The 50-year-old man clung firmly to the homemade ladder made of old bamboo tied tightly to the palm trunk. With two strong legs, he reached the top of a tree about 20 metres above the ground. He leaned on a sturdy branch, cut the flower tops and hung the vases below to catch the sweet-tasting liquid, which had a faint fragrance and milky white colour.
Ngoc said that he could collect some 400-500 litres of the jaggery (a mixed sugar liquid that contains molasses), earning over a million dong.
"This is a hot job for men in An Giang Province at this time," he said. "We usually collect the jaggery during the dry season from November to April when the trees are easy to climb and the jaggery has its best quality for producing sugar. I climb some 60 trees twice a day at 8 am and 2 pm."
The man added that although the work brings high income, it is dangerous and hard. "As a boy, I used to follow to help my father to collect the liquid and then I learned to climb the sugar palm trees," he said. "But I haven’t let my sons follow my work as it's too dangerous. Many people have been injured or even died from falling off the trees while collecting sugar."
