A visit to the incense-making village of Hung Yen
The two century old Cao Thon craft village in the northern province of Hung Yen is one of the largest incense-making villages in Vietnam.
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| At the village located about 50km southeast of Hanoi, the days leading up to the Hung Kings Festival are a non-stop work effort to churn out incense sticks for the festivities throughout the country. |
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| Each household in the village can turn out twenty-to-thirty thousand sticks per day, using a time-tested mix of sawdust, cinnamon, sandalwood and sunshine. |
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| Incense sticks must be left to dry for one to three days in the sunshine. |
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| The basic materials for making incense are glue wire that is pulverized, then mixed with herbs such as eucalyptus, galbanum, ginger root, hibiscus, hyssop, iris root and juniper berries. |
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| Little to none of the process of making incense is automated and virtually all the steps must be carried out by hand. |
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| Each stage requires careful attention of the workers. |
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| The last few days before the Hung Kings Festival are bustling with villagers selling all sorts of aromas of incense – cinnamon, black, round, tan beans – to name just a few of the large variety. |
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| There are more than 100 households in the village in the business of making incense. |
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| Many families in the village of Cao Thon have produced incense for three or four generations. |
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(Source: VOV)
