After the harvest, the rice fields suddenly turned into a vast sea of water rippled by the monsoon. Then suddenly a ghost gun appeared, blooming red, white, pink, purple… like magic.
From October, flood water flooded the fields in the West. Vast fields, water surface adjacent to canals and large rivers. Floating water season, the most unique season of the year has arrived.
Flood water brings shrimp, fish, alluvium to enrich the fields with dozens of species of flowers and wild vegetables, a unique food source only available in the floating season. Going to the West in the floating season is also a tourist specialty. There are tours that focus on introducing cuisine or “traveling flowers” in the floating season.
The special thing is that the flowers and vegetables in the wet season are very beautiful, few or not seen in other places such as crazy flowers, ghost guns, golden eardrums…
Wildflowers grow wild in the canals, along the fields, abundant in the flood season. People harvesting wild flowers often row their canoes to pick them by hand or use the canoes to beat on the tops or branches so that the flowers fall onto the boats and then collect them. Dandelion cotton is used to cook sour soup, stir-fry copper shrimp or mix a very delicious salad.
Farmers often calculate and harvest rice before the flood comes. After the harvest, the rice fields suddenly turned into a vast sea of water rippled by the monsoon. Then suddenly a ghost gun appeared, spreading all over the water, blooming red, white, pink, purple… like magic.
Called ghost gun because this water lily grows naturally, in the “germ” season follows the water or hides in the soil from the previous season, then emerges, spreads, and blooms most beautifully at the peak of the flood.
In recent years, in some places, clusters of purple water lilies like Thai cotton have bloomed, with thick petals. There are places where farmers gather Thai guns to grow in canals or corners of their fields, both harvesting and selling as vegetables and welcoming tourists to visit and enjoy delicious dishes in the field.
Young lingfish are best near the top of the flood, deep fried or cooked in hot pot, they can be eaten whole, with soft bones; When it’s a little bigger, it’s crispy fried with young lotus leaves and fried copper shrimp with crazy cotton. Young lotus leaves are also rolled with trumpet worms, plucked leaves before eating, put deep-fried Linh fish in the middle of the leaves, add a spoon of fried copper shrimp with crazy flowers, with some basil leaves and pickles, roll it up and dip it in sour tamarind fish sauce. sweet, delicious, delicious!
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Every season when the water is high, our group of friends often go to Moc Hoa district (Long An) to walk in the lotus and gun fields.
We followed the garden girls rowing canoes to pick ghost guns in the water and bring them to the market to sell. Stems and water lily used to cook sour soup, mix salads or stir-fry shrimp are also very delicious.
It is hard to describe the beauty of the water lily in the flood season. Dawn and the sun rise is also the time when the water lilies gradually open their wings and bloom when the sun rises and shines brightly.
My favorite thing is to go with the farmers to row the three-leaf canoe to pick flowers, take pictures, learn how to make flowers, and bunch them into big bundles. Ghost water lily blooms beautifully in the early morning, regarding 10 o’clock begins to close its wings.
Farmers grow lotus for seeds alternating between rice crops or long-term cultivation, every six months. Each lotus field in Dong Thap Muoi is usually tens of hectares wide. The lotus plant is very useful: Flowers in vases beautify the house; Lotus seeds, lotus roots, lotus roots, lotus leaves, and lotus hearts are used as food, medicine, and tea.
And yet, the lotus field floating season is also a film studio, a photo studio for photographers and tourists – a product of the unique beauty of the fragrant flowers of the field.
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Another unique specialty of Dong Thap Muoi is ghost rice, also known as heavenly rice, which grows naturally and thrives in the flood season. No matter where the water level rises, the ghost rice grows there, the vitality and vigor of this rice variety is extraordinary.
Farmers often hunt for ghost rice and wait for harvest following the flood season. Ghost rice cooked rice is a bit hard but quite delicious. In recent years, farmers and LTG Agricultural Group have started cultivating ghost rice, also known as floating season rice, Nang Tay Dum variety, large area in Long An, on the one hand to preserve precious indigenous rice varieties. rare, on the other hand produces a unique specialty rice.
We mightn’t believe our eyes when we saw the 2.5 m tall ghost rice tree, as strong as a reed, rising high above the water on the day of the flood. Nature, survival, powerful genes passed down from generation to generation of ghost rice, plus the diligence of farmers, knowledge of Vietnamese scientists, have created ghost rice fields with a yield of 2 tons/ha. a special meal on the dining table of each family. There is also a story associated with the history of reclaiming and opening the land of our ancestors, the life and style of the beloved Southwest region.
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Different from the past, the flood season is considered as the “suffering season” of farmers in the West, causing flooding and difficult life. Nowadays, floods do not come back or come back less, it is really suffering, which means that there is a lack of shrimp, fish upstream, flowers and wild vegetables in the flood season, the land is not cleaned and deposited with alluvium following the best crops.
Importantly, the floating season in the West is also a tourist season, a unique destination for those who are interested and look forward to experiencing and fully enjoying the beauty of a beautiful, peaceful land and gentle people. , simple and friendly.
