accumulation which leads to uneven of livings and economic differenfiafion Anyway, global market tourism per se is not the cause of uneven income dislribufion in the tourist villages since the villagers, by the quality and quantity of labor forces, and ability to transfer the social and cultural capitals to economic capitals can take any opportunity in improving their lives • Engaging with tourism makes villagers realize that, more than diligent, creative thinking in markefing and managing business as well as making a diversified living, is important This means that in contemporary times, villagers have to know how to deal with trade and business; the elderly who used to be a head of the commune cooperafives, I talked to, insisted on this point He said, those who work for homestay can get more money by investing less time and energy than thosze mn farming In not so distant future, those who worked hard would get more; 495 VIET NAM HQC - KY YEU HOI THAO QUOC TE LAN THU TU but at this moment the lazy ones (who have business connections) are able to become richer than the diligent ones (working on agriculture) For that reason, he claims for changing perception of work as seen through dealing with tourism Thus, it is generally acknowledged among the villagers that farming activities is for only households' consumption while engagement in tourism business or any kind of business is for money and prosperity So, manipulating and living with tourism is a new (livelihood) strategy of White Tai in Mai Chau However, tourism has not undermined cultures and local pallems of resource consumption, use, need and management In contrast, drawing on a sustainable culture and natural resources, local people have inlergrated them into the realm of tourism which is shown in developing tourist market, business management and livelihood strategies In addition, tourist market development in Mai Chau helps people utilizing their customs, moralities and habits to develop strategies of living with tourism That is rather than coping with globalization; tourist market of Mai Chau can also be seen as the "localized process" As part of the commodification of hospitality and in a situation of changing social relations between the villagers and outsiders, the villagers have reeonstmeted their identity from being nong dan (peasants) to doanh nhdn (entrepreneurs) They have been able to so by converting their social and cultural capital into economic capital The homestay business founders in Mai Chau were the first to so and were then followed by several villagers who claimed themselves to be entrepreneurs To be entrepreneurs, the villagers have had to organize private businesses in their own ways Firstly, through their experience of changing relations with outsiders, they have transfonned their culture of traditional hospitality (considered a gift) into a saleable commodity or saleable hospitality Secondly, these pioneer homestay hosts have been able to convert their social (polifieal relations) and cultural capital (culture of hospitality) into economic capital, allowing them to invest in constructing homestay businesses and market networks Thirdly, these new business comers have also been able to construct an identity as new entrepreneurs through their ability to spot gaps in the market, interpret and practice their culture, and then create and insert themselves into the appropriate market segment They have since; therefore, had the ability to transform cultural capital into a "business resource" called a "social-ties network" The commodification of culture in the tourist market implies a change in the social stmeture (Miller 1995) that exists between the villagers and outsiders Firstly, among the villagers, this change has led to their social exclusion from business conneefions and have gained access to the market Secondly, in relation to the state 496 COMMODIFICATION OF HOSPITALITY and the Vietnamese tourists, eonslmeting their identity as entrepreneurs in the tourist market has allowed the White Tai people to change their relations with the majority Mai Chau tourism, with its constmefion of White Tai idenfity, has led to the creation of a variety of choices within people's lives, and has freed them from the political economy of social exclusion Specifically, when the villagers are engaged with the market as part of the "cultural economy", no one is excluded from the resources (networks) and business opportunities due to cultural interpretafions and practices, or economic rational thinking Interpreting and practicing culture therefore leads them to engage freely with the market Within the process of the commodification of hospitality, the boundary between gifts and commodities is blurred, for they are not a part of the objeetification process, but reflect the subjectivities of the givers and receivers (Goddard 2000: 147), who conslmet not the meaning of the gift/commodity; but construct "meaningful relationships" (intimate relationships) that go beyond the gift/commodity exchange per se These meaningful relationships can also be perceived as "authentic relations" The authenticity is thus not about the "thing", but rather is about "relations" Such meaningfiil relationships in the long term can be utilized to build market networks, and villagers see these relationships as a priority; providing access to material wealth or money All of the study entrepreneurs cite the building of "soeio-business networks" (which are based on intimate relationships) as the most important factor in developing their businesses Finally, the authentic White Tai is not necessarily the "essential White Tai" in temis of the vernacular language or an ethnic/unique culture, or a cultural commodity to be sold in the marketplace The White Tai have not frozen themselves in a primitive world; hence, we should see them as being part of the contemporary world Explicitly, they have negotiated their "White Tai authenticity" as part of the process of eonslmeting their identity within the tourist market space Thus, the "authentic" White Tai in the realm of the cultural economy can be seen as entrepreneurs who are able to articulate their culture and market and as a result make a living in the contemporary world If they were just simply primitive, they would be nobody in the modem world, so the fact that they have a presence is because they are entrepreneurs The villagers not cage themselves in, in terms of being "authentic White Tai", sitting behind a locked door and taking a primitive perspective 497 VIET NAM HOC - KY YEU HQI THAO QUOC TE LAN THlT TlT Bibliographies Achariya Nate-Chei 2011 Beyond 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process of the commodification of hospitality, the boundary between gifts and commodities... through their ability to spot gaps in the market, interpret and practice their culture, and then create and insert themselves into the appropriate market segment They have since; therefore, had the. .. is rather than coping with globalization; tourist market of Mai Chau can also be seen as the "localized process" As part of the commodification of hospitality and in a situation of changing social