The unique cultural features of the Cham people of Bac Binh

Located in the northern part of the province, Bac Binh is a land with mountains, hills, sea, and desert, but its dominant feature is the rice paddy plain. More than 40,000 Cham people have lived here for generations, including Cham Muslims (Bani) and Cham Brahmanists.

Bac Binh is a land with mountains, hills, and the sea, but its dominant feature is the rice paddy plain.

The Cham villages in Bac Binh are characterized by their rural charm and coastal flavor, primarily focusing on rice cultivation, vegetable farming, pottery making, and offshore fishing. Continuing their traditional customs, the Cham people in Bac Binh still make household pottery—jars, vases, and even statues of deities—all by hand, without any tools, unlike the Vietnamese method of using a potter's wheel. The pottery is fired using wood and straw, not in traditional kilns like in other regions.

The Cham people in Bac Binh still make household pottery: jars, vases, bottles, and even statues of gods, all with their bare hands.

Tourists admire pottery making in Beiping.

Along with pottery making, rice cultivation, and hillside farming, the refined culinary traditions of the Cham people here, embodied in their unique fermented fish sauces such as steamed fish sauce and fermented fish paste, are truly remarkable. Not to mention many other dishes like grilled fish and fish soup, also invented by the Cham to enrich their daily meals. Bac Binh, with its landmarks like Phan Ri Thanh, Phan Ri Cua, Cho Lau, and Song Luy, exudes a rich and savory atmosphere with its famous seafood specialties, most notably fish sauce and dried seafood.

Sticky rice cakes (Bánh tét) and ginger cakes (Bánh gừng) are indispensable treats during holidays.

Every year, the Cham people in Binh Thuan province celebrate traditional customs and festivals that attract both domestic and international tourists . The social life of the Cham in Binh Thuan still retains unique characteristics, reflecting their distinct cultural identity such as: gentleness, respect for promises, loyalty, honesty, a sense of hierarchy and order, and especially a strong tradition of learning.

During the month of April in the Cham calendar, Cham Muslims often celebrate the Ramuwan festival.

Anyone visiting Bac Binh is impressed by the vast stretches of bright red and golden sand dunes in Phan Ri and Tuy Phong… This is also the unique feature of the natural heritage of this region. During the fourth month of the Cham calendar, the Cham Muslims often hold the Ramuwan festival, similar to the Thanh Minh tomb sweeping ceremony of the Vietnamese. The Cham tomb sweeping ceremony truly creates a magical scene as hundreds of people, old and young, men and women, dressed in colorful and solemn attire, gather at the cemetery to worship and pray. Ramuwan, along with the Katê festival of the Cham Brahman people, has become a national cultural heritage.

The Katê festival of the Cham Brahman people.

Bac Binh is a place where many unique aspects of Cham culture from the delta and coastal regions converge. It is no coincidence that Bac Binh has become a prosperous district economically , with a thriving cultural tourism industry centered around the Cham cultural heritage, showcasing invaluable artifacts dating back several hundred years of the Cham people's formation and development. The Cham community has been closely associated with Binh Thuan province for centuries, and together with other ethnic groups in the region, has contributed many valuable legacies to the culture of the province in particular and Vietnam in general. Preserving and promoting the cultural values of the Cham people in the process of building an advanced Vietnamese culture rich in national identity is a crucial requirement, always receiving special attention from the Party committees and authorities at all levels in the province.

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