Why am I showing this embroidery depicting ‘The Secret War’ in Laos in the 1970s? Remarkably, because it’s was made on the other side of the world by Hmong tribesmen in French Guiana.
Why am I showing this embroidery depicting ‘The Secret War’ in Laos in the 1970s? Remarkably, because it’s was made on the other side of the world by Hmong tribesmen in French Guiana.
They arrived as refugees in September 1977. For years they’d been supporting the French and the Americans in a dirty war in the SE Asian jungle. By 1977, it was all over and the Hmong were on the run. France agred to take around 2,000 refugees and settle them in its colony on the ‘Wild Coast’. Today, they’re a highly successful farming community, supplying almost all of French Guiana’s fruit and vegetables.
It’s been a struggle. As one Hmong told me, ‘Sure, we had a bit of help from the French whites, the Fabkis Dawb. We never knew how much the African Guyanais disliked us. They called us ‘le péril jaune’, and thought we were Chinese (who weren’t popular in 1977). They still don’t trust us, les Guyanais. Personally, I don’t really understand it. They refuse to cultivate their own land, and have never fought for France. We lost 400,000 people fighting the communists.’
You can read more about the maroons in my book, Wild Coast
