Amid the noise of the city located in a small alley at No 180 Pham Phu Thu in District 6, HCM City, workers in the last grass broom village in the city are chopping grass with knives on wooden cutting boards. 

Elderly people say that broom grass production appeared in HCM City in the early 1960s. The first workers were from the central region who migrated to HCM City to settle down. They gathered in groups around Binh Tien Market on Pham Phu Thu and Pham Van Chi streets. 

Pham Van Trung, 55, who has been making brooms since he was 8 years old, said in the past, there were only ponds and swampy fields, and people earned their living by cutting rau muong (a kind of vegetable) to sell at the market. Later, some people tried to make grass brooms for sale. 

As the products sold well, many people learned the craft, creating a crowded village.

In its golden days, the craft village once had thousands of households making and selling grass brooms. There were so many workers that the small alley had little vacant room. 

“Households had to install frames and wires to plait the brooms. Finished products were piled up everywhere,” he explained.

There were few machines in the village. All the stages of making brooms were done manually by experienced workers.

The main material was a grass with the scientific name ‘Thysanolaena latifolia’. To make a broom, workers went through various stages that required high skills.

It was hard job and even affected workers’ health. They directly contacted thick dust from the material, and their hands were cut or sometimes stabbed by wires.

A broom now sells for VND20,000-40,000. In recent years, the HCM City craft village has to compete fiercely with products made in the central region and imports from China.

Hard work, low income and stiff competition have prompted many workers to leave. The once prosperous craft village has shrunk, and there are only 5-10 households still following the traditional careers handed down generation after generation.

Trang Duc Anh, 52, who has been working there for more than 40 years, said he feels sad because the craft village has become deserted, and young people nowadays don’t want to continue the career.

“I still plait brooms because I have to preserve the traditional craft. However, no one wants to keep the career anymore. When we die, this traditional career will fade away,” he said.

“Young people turn their back on this, because the work is hard, while the income is modest. Even my children and grandchildren don’t want to follow the career. The youngest in our craft village is just over 50 years old,” he said.

Tran Thanh Hoang, a worker, said he once trained several young workers, but the workers left the village and shifted to another business.

Pham Van Trung, who began making grass brooms at the age of 8, stopped working and sought another job. He has returned recently to the village to continue the family’s traditional career, as his financial conditions are better and there is no need to worry about his livelihood.

Like Trung, Huynh Thi Kim Thanh and her husband also vowed to preserve the career but Thanh believes the disappearance of the career is inevitable.

“With the job, we don’t have income from the beginning to the end of the year. We can only sell products and earn money on pre-Tet days,” she said.

“On rainy days, the work is slow. On ordinary days, we work at a moderate level. Some of us make brooms for export, but the export volume is modest,” she added.

Ha Nguyen