The Boutique
The hotel reception houses a boutique with a choice of local handicrafts: indigenous fabric, silk, T shirts, semi-precious gems, jewels and some standard consumption goods.
Ratanakiri's Handicraft
Clothes
The Khmers Loeu no longer wear traditional clothes but it is still possible to find loincloths, sampots, jackets and blankets in the villages, in the shops of Banlung and, of course, in the Terres Rouges boutique.
Bags Basket
This is the first thing you notice because it is carried by the minorities that you see walking in the streets in single file, pipe in mouth and basket on the back (women’s are of course always more heavily laden).
The shape, the size, the colours and the quality of the basketwork depend on the tribe and the skill of the craftsman.
The Gourds
Gourds or ‘klogs’ are small containers sometimes engraved with ethnic motifs, or scenes of daily life ; the stoppers are made witth rolled up leaves.
Other Artefacts
You can purchase small pipes, earrings made of ivory (more and more difficult to find) bracelets, machetes, crossbows, ancient gongs used in ceremonies, earthenware jars used to make rice wine and funeral totems.
Warning : it is strictly forbidden to steal statues in the forest, even if the cemetery seems to be abandoned. For the mountaineers also « dust must return to dust » and the statues are there to accompany the dead. Stealing a statue means interrupting the cycle and the soul of the departed will forever between the world of the living and that of the dead. You will be able to buy replicas in Banlung.
