Since the Mekong isolated Sainuyabuli from other Laotian provinces with Hmong villages, the warfare during the Laotian Civil War that affected other Hmong villages largely did not affect Sainyabuli. Most Hmong villages in Sainyabuli did not see any fighting. Houaysouy was a Hmong village in Sainyabuli that had no fighting during the Laotian Civil War, and Vang Pao did not recruit any of its men. After the war, Anne Fadiman, author of "The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down", said that the village was "tossed into the political melee along with the rest of the country." The occupying Vietnamese soldiers regarded the residents of the village as traitors and persecuted them. In 1979 around 400 members of the Lee, Vang, Xiong, and Yang clans attempted to escape from the village. The family of Lia Lee, the subject of "The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down", originated from Houaysouy.