Festival «Lễ hội gốm Chăm Bàu Trúc» (First Cham Pottery Festival)

   In Bàu Trúc village the potters still work without a wheel: they walk around the piece instead of turning it, and fire it in the open under straw. UNESCO placed the craft on its list of heritage in urgent need of safeguarding — and for the first time the village is holding a festival of its own for it.

   This is the first edition. It runs under provincial plan No. 9379 of 23 July, part of the national programme to protect Cham pottery. The scale is commune-level but extended to neighbouring localities, and it splits into a ritual part and a festive one. The organisers have timed it to Katê, the Cham new year.

   What happens:

   — the rite of opening the Pô Klong Can temple in Bàu Trúc, where the Cham honour the figure who taught them the craft and ask for peace and a good harvest;
   — an exhibition and hands-on sessions in Cham pottery;
   — brocade weaving alongside the women who do it;
   — «One day as a Bàu Trúc potter», a programme for visitors, residents and schoolchildren;
   — virtual-reality tours of the pottery and weaving villages and of local monuments;
   — a food market and a fair of OCOP products.

   Come if you care about craft as practice rather than display. Cham pottery is made the way it was centuries ago, and on these days you can take a place at the work yourself — access you will not get on an ordinary day.

   The opening and closing ceremonies are held on Ninh Phước square, the ritual part in the village itself. Entry is not restricted. The hour-by-hour schedule is announced locally closer to the dates.

   Practical note: this is the former Ninh Thuận, about two and a half hours from Nha Trang by road. The festival coincides with the Cham Katê, so one trip can cover both.

   Three days, a village of potters and a craft UNESCO lists as urgently endangered. If you are in Khánh Hòa in early October, it is worth the drive.