Despite their distance from ancestral homelands, the Tày, Nùng, Mông (Hmong), and Mường groups continue to safeguard cultural rituals, festivals and cuisine that define their identities during spring celebrations.
The Hmong community in Mong Village, Ya Hoi Commune, opens the year with the Gầu Tào (hilltop) Festival, held each January to pray for good weather, family health and prosperity. According to village head Ly Kim Tuyen, the community of 161 households and 748 residents has maintained this tradition for more than 44 years since relocating from Cao Bang Province.
The one-day festival begins with ceremonial rites, including fetching the first water and worshipping village and earth deities. A shaman offers prayers accompanied by chicken, sticky rice, mèn mén, and white liquor before the event shifts into lively folk activities—khèn (reed pipe) performances, antiphonal singing, flute music, bamboo pole dancing, and games such as nem con (cloth-ball throwing) and blindfolded mèn mén eating contests.
Traditional foods remain central to Hmong celebrations. Mèn mén, made from finely ground steamed corn, is served in daily meals and festivals, while the community also prepares “cow horn cakes” with sticky rice, meat and mung bean fillings. Four-color sticky rice and smoked pork further enrich the seasonal table.
In To Tung Commune, once home solely to the indigenous Bahnar people, the arrival of Tày and Nùng families from Cao Bang more than 40 years ago has transformed the cultural landscape. From the first day of Tet, villagers visit elders and host folk games. This year’s Spring Festival, scheduled for 27–28 February, will showcase then singing and the dan tinh (gourd lute), artistic traditions emblematic of the Tày and Nùng.
Nam Cao Village formed a then and dan tinh group in 2020, growing from 13 to nearly 20 members. Group leader Nong Thi Van said the art has become integral to communal life, especially during Tet.
The practice, recognized by UNESCO in 2019 as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, continues to be passed on to younger generations.
The Mường people, among the earliest to celebrate Tet according to their traditional calendar, also bring long-preserved customs to Gia Lai. Hundreds of households resettled in the early 1990s after the Da River reservoir project, establishing villages bearing names from their northern roots such as Da Bac, Hoa Binh, and Pac Bo. Da Bac Village alone now includes 213 households and 1,128 residents.
From the 25th day of the twelfth lunar month, Mường communities enter a festive season featuring xoe dances and gong ensembles, performed by women, while men play drums. A 24-member children’s gong team helps ensure continuity of the tradition.
Culinary heritage is equally cherished. Tay and Nung families prepare banh giay, banh gai, and the elaborate khau nhuc, a pork belly dish cooked with minced meat, wild shiitake mushrooms, mac mat fruit and pickled mustard greens. During Tet, households in Nam Cao, Truong Son and Cao Son Villages regularly serve it with rice or noodles.
Distinctive spices such as mac khen and doi seeds define Northwestern cuisine. In Da Bac Village, Tet dishes include chicken with sour bamboo shoots and doi seeds, and ca do, a steamed freshwater fish marinated with lemongrass, mac khen and giang leaves before being wrapped in banana leaves and cooked until tender.
Across Gia Lai, each spring dish, dance and ritual serves as a bridge to ancestral homelands, reinforcing unity among communities that have built new lives while steadfastly preserving the cultural identity of northern Vietnam’s ethnic groups.