At the Skyline Hotel, there are a few staff that take turns doing different shifts in the day. The ladies bring their child with them to work sometimes. And I try to talk to the children, in whatever simple Vietnamese that I am able to speak.

Me: Toi la Helen (pointing at myself, then pointing at the child)

Mother: Gong Chai!

So this lovely child’s name is Gong Chai. He was doing his homework. A leftie, I see, and I was a leftie at his age too.

I went in and out of the hotel often, and the second time I saw him, his mother brought him lunch. It was rice in a tin box, with small pieces of meat. Judging from the color, the meat was cooked in soy. It was certainly not the heavenly morsels that I get at the Vietnamese restaurants, but it was good, simple, humble and motherly.

At that moment, I thought of my grandma and her food. Perhaps in an effort to tame the emotions that were welling within me, I pulled out another Vietnamese word that I gathered over the years. In the most dramatic, theatrical manner, I delivered the one word that suited the occasion, “ngon!!” (Delicious!)

The child looked at me like “huh” but her mother laughed. She was probably thinking, “why is she trying so hard?”

In the evening, around 8 or 9, I took my New Yorker and sat at the table outside to read a bit before bed. The lady was off duty then, about to get home. She was on the motorbike, and the child was seated at the back. I saw her carrying two big bags of soda cans with her.

Her shift was probably as long as half a day. At this hotel, the child encounters all sorts of foreigners, and this can be a part of his early education. He’d be quite accustomed to the idea that people look different, speak different languages, dress quite nicely, and some would be kind to him.

They didn’t see me, so I didn’t get to say goodbye. I watched them leave quietly, a mother with her precious child at the back on the motorbike, with two bags of soda cans hanging on the side, almost as tall as the child. They slowly disappeared into the lull of the night.

Seeing this, I said to myself, “that’s telling.”

I wondered about hope. What this last sight of the lady and her son suggests to me is that she would do what she could to earn just a few more bucks, for the sake of her child’s future. She has a proper job at the hotel already, but in her capacity as a hotel staff she comes across the opportunity for a minuscule more. And why not? The dignity that she has exhibited is in the fact that she allows her child to grow up having realistic views of the world, being exposed to the enormous gap between those who have plenty and those who don’t. Maybe he will be inspired to be more than his humble mother. Whether he becomes successful or not, he will appreciate the young days when he saw his mother hard at work, and taking the extra opportunity to provide for him. For he is her hope.

Surely, in the times that I have visited Vietnam, I always could see that the country has hope. At least in the urban areas, what I could observe is that the Vietnamese people are way beyond mere survival in their standard of living. Phu Quoc, being primarily a tourist location, bustles with the dynamics that sets the tone between those foreigners who spend money for fun and those locals that earn the same money for a chance to do more with life.

In this dynamics, the foreigners’ expectation of “what I am supposed to get with this much money” are the terms that govern the relationship. Having joined a couple of island tours in Phu Quoc, I must say that the Vietnamese people are very adept at handling challenging situations. I would not say that they are professional, for there are many scenes of chaos, and in so many ways things aren’t communicated adequately because of the language issue. But my experience has been that “no one is left behind,” even for me, this one lone fish in an ocean’s worth of tourists in the tours. When they see that someone awaits to be taken care of, they simply find the solution. They do not do so out of a sense of professionalism. They do so out of a sense of responsibility that likely comes from old-fashioned family values and socialist school education.

Hope is expressed in the way that people handle life and business, how they hustle for more and always strive to meet expectations. I seem to be able to see a common spirit behind the way that they manage their operations. They work in the belief that “with hard work I will get better in life.” They solicit opportunities with the mindset that “I am willing to do more for you tomorrow.” And that is how their hope is shown, in embracing the value of hard work. They do not question the expectation that has been shown to them. When the tourist demands something, they take it as a given that it is the standard to meet. Then they do what they have to do to satisfy the same. No attitude, no complaints, no arguments.

As you can see, I am roundly impressed by what I saw in Phu Quoc, beyond the beauty of its natural endowments. The airport certainly lived up to its notoriety for being wildly inefficient, but if you would tolerate just this one bit of extreme inconvenience, Phu Quoc is a wonderful alternative to other beach towns in Southeast Asia.

I was waiting for the driver to pick me up at the Dinh Cau Temple. In the open area outside the Dinh Cau Temple, I saw some snack vendors and I was curious. Besides that they were apparently sweet snacks, I had no idea what they were. I decided to get one.

This is the fifth time that I visit Vietnam and by now I have learned the names of my favorite foods, so I can order with ease. Other than that, I do not have much Vietnamese besides “hi” and “thank you.” But whenever I learn some new words I am quite eager to put it to use. So at that little street vendor, I asked, “how much?” in Vietnamese:

Me (pointing at snack): bao nhieu? (how much)

The vendor looked at me and I noticed he paused for a distinct moment, seemingly thinking.

Vendor: muoi lam nghin (15,000).

Only at that moment did I realize what silliness this is. I could ask “how much” but whatever the answer, I wasn’t going to understand. I have no Vietnamese numbers in my system.

So I proceeded to show him my phone on the calculator mode, and he ignored my gesture. He simply took out 15K and showed me how much it was (wasn’t this how it was always done before the phone age?)

I then figured, when I said “how much” in Vietnamese, his pause was likley that he was thinking, “OK, this lady clearly doesn’t speak Vietnamese, so do I reply in Vietnamese or just show her the money.” He took a leap of faith with me and said the price in Vietnamese.

And I failed to impress, obviously.

More Vietnamese Learning at Ice Cream

After this sweet treat, I went to another vendor, who was selling ice cream.  Her ice cream comes with one cone and two scoops. I was intrigued by the tropical flavors. So I pointed at durian and mango.

My intention must have been lost in the shuffles of eager business objective and inadequate customer service. She handed me a cone with two scoops and before I could stop her, she gave me another cone with two more scoops. She had to have understood that I meant one scoop of mango and one scoop of durian in one cone, but she gave me two cones of one flavor each.

She saw the surprise on my face, but I gladly took over two cones and joked with the American man, who was approaching with curiosity, that the ice cream is so good that having two cones is a good idea. The lady gave me an extra cone (without ice cream) as a way to show that she was “sorry” about the “misunderstanding.” I gladly took over that cone as well.

That evening, I took out my Duolingo and started learning Vietnamese. I must know enough in the language to order my ice cream right.

Being an island, Phu Quoc’s economy was heavily dependent on fishing before the people realized that the pristine waters by the creamy beaches bore enormous potential for tourism. Besides fishing, Phu Quoc was known for agriculture and pearl culture as well. I managed to visit all such representative ventures in one day.

The occasion was a visit to the Starfish Beach off of the fishing village of Rach Vem. It lies on the very northern side of the island. Such a trip required hiring a driver for a full day. I figured that, since I had the driver with me, I should visit all other sites of interests. I wanted to see the black pepper farm that shows the process of farming and drying (not the one in the urban area, which really is only for tourists to purchase black pepper). The driver suggested seeing pearl jewelry, I said yes to that. And finally, I wanted to visit the Din Cau Temple close to the Cho Dem Phu Quoc Market (the Night Market).  As I said, I did not visit the night market itself.

The Phu Quoc Pepper Farm

The Phu Quoc Pepper Farm is a family-owned business, three generations in the running. The grandfather opened his first farm close to where the current farm is.  The first chapter of this family business began 50 years ago. The father, who I will meet, would begin his operation at this current location 35 years ago.

A familiar pungency greets my senses and surely it is the distinctive fragrance of pepper. The diffusion of peppery fragrance in the air excited me. Black pepper is critical in any cuisine of the world but certainly it is the chief muse of zest in Vietnamese cooking.

I went into the farm and a lady immediately greeted me and the party before me. Having understood that I did not speak the same language as the previous group, the lady took up that last group and I was left standing there, not quite knowing what to do.

I immersed in the rustic scenery in the pepper farm. Right next to the family’s home lies the patch for pepper drying. The black peppercorns have been sorted in a single layer and dried in open air under generous daylight. Needless to say, that the farm is not only about pepper trees. The pineapple bush, papaya and banana trees being pregnant with nascent fruits, seemed to be singing a prelude to the summer season of fruition.

It was properly wintertime even in Phu Quoc, but maybe there wasn’t much a difference in this tropical haven. For about 15 minutes or so I felt strangely at home in a foreign land. I live in a village in Hong Kong and we have papaya trees in our garden too.

The Tour at the Hai Duong Pepper Farm

By this day in Phu Quoc, I came to see how the island’s people, in whatever variety of capacities that they are in, have a savviness that well positions the economy for tourism. Soon enough, an older man, smiling ear to ear, approached me and took me around the farm. He spoke no English, but he had his phone ready to translate what he was saying to me.

I realized quickly that this is the father of the current farm, the boss himself. His savviness is in that he knows which parts of his farms are points of interest.  He knows which spots are instagram worthy for tourists. He showed me where an auntie was harvesting peppercorns from the lush pepper trees. He was a bit surprised that I was keener to photograph the farm and the lady harvesting — more so than taking selfies. It seems to me that he is going through the usual course of business as he understood tourist expectations. He asked me frequently for my phone to snap photos of me.

He isn’t accustomed to taking the heritage tourist that I am around his farm. I had a million questions, as I was genuinely interested how the business is run, and the way that he grows pepper. But he was very intent on taking instagram pictures for me. I was keener to take pictures of him in this farm, and he was clearly surprised to have to serve as a model for my pictures.

He probably told me just one or two things about the farm. One thing was that the auntie picks only the mature peppercorns before putting them in the big basket. I wanted to ask him how he could judge whether the fruits are mature, but I couldn’t get the question through.

Before leaving, he took me into their farmhouse and cut up a fresh papaya for a snack. Even though we did not manage to chat very much, I left feeling the warmth of hospitality that is typical of Vietnam.

Pepper Growing

The pepper tree is a perennial vine. At Hai Duong Pepper Farm, they were in a lush shade and bushy. But the fruits were few when I visited. The people of Phu Quoc harvest their pepper during December and March of the lunar calendar. The pepper there is harvested by hand.

Pepper typically grows in tropical climates. It needs a lot of water to bear fruits, so much so that both heavy rainfall and humidity are a must for them to flourish. They are accustomed to hot weather too, in the range of 20 and 30 degrees Celsius.

The Hai Duong Pepper Farm engages in natural farming. For fertilizers, they mix the remains from fish sauce making with cow manure to turn up a black mass of natural fertilizer. This process takes a whole lot of effort, because they must manually remove the heavy salt content from the fish before it can be turned into fertilizers. They apply the fertilizer by digging a big hole about 60cm from the trunks of the trees and burying the fertilizer there.

It takes 3-5 days to dry pepper in open air. The berries (peppercorns) will change color during drying.

Bring Home the Pepper!

And finally, I arrived at the products counter and considered the goodies to bring home. There were white pepper, black pepper and red pepper on sale. I then understood that red pepper is a special crop at this pepper farm. I have never seen red pepper before, and so I decided to bring that home because it’s uncommon.

After getting home, I blended those red peppercorns with white peppercorns, and the resulting mix of pepper (powder) was very good for steaks. I also used whole peppercorns in my braised beef ribs. When I happened to taste the whole red peppercorn, I knew the difference between black and red pepper and it is readily distinguishable. Red pepper has a very strong character. It is a lot bolder, more punchy — even if the heat is on the same level as black pepper.

The address of Hai Duong Pepper Farm is Hamlet 4, Cua Can, Phu Quoc, Kien Giang, Viet Nam.

Sources

Tour at the Hai Duong Pepper Farm.

The official website of the Hai Duong Pepper Farm.