Currently, the custom of eating betel nut of the Muong people is no longer common, leaving only a few elderly people in the Muong areas who still hold betel nut sticky rice. However, betel nut still plays an important role in cultural life; in all rituals in the life of Muong people.
Muong people have a tradition of betel chewing perhaps for a long time, because betel nut has gone into the place of worship. Like Kinh people, Muong people also take "betel nut is the beginning of the story". Whenever they met, they invited each other to eat betel nut and then talk. Previously most women and girls dyed betel teeth and many men were addicted to betel. Girls and boys who grow up around 14 or 15 years old begin to dye their teeth and eat betel nut. The type of betel nut that Muong people like is the betel nut tree, which is big, thick and fragrant. The second kind of betel nut is betel nut. Betel leaf leaves smaller and not as delicious as betel nut. These two varieties of betel are planted but when the winter, the salt fog on the leaves of betel leaves falls out, the betel nut addicts must resort to the betel grass, growing wild in the forest. This betel nut is not spicy, not as fragrant as betel nut, but they have to be used temporarily in the winter.
The things that Muong people eat with betel nut are areca, lime, then bark, or betel leaf and tobacco and waterpipe tobacco. Once upon a time, every woman and girl had a betel nut bag, which was a cloth bag, sewn into a gizzard shape or a round-bottomed tube on the mouth stitched to thread the strings, tied and tied at the waist whenever they went. Old people who have broken their teeth must eat betel nut. The betel bowl is made of cow's shin bone, the bottom of the leg is about 7-8cm tall. Someone even wrapped silver around the mouth of the mortar. Chay betel pounding usually with a small piece of copper or iron, there are three ranks outside the first to pound. Later, often people made mortar to pound betel. Limestone is usually made of ceramic, which Muong people cannot do but must buy from Kinh people who bring it from the plains to sell. If you can't buy it, people store it with bamboo. The poor often pack tobacco with leaves in a towel while the rich and the nobility put tobacco and lime in a silver snail, a snail that is both for jewelry and a snail. put it on the belt, take that to make. Because the Muong people have the saying "Thul tlù pang pang, size-sized handkerchief, funny pau khau" means "betel nut bag next to, areca front, comedy (slipper) behind.
Betel nut has entered the cultural life of Muong people deeply. Betel nut is present in all rituals in the life of Muong people. At the offering of a ritual, people are always invited to drink betel nut water first, then to invite rice and wine. And especially in the wedding ceremony, betel nut is an important indispensable gift. Betel nut is also good news. Whenever anyone is offered betel nut and betel nut, they immediately know that the house with their younger sister and granddaughter is about to be exported. Thereby, the relatives also know to prepare gifts for the next wedding. Those congratulatory goods have things that need to be prepared for a long time, such as wine. In solemn reception parties, Muong girls are often the ones who invite betel nut to invite water. They have a really lyrical song to invite betel.
Although Muong people have known to eat betel nut so long, they hardly know betel nut. Betel pieces are wiped with lime in the middle of the leaf, folded in parallel, along the sides of the leaf curled up and embedded in the center of the leaf. Normally, the women had betel nut betel the night before, when everything was done in the day, they sat down to drink betel nut water and talked after a hard working day, so they prepared betel nut for the whole day. after. In the morning, they start the day again with a piece of betel nut to red lips, fragrant mouth.
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