The arduous task of extracting honey from a high place.

In April, the dry, hot sun in Bay Nui doesn't deter the men from climbing the palm trees to collect the sap, which they then use to make the famous, delicious sugar that's renowned far and wide.

Mr. Chau Khan, a resident of An Cu commune, climbs a palm tree to collect sap for making sugar. Photo: THANH CHINH

Visiting the palm tree forest tourist area owned by Mr. Huynh Ba Phuc, looking up, a slender man was climbing a palm tree very quickly. Mr. Ba Phuc said that every day, the Khmer people often come here to climb palm trees to collect sap to make sugar. Every day, twice a day, in the morning and afternoon, Mr. Chau Khan (50 years old), residing in Day Ca Hom hamlet, An Cu commune, regularly climbs palm trees. Mr. Chau Khan said: “After breakfast in the morning, I rest for about an hour, then I carry plastic bottles and climb the trees to harvest palm sap.”

To make climbing easier, locals cut thorny branches and tie them tightly to the palm tree trunks to make ladders. However, Mr. Chau Khan doesn't need a ladder, yet he still climbs nimbly to the top of the tree. Mr. Chau Khan says he climbs more than 50 palm trees every day, but he doesn't get tired at all. Considered a master in the art of climbing palm trees to collect sap, Mr. Chau Khan expressed: "I'm used to climbing! Since I was little, I've followed my father to collect palm sap. Later, I took up this profession to earn money to support my children's education."

After climbing to the top of the palm tree to collect about six bottles of palm sap, Mr. Chau Khan quickly climbed down to the base of the tree and poured each bottle into a plastic container. After a brief conversation with us, he continued climbing the palm tree as swiftly as a squirrel. Seeing his professional climbing skills, I tried to climb the tree myself, but without success. This job is truly difficult and extremely arduous. Producing fragrant palm sugar requires many laborious steps. Those in the palm sap harvesting profession jokingly say, "Eating on the ground and working in the sky," because they are always climbing high trees, and a slight slip could lead to imminent danger.

Under the scorching sun of the Bay Nui region, Mr. Chau Khan's every movement of climbing and cutting the palm flower (palm blossom) is neat and precise. Before cutting the flower, he uses a bamboo clamp to insert into the stem and gently presses it like a "massage" to stimulate the sap to seep out. "After cutting the flower, I attach a plastic bottle and leave it overnight. Each flower yields more than 2 liters of sap," Mr. Chau Khan revealed.

Having dedicated over 30 years to the craft, Mr. Chau Khan's hands and feet are calloused, a testament to his years of hardship. He explains that every step is arduous; extracting the palm sap is difficult, but the sugar-making process is even harder. To ensure the sugar is delicious and doesn't burn, the cook must constantly monitor the fire. When the sap thickens to a reddish-brown color, the cook must use a large bamboo cooking chopstick to stir it evenly around the edge of the pan. "It's exhausting! From the time the palm sap is as thin as water until it thickens, I have to stir it hundreds of times around the edge of the pan," Mr. Chau Khan confided.

Sitting and resting under a nearby palm tree, Mr. Chau Rot, a resident of An Cu commune, proudly recounts his traditional craft, preserved through generations, which provides stable employment and income for many local workers. Mr. Chau Rot shared that he climbs 60 palm trees daily, harvesting 300-400 liters of sap to make sugar. “For every 5 liters of sap, I can make 1 kg of sugar. So, with about 300 VND per liter of sap, I can make 60 kg of sugar per day, selling it at 26,000 VND per kg, earning over 1 million VND per day after deducting all expenses,” Mr. Chau Rot explained.

Every year, the palmyra palm trees yield a bountiful harvest of sap from January to June of the lunar calendar, bringing economic benefits to the local people. During the peak season, even though the price of sugar decreases slightly, the people still earn a considerable income from this profession. Currently, with the Via Ba Chua Xu festival at Sam Mountain underway, many tourists are visiting Bay Nui (Seven Mountains), and palmyra palm sugar is in high demand, making the traditional craft of the Khmer people in the Bay Nui region even more vibrant.

Having observed the process of making palm sugar, Mr. Bá Phúc said that the locals put a lot of effort into it. “For each bottle of sap taken from the tree, the locals have to cut bark from the Sến tree and add it to preserve the fragrance and deliciousness of the sap. When making the sugar, they do it manually, stirring continuously with chopsticks until the sugar thickens, then pour it into molds. After the sugar cools, they take it out and wrap it in fragrant palm leaves,” Mr. Bá Phúc said.

As evening falls, glimpses of people gathering sap can still be seen on the tall palm trees, creating a rustic scene typical of the mountainous region.

THANH CHINH

Source: https://baoangiang.com.vn/nhoc-nhan-lay-nuoc-mat-tren-cao-a482144.html