In June 1990, Christopher Hutton and Grant Evans visited Nei Ku Chau detention center in Hei Ling Chau island, Hong Kong. They were going to visit a group called Nung, assuming that this group would speak a Tai dialect. In fact, these Nung were not Tai-speaking. In the course of two days they spent there, they discovered that most of them spoke a Southern Chinese-like dialect with a resemblance to the Southern Yue dialects of Chinese, which these people referred to as Ngai, they also termed themselves Nung or Nung people as a group. Some members of the group spoke both Ngai and another language called San Diu/San Y/Xanh Y. It appeared that speakers of San Diu/San Y were in the progress of assimilating into the Ngai. These "Chinese Nung" were in general either born in Quang Ninh province, in northeast Vietnam, or the children of parents born in North Vietnam or China who had gone south after 1954. They had been denied refugee status, though they claimed family links to the South Vietnam army.
It's worth stressing that Hutton presented a case of a detainee by the name of Mr V. as an illustration for the difficult situation that these Chinese Nung were facing to at that time. Mr V. was born in 1929 of newly migrated parents, in Tien Yen, Quang Ninh province. His parents came from Fengcheng in Guangdong (now Guangxi) province, involving in domestic paper manufacturing. He served in French army and went south in 1954 along with 50,000 Chinese Nung from Mong Cai. Subsequently, he fought in South Vietnamese army until getting wounded, then continued to serve as a driver. After 1975 his family lived in Dong Nai province, and was subjected to discrimination. They came to Hong Kong in 1989, via China; Mr V. and his family crossed the border at Mong Cai, retracing the journey his parents had made in the late 1920s. In spite of his military service, Mr V. was denied refugee status. At the same time, he could not be sent back to Vietnam since being regarded by its government as a non-national. He held the Republic of China (Taiwanese) papers, but these papers did not grant the right of abode in Taiwan.
Of 17 'Nung' detainees that Hutton and Grant Evan interviewed, only two characterized themselves as Chinese. Fifteen described themselves as Nung, and of those fifteen, nine saw themselves as Chinese Nung, or as both Nung and Chinese. Several made the explicit statement that Nung was a form of Chineseness. Only one used the term Ngai as an ethnic designation. In 1954, their family had come south from Hai Ninh autonomous territory, and had lived in Saigon, Song Mao, or in Xuan Loc.
In order to understand the historical origin of this Chinese Nung group, it's important to emphasize that Vaillant, a French doctor, in 1920 mentioned the Hakka migration to the area of Mong Cai in 1828 and 1832, and then from 1864-1866. These Hakka arrivals displaced an early Chinese migrant tribe, the "Outong". In French scholarly literature, the Chinese ethno-linguistic categories of Hakka and Cantonese were intertwined in complex ways with Nung, Ngai, and so forth. The category of
baahkwá (Pạc Và in Vietnamese) also appears frequently. Georges Maspero (1929), emphasized the linguistic continuity between the Chinese of northeastern Vietnam and China when describing the presence of Hakka and Cantonese villages near Mong Cai. However, André Haudricourt (1960) gave a range of categories for ethnic Chinese groups in Mong Cai on a continuum from Cantonese to Hakka: Cantonese Nung, San Chi, Ngai, San Gieu (San Diu), Maalao, Hakka. Nung and San Chi were grouped under Cantonese, whereas Ngai and San Gieu (San Diu) were categorized as kinds Hakka. The article ended with the postulation that San Diu was a product of Yao switching to Hakka, and Hakka were the products of sub-stratum influence from Thai (Tai) and Yao respectively.
In 1978, Vietnamese government survey reported that 54 main ethnic groups were identified; the Hoa or ethnic Chinese were listed as the 4th largest group, the Nung as seventh, and the Ngai as eleventh. While this survey did not give population figures, this ranking of the Ngai suggested a population of at least 120,000. In this list, the Nung were classified as a Tai group. the Hoa and the Ngai were listed separately, though they were both categorized (along with the San Diu) as speakers of Han languages. It's worth mentioning that in an official report on the population of different ethnic groups in 2009, the Ngai were numbered only 1,035, declining drastically from a population of 4,841 in the year of 1999.
In a book titled
The Nung Ethic and Autonomous Territory of Hai Ninh-Vietnam (2008:42), a document focuses merely on the area of Mong Cai (Autonomous Territory of Hai Ninh) and its main population—the Chinese Nung, it is reported that the 'Nung' constituted 72% Hai Ninh’s population. They were made up from 4 principal tribes, namely Tsin Lau, Ngai, San Diu and Hakka. Additionally, without any citation, it gives a short description of the origin of the Tai-speaking people in this area who are referred to under the name of "Thai" and "Tho". These two ethonyms were once designated to the present-day Tay and Nung. The description goes as follows:
The Thai came from Yunnan. They gradually pushed the Tsin Lau and the Ngai to the coastal areas. There were many bloody battles at the confluence of Tien Yen River and Pho Cu (Cau Cai) River where thousands of people were killed. The Tsin Lau suffered heavy losses, so they allied themselves with the Ngais, a more populous tribe, to fight against the Thai. Unable to get accustomed to life in the seaside region, the Thai moved back to inland areas upon reaching the coast, leaving a number of their relics at some villages with Thai names such as Na Sin, Na Pac of Mon cay District, and Na Pa of Dam Ha District.
Unlike the Thai, the Tho came later from the GuangTsi region. They fought each other when the Thai found their ways to move inland. At last, the Thai flocked into the valleys of rivers Tien Yen and Pho Cu. As time passed, the Thai and the Tho were living together, presently in Dinh Lap in particular. Traditions and habits mingled, and they were all considered Tho, including the Binh Lieu area with villages of Thai immigrants.
Although, there is no merit in this book, but it provides a hint of a long presence of the Tai speakers who are now classified as Nung and Tay in the Mong Cai area.
