Ngu My Thanh Fishing Village

Before it reaches the sea, water in Hue often passes through wide lagoons. The fishing village of Ngư Mỹ Thạnh sits on one such stretch of water, where sky, water and the lives of fishing families meet.

The village lies in the Quảng Lợi area of Hue. On a map it is one small name among a great many.

Ngư Mỹ Thạnh stands beside the Tam Giang Lagoon, the largest lagoon in Southeast Asia. Here fresh water and salt water meet across a wide, open surface. Families have lived on this water for hundreds of years, from father to son and from son to grandchild. Fishing feeds them, and it also taught them how to read the weather, the tides and the sky. Without anyone saying so, the place tells its own story through the color of the water, the moored boats, and the eyes of old people mending nets in the afternoon.

What sets Ngư Mỹ Thạnh apart from villages on dry land is the floating market at dawn. While mist still hangs over the lagoon, boats begin to gather in the middle of the water. Sellers and buyers trade by calling to one another across the surface. There is the soft knock of oars, the flick of fish in the hold, and a grandmother telling her grandchild to sit still so the boat will not tip. Mornings like this are the breath of the whole village. There are no car horns and no smoke from city streets. There is only mist, water, and the glow of oil lamps on each small boat.

A sleepy child curled in a grandmother's lap, the boat sliding out into the lagoon before the sky is fully light: this is the picture that people who have been there tend to remember longest. People remember it because it is real, not because it looks like a painting. It is real enough that the sound of water against the side of the boat comes through even in the telling.

In the afternoon the Tam Giang Lagoon looks completely different. The water changes color hour by hour, from blue at noon to glowing gold and red as the sun sinks low. The fishing boats return and moor along the village bank. Nets are spread out to dry, and children run barefoot on the dirt shore. Smoke from the cooking fires on the boat homes begins to curl up over the water.

Ngư Mỹ Thạnh has no grand gate and no big signpost. A narrow dirt track follows the shore of the lagoon, and then the water suddenly opens out ahead. That moment, when the view appears before anyone is ready for it, is just as hard to forget.

This is a part of Hue that is rarely named, yet it has kept its spirit the longest. It is not ancient in the way of palaces and royal tombs. It is still alive and still working, and it still wakes in the half dark to go to the floating market, as it did for generations before. At dawn, the lights of the boats still move slowly through the mist.