Farmers at Cam Thanh Village used to toil the land and live simply because it has always been their way of life. Today, they still do the same thing, not so much anymore because it’s their means of living, but more so now to entertain the tourists.

Today, a 720-square kilometer rice farm was specifically set up in the village for the purpose of making tourists experience a day in the life of a farmer. And to make the scenario feel authentic, visitors have to wear the traditional conical hat and boots, and actually work in the field for five hours. Tourists have to plough the field with a buffalo, water the plants with water buckets, sow, plant rice, harvest their crops and cook them for lunch. This on-hand experience, even for just a day, makes visitors realize how hard being a farmer is and learn to value and respect the worker and industry itself.

This program was introduced and patterned from a similar tour, that is with vegetables, from the village’s neighbor, Tra Que. Tour guides and farmers themselves find the idea interesting, enjoyable and especially lucrative.  

Since it is usually a first time experience for visitors taking the farming tour, most of them don’t get the job perfectly done. In fact, they can get clumsy and end up messing up the place and themselves. Vietnamese farmers can’t help but laugh at the tourists’ seemingly lack of knowledge at farming, but even the tourists themselves laugh at their own ignorance, and the whole process becomes a fun and memorable yet mind-opening and learning experience.

Residents at Cam Thanh Village were born and grew up in farming. It is their tradition and not just merely means of livelihood, but their way of life as a whole. To be able to do that and earn extra income along the way because of this new tourism development is so much more than they could ever ask or hope for. It is like heaven on farmer-toiled earth.