The proto-Indochinese populations, also called the “Montagnards of Indochina,” were the first inhabitants of the area we now know as Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. In the distant past, these powerful, independent ethnic groups lived isolated in their villages, protected from the outside world by high mountains and impenetrable jungles.

The Katu ethnic group in Laos mainly inhabit the Xekong Province along the Upper Xekong River. Part of the “Katuic” ethnolinguistic group, these populations usually live at a distance from the modern world, in mountainous districts, glades, jungle copses, or small villages along a water source.

Upper Xekong is located in southern Laos, in an Annamese cordillera occidental meander constituted of rugged landscape, long southward oriented mountain ridges, profound valleys, impetuous rivers, uninhabitable forests and mythical groves: a wild land forming a natural obstacle to the world uncertain influences.

Become acquainted with the legendary Raglaï tribe, a matriarchal ethnic group located in the provinces of Khanh Hoa, Binh Thuân and Ninh Thuân on Vietnam’s south-central coast. Also known as Rac Laï, Orang Glaï, or Roglaï, the approximately 110,000 Raglaï are Austronesian and speak a language that belongs to Malayo-Polynesian language family.